The Effect of Power on the Adoption of Interorganizational Information Systems: The Adoption Position Model

The adoption and implementation of interorganizational information systems (IOS) heavily depend upon the trading partner(s) of the focal organization. Power structures have been shown to have a positive effect on the adoption decision. The paper provides a critical literature review on the role of power in the IOS literature and introduces the Adoption Position model to address the shortcomings. The main argument is that power can act as a barrier to adoption as well, which has not been adequately addressed before. The model builds on previous research on IOS adoption and proposes that the relative power of a firm and its intent of adoption toward a specific IOS together predetermine its position in the decision. The result is a typology of adoption positions of two trading partners that serves as an explanatory and predictive tool for further research and hypothesis generation

Factors Affecting Adoption of B2E E-Business Systems: A Case of the Australian Higher Education Industry

In recent years, there has been a surge in the number of organizations wanting to embrace IT systems that support the notion of business-to-employee (B2E) e-business. Trade magazines are now filled with many short essays and case reports highlighting the benefits of B2E ebusiness systems. However, little is reported in the scholarly academic literature about the adoption of B2E e-business systems. Thus, it is not clearly known what factors facilitate the decision of large organizations to adopt these systems. Given the fact that higher educational institutions maintain a large workforce, it is important to determine the conditions that affect their decisions to adopt B2E systems. This study reports on the employee portal adoption experience of two large Australian universities and identifies the key factors that influenced their decisions to adopt these systems. The implications of the findings are also discussed

The determinants of electronic voting adoption: Independent National Electoral Commission of Nigeria employees' perspective

The trend in the technological development has made the use of information technology and supporting devices mandatory in virtually all aspects of life. Yet the development of an Information system can be rejected by users due to several factors, that can be costly if left unsolved. This study investigates the determinant factors that can influence the successful adoption of electronic voting technology in the organisational context using the managerial and operational staff of the electoral commission for the data collection thorough a survey study. Based on previous studies on adoption of technology, four key determinants factors or variables i.e. Technological Readiness, Organisational Readiness, Environmental Factors, and Perceived Benefits were identified from theories of Diffusion of Innovations, Technology-Organisation-Environment framework, and Iacovou et al. (1995) model to develop a model of organisational adoption of electronic voting technology. Past studies in the area of technology adoption have equally identified other important factors that can influence adoption of technology such as user participation in system development and ICT training and Skills. The study extend the model with these two factors and tested for mediation and indirect effects in the model relationships using ICT training and Skills being a critical factors in the success of any information technology adoption, especially in the developing countries such as Nigeria as shown from previous studies. The proposed model consists of eleven hypothesized structural relationships-direct and indirect. A total of 500 questionnaires was distributed for this study between the two major categories, i.e. Managerial and operational staff. A Partial Least Structural Equation Modelling method of analysis was use to investigate the causal, mediating and moderating relationships between the latent variables. The results showed that all the determinants factors positively influence the electronic voting technology adoption success. Based on the results obtained, a model of information technology adoption known as E-voting adoption is proposed. The theoretical and practical implications were finally discussed, while necessary suggestions on future research were recommende

Modeling and Analysis of Complex Technology Adoption Decisions: An Investigation in the Domain of Mobile ICT

Mobile information and communication technologies (ICT) promise to significantly transform enterprises, their business processes and services, improve employee productivity, effectiveness, and efficiency, and create new competitive advantages and business agility. Despite the plethora of potential benefits, however, widespread enterprise adoption of mobile ICT has not been as extensive as initially anticipated. Drawing on the extant information systems, technology management, and organizational innovation literature, this dissertation investigates the salient drivers and inhibitors of emerging ICT adoption, in general, and mobile ICT in particular, and develops an integrative ICT adoption decision framework. From this synthesis we identify four broad elements that influence an enterprise s decision to adopt mobile ICT: (1) business value, (2) costs and economics, (3) strategic alignment, and (4) enterprise readiness. The latter decision element has received only little theoretical and practical attention. In order to fill this gap, this dissertation explored the concept of enterprise readiness in further detail and identified eight key dimensions and their associated assessment indicators. Using a two-stage expert study and experimental design approach, we empirically validated these dimensions and determined their relative importance. Results indicated that leadership readiness followed by technology, data and information, and resource readiness, contributed the most to enterprise readiness for mobile ICT. The results are implemented into a web-based readiness diagnostic tool (RDT) that enables decision makers to assess an enterprise s readiness for mobile ICT. The benefits of the RDT are multifold: first, it navigates the decision maker through the complex readiness assessment space; second, it identifies potential organizational deficiencies and provides a means to assess potential sources of risks associated with the adoption and implementation of mobile ICT; and third, it enables decision makers to benchmark their level of readiness against other organizations. The dissertation concludes by highlighting both theoretical and practical implications for emerging and mobile ICT adoption management and suggesting directions for future research.Ph.D.Committee Chair: Rouse, William; Committee Member: Cross, Steve; Committee Member: Cummins, Michael; Committee Member: DeMillo, Richard; Committee Member: Vengazhiyil, Rosha

Standards Battles for Complex Systems: Empirical Research on the Home Network

Home networks combine components and technologies from the consumer electronics industry, the information technology industry, the telecommunications industry, and the home automation industry. Irrespective of the fact that the home network has been technically possible for many years, it has not become a practical reality. A major reason is the lack of generally accepted common standards. In this dissertation we develop a framework with which we can explain and predict which standard will have the highest chance of achieving dominance. We applied the framework to several standards battles and it appeared that it can be used to explain these standards battles better, when compared to existing frameworks in the literature. We applied a multi-attribute utility approach to standard selection and provide a first indication of weights for factors. Also, we have studied two factors in depth: the diversity in the network of actors that support a standard; and the flexibility of the standard. We provide a first indication that these variables influence standard dominance positively and reinforce each other

The Business of Modularity and the Modularity of Business

Matthijs Wolters was born on June 4 1972 in Dronten, the Netherlands. He studied Econometrics at the University of Groningen, with a specialization in Operations Research and Statistics. During his study he was involved in a number of research investigations, varying from forecasting the outcome of tennis matches to a viewers inquiry for a popularscientific television program. He graduated in 1996 on a thesis that dealt with the development and testing of algorithms and heuristics for efficient orderpicking in warehouses. Since October 1996 he has been working at the Erasmus University Rotterdam as a Ph.D. candidate on modularity, mass-customization, dynamic networking and ICT. His research was published in several newspapers, books and journals and he presented his work at international conferences. He also supervised a number of graduation students with their master's project. In 1998 he organized an international conference "Electronic Commerce: Crossing Boundaries". Recently, he has started his own company Ludens Research and Consultancy in which he continues his work on customer-oriented organizing and modularity.This thesis deals with the concept of modularity, which is used in many different fields of research and applications. The objective of this dissertation is to investigate how and to what extent business networks can use modularity to become more customer-responsive and flexible. For this purpose, a theoretical framework on modularity has been developed, which focuses on three dimensions of doing business: designing products, business processes and supply chains. The central proposition is that a concurrent, modular design in these three dimensions increases the performance of inter-organizational business networks in general and a mass-customization strategy in particular. This proposition was validated in a number of empirical settings. First, the applicability of a business modeling approach, called Modular Network Design, was validated in the air cargo industry. Second, it was investigated how the Dutch building industry applies modularity in order to mass-customize newly built houses. Third, a survey was held among numerous customizing organizations, dispersed all over the world, which led to more understanding about the relationship between business modularity and organizational performance