SOME CONSIDERATIONS ABOUT IT OUTSOURCING PROCESS

IT outsourcing is the practice of contracting out the running of a part of an organization computer department. It is not a new phenomenon, but the scale and scope of its occurrence has greatly increased over the last decade. Due to the fact that IT outsourcing has no obviously and quantifiable benefits, most of the business entities choose not to do outsource their IT. The paper is based on the idea of incapability of exact determination of IT services costs. The purpose of this research regards the layout of the current approaches to outsourcing, description of different types of IT outsourcing and their advantages and the analysis of some models which might be used in order to facilitate the IT decision making process.Outsourcing, Information Technology, Information Systems, Application Services Provider, IT Risks

COLLABORATIVE PORTAL MODEL FOR INTERCULTURAL TEAMS KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT

In the multinational organizations, more groups of individuals are being involved in the process of knowledge creation in a collaborative manner, of sharing knowledge and learning from it. These individuals can have heterogeneous cultures and they must use a common language. IT has created and is developing the infrastructure for cross-cultural communications and intercultural knowledge management. Nowadays, intercultural knowledge management can be realized with support of Collaborative Technologies and Knowledge Management Support Systems (KMSS). In this respect Collaborative Technologies and Intercultural Knowledge Management Support Systems (IKMSS) will be the appropriate way for supporting intercultural communication, learning and collaborative knowledge management in organizations. In this paper we present a conceptual model of a collaborative portal for Intercultural Team Knowledge Management as a powerful support for increasing team’s performance.: collaborative support, collaboration, knowledge management, intercultural teams, intercultural knowledge management, intercultural knowledge management portal

Study on the Support Systems for Corporate Governance

The problems generated by the information asymmetry within the agency relationships at corporation level, governments and capital markets led to a higher necessity for corporate governance (CG). The information system of corporate governance is a very complex one, which involves a series of actors, decision-making and transactional processes, technologies, procedures and good practice codes. In order to ensure the efficiency and efficacy of corporate governance as a premise for increasing company’s performance and position consolidation for the company on the capital market, it is necessary to analyze the way information technology could contribute to this undertaking. The purpose of this study is to analyze the architecture of the corporate governance systems and to identify and classify the systems and technologies involved in ensuring CG support in order to underlie the basis for developing a conceptual model for a hybrid and collaborative support system for corporate governance.Corporate Governance, Support Systems, Information Technology, Decision-Making, Performance

Unified Approach in the DSS Development Process

The structure of today's decision support environment become very complex due to new generation of Business Intelligence applications and technologies like Data Warehouse, OLAP (On Line Analytical Processing) and Data Mining. In this respect DSS development process are not simple and needs an adequate methodology or framework able to manage different tools and platforms to achieve manager's requirements. The DSS development process must be view like a unified and iterative set of activities and operations. The new techniques based on Unified Process (UP) methodology and UML (Unified Modeling Language) it seems to be appropriate for DSS development using prototyping and RAD (Rapid Application Development) techniques. In this paper we present a conceptual framework for development and integrate Decision Support Systems using Unified Process Methodology and UML.Decision Support Systems, Unified Process, UML, Prototyping, DSS Tools

Risks and Audit Objectives for IT Outsourcing

In the recent years, as a result of globalization, internet and IT progress, the outsourcing of IT services has seen an exponential growth. As a result more and more companies decide to outsource, partially or totally, their IT services. Nevertheless, the outsourcing process exposes both clients and service providers to a series of risks that can seriously affect their activities. Managing these risks by improving the quality and efficiency of internal control has made the ITO audit a necessary component for all the companies involved in this process. The goal of this paper is to identify analyze and map the influence areas of ITO risks in order to suggest a series of objectives for ITO audit.Information Technology, Outsourcing, Audit, Risks, Service Provider

SOME CONSIDERATIONS ABOUT IT OUTSOURCING PROCESS

IT outsourcing is the practice of contracting out the running of a part of an organization computer department. It is not a new phenomenon, but the scale and scope of its occurrence has greatly increased over the last decade. Due to the fact that IT outsourcing has no obviously and quantifiable benefits, most of the business entities choose not to do outsource their IT. The paper is based on the idea of incapability of exact determination of IT services costs. The purpose of this research regards the layout of the current approaches to outsourcing, description of different types of IT outsourcing and their advantages and the analysis of some models which might be used in order to facilitate the IT decision making process

Integrated Approach Model of Risk, Control and Auditing of Accounting Information Systems

The use of IT in the financial and accounting processes is growing fast and this leads to an increase in the research and professional concerns about the risks, control and audit of Ac-counting Information Systems (AIS). In this context, the risk and control of AIS approach is a central component of processes for IT audit, financial audit and IT Governance. Recent studies in the literature on the concepts of risk, control and auditing of AIS outline two approaches: (1) a professional approach in which we can fit ISA, COBIT, IT Risk, COSO and SOX, and (2) a research oriented approach in which we emphasize research on continuous auditing and fraud using information technology. Starting from the limits of existing approaches, our study is aimed to developing and testing an Integrated Approach Model of Risk, Control and Auditing of AIS on three cycles of business processes: purchases cycle, sales cycle and cash cycle in order to improve the efficiency of IT Governance, as well as ensuring integrity, reality, accuracy and availability of financial statements

Is Cognitive Reserve a Determinant of Functional and Mental Health in Older People of the Sardinian Blue Zone? A Mediational Approach

The main purpose of this study was to examine the mediating role of cognitive reserve in the relationship between functional health (expressed through the amount and intensity of performed physical activity objectively assessed using wearable accelerometers) and psychological well-being (i.e., assessed in terms of self-reported depressive signs) of older people living in an area of exceptional longevity, the so-called Sardinian Blue Zone. A further goal was to investigate the impact of gender on the cognitive reserve and physical health of our participants, using global cognitive functioning as a covariate. A battery of tests assessing motor efficiency, cognitive reserve, global cognitive functioning, and self-reported depressive symptoms was individually presented to 120 community dwellers (Mage = 82 years, SD=8.4 years) of the Sardinian Blue Zone. Significant associations were found between cognitive reserve, motor efficiency, and self-reported depressive signs. Moreover, three mediation analyses documented that distinct indexes of cognitive reserve and motor efficiency explain 27.2-31% of the variance in the self-reported depression condition. Following this, it was also found that people with scarce cognitive reserve tended to exhibit significant signs of depression and showed worse motor abilities. In addition, after controlling for the effect of global cognitive functioning, motor efficiency, and cognitive reserve were generally more preserved in males than in females. Overall, these findings suggest that cognitive reserve is a compensatory resource that contributes significantly to the enhancement of health-related quality of life in the last decades of life

Cognitive Reserve, Physical Reserve, and Cognitive Efficiency of Older People Living in the Sardinian Blue Zone. An Exploratory Study

This study mainly intended to disentangle the role played by physical reserve as a mediator of the relationship between cognitive reserve and global cognitive functioning in older people aging well. A sample of 120 67-101-year-old community-dwellers was recruited in the Sardinian Blue Zone, an area characterized by the extreme longevity of its inhabitants. Each respondent completed a battery of tests examining cognitive functioning, perceived physical health, cognitive reserve, and physical reserve (objectively assessed through accelerometric-derived measures). Significant associations were found among measures of cognitive reserve, physical reserve, perceived physical health, and cognition. Besides, two mediational analyses pointed out that physical reserve and distinct indexes of cognitive reserve explained 18% and 32% of the variance associated with global cognitive functioning. In conclusion, the combination of high cognitive reserve and more preserved motor functioning seems to contribute to the maintenance of healthy cognition in older people aging well