Motivating CIO Advice Networking to Improve Firm Performance

Prior research has examined factors that motivate executives in general to seek advice from external peers. The literature is silent however regarding what IT governance mechanisms motivate CIOs to mindfully seek advice in their external advice networks. Our research shows that simply applying the advice of the prior literature in the CIO and IT governance context can be counterproductive. We analyze data from a survey of 99 municipal corporations to show that an effective configuration of IT governance mechanisms fits and changes over time with the firm’s financial performance and state of IT enactment. The lessons learned are instructive for practitioners, while also highlighting the importance of attending to context in IT governance research

Developments in Practice XXVI: Social Networks: Knowledge Management\u27s Killer App ?

The networks of communication and interpersonal relationships that develop naturally within an organization form channels for the flow of organizational knowledge and can also promote organizational learning. These informal social networks are significant mechanisms for both innovation and change management. However, until recently, very little has been done to try to facilitate or leverage social networks to take advantage of what they can do to deliver organizational value. Today, pressures on modern business to continually innovate and the increasing capability of information technologies to enable broader and more far-flung communication are driving organizations to look for ways to leverage social networks to improve business performance. Social networking concepts combined with a group of new and powerful interactive technologies, known collectively as peer-to-peer (P2P) computing, have the potential to profoundly change how companies work and deliver value. The effective harmonization of knowledge management with P2P technologies could therefore be the killer app that makes executives realize the importance of knowledge management (KM) to their organizations. However, their contribution to this partnership in the future will largely be dependent on knowledge managers\u27 ability to demonstrate their skill at leveraging and facilitating social networks today. This paper combines the ideas and experiences of a group of practicing knowledge managers with research from the academic literature on social networks to create an overview of the issues and practices that are critical to facilitating the development of social networks and understanding their value in organizations. It examines the different types of social networks currently operating in organizations and the value of these networks to the enterprise and then looks at ways of developing and facilitating social networks in organizations. Finally, it examines the strategic potential of networks in organizations and how KM might help realize this value

Organising for Effective Academic Entrepreneurship

The contribution has three parts. In the first part the concept of academic entrepreneurship is explained, defined and put into the context of the entrepreneurial university. In the second part four cases are described: - (1) The Nikos case at the University of Twente: In Nikos teaching, research and spin-off activities are combined into one research institute. - (2) The NICENT case at the University of Ulster: NICENT is set up under the Science and Enterprise Centre activities in the UK. It focuses on education and training of students (undergraduates, graduates and post-graduates) and the stimulation of academic entrepreneurship in the academic constituency. - (3) The S-CIO case at Saxion Universities for Applied Sciences: In 2004 Saxion set up this Centre to have a one-stop shop for all entrepreneurial activities at the University. - (4) The Chair in Technological Entrepreneurship at Tshwane University: The focus of the Chair is on education of (under)graduate students in (technological) entrepreneurship and on the stimulation of entrepreneurship in the wider community. Each case has its own specific angle on academic entrepreneurship and in the thrid part the four cases are compared and analysed according to the model presented in the first part. Finally, some conclusions are formulated regarding the organisation of effective academic entrepreneurship

ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks: a literature review

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementation is a complex and vibrant process, one that involves a combination of technological and organizational interactions. Often an ERP implementation project is the single largest IT project that an organization has ever launched and requires a mutual fit of system and organization. Also the concept of an ERP implementation supporting business processes across many different departments is not a generic, rigid and uniform concept and depends on variety of factors. As a result, the issues addressing the ERP implementation process have been one of the major concerns in industry. Therefore ERP implementation receives attention from practitioners and scholars and both, business as well as academic literature is abundant and not always very conclusive or coherent. However, research on ERP systems so far has been mainly focused on diffusion, use and impact issues. Less attention has been given to the methods used during the configuration and the implementation of ERP systems, even though they are commonly used in practice, they still remain largely unexplored and undocumented in Information Systems research. So, the academic relevance of this research is the contribution to the existing body of scientific knowledge. An annotated brief literature review is done in order to evaluate the current state of the existing academic literature. The purpose is to present a systematic overview of relevant ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks as a desire for achieving a better taxonomy of ERP implementation methodologies. This paper is useful to researchers who are interested in ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks. Results will serve as an input for a classification of the existing ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks. Also, this paper aims also at the professional ERP community involved in the process of ERP implementation by promoting a better understanding of ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks, its variety and history

A Half Century Post Title Vii: Still Seeking Pathways for Women to Organizational Leadership

Perhaps the most important of the many 50th anniversaries marked in 2014 is the passage of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII). Although Title VII and accompanying legislation and judicial rulings have made significant headway in improving the work environment for women, pathways for women to positions of leadership in organizations are still generally elusive. Our studies suggest additional challenges for women with dependents. In light of the overwhelming evidence that leadership opportunities are effectively denied to a large number of female citizens, it is time to reinterpret Title VII in a way to help remedy this type of discrimination. We thus advocate three proposals for reform. First, recognizing that quotas would be difficult to implement in the United States, we argue that in cases alleging gender discrimination, courts consider the paucity of women in leadership positions as a rebuttable presumption of discrimination – as a logical extension to the disparate impact analysis firmly established in precedent. Second, we implore the SEC to define diversity, in reports already required of public companies, to include gender diversity. Finally, we urge firms to improve programs for mentoring and networking to provide true opportunities across cultural backgrounds to break the logjam in the pathway for women seeking upward mobility.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/111742/1/1278_Schipani.pd

How collaborative innovation and co-creation can deliver value: a stakeholder approach

This project explores how collaborative innovation and co-creation between stakeholders can deliver value for firms. In today’s increasingly competitive and fast-changing global marketplace, firms must seek to develop more frequent and higher quality innovations (Ngugi et al, 2010). In addition, customers, employees and other stakeholders are demanding opportunities to co-create and collaborate with businesses more and more. As Ramaswamy (2010) comments: “Providers of products and services are challenged by customers who are increasingly informed, connected, networked and empowered. Customers, employees and stakeholders are demanding higher quality interactions and experiences from businesses and a deeper engagement in the value-creation and service delivery processes” (Ramaswamy, 2010, pp. 22). Given this increasing need to collaborate, innovate and co-create, firms need a better understanding of how they can engage in these activities in a way that maximises the value created for all stakeholders; this project, through exploratory, qualitative research interviews and a wide-ranging literature review, seeks to make a contribution in this area

The GET Immersion Experience: A New Model for Leveraging the Synergies between Industry and Academia

This article describes a new and innovative open co-op program for MIS/IS students. The program, Global Enterprise Technology Immersion Experience (GET IE), has a global enterprise focus that is integrated with hands-on experiential work-based learning to provide a context in which students are stimulated to utilize their classroom knowledge. The program includes a two-semester internship component that can be seamlessly incorporated with an existing MIS curriculum. The internship\u27s unique pedagogical innovation is to deliver academic coursework on global enterprise technology to the students just in time—that is, while they are participating in an extended internship. The program, in effect, creates a domain-specific, next generation co-op program that complements traditional information systems curricula with a skillset that is required for creating and running very large global enterprise applications. The guiding GET consortium consists of four universities and a number of large companies, and the consortium is open to future expansion. The continued growth of the consortium would enrich student choices and foster cross-fertilization of curriculum activities

Analysis of computer services industry

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/96905/1/MBA_KhuranaW_2000Final.pd