The 2018 Iraqi federal elections: a population in transition?

On 12 May 2018, Iraqis went to the polls to vote for their next parliament, prime minister and cabinet. The elections delivered a surprise, with Muqtada al-Sadr’s Saairun Coalition winning the most seats of any bloc, although not enough to form a government alone. The results also carried a number of clear messages about the state of Iraqi politics, not least the low turnout and the decision of many Iraqis to boycott the elections, reflecting a general malaise and disillusion with the current political leadership and bloated bureaucracy. The revelations of electoral fraud and the very low turnout (of 44.5 percent) indicate that it will be difficult for the political class to overcome its reputation for maintaining the status quo – and for the citizenry to accept it. This report is the second in a series of three produced by the Institute of Regional and International Studies (IRIS) as the outcome of a project examining the mobilisation strategies and results of the 2018 Iraqi elections. This project forms part of the Conflict Research Programme, funded by the UK Department for International Development

Assessing the Impact of Organizational Internet and Email Monitoring Policy on Australian Employees

Monitoring of Internet and email usage within the organisation aims to maintain workers’ productivity, minimise time inefficiency and misuse of resources. Whilst moderate monitoring may control resource efficiency, excessive monitoring may lead to declines in organizational effectiveness and breaches of business ethics. This research will focus on assessing the impact of organizational Internet and email monitoring on employees’ job satisfaction and productivity. Results identified that employees’ perception of Internet and email usage restrictions significantly impacts their satisfaction and perceived productivity. Consequently, findings contribute to a greater understanding of the impact of monitoring thus enabling optimum monitoring to be implemented within the workplace

Business Analytics (BA) - powered transformation for environmental and social sustainability in organisations: A dynamic capabilities perspective

The impetus to address issues of global warming, pollution, and social inclusiveness continues to grow, forcing organisations to focus on their environmental and social sustainability. The sustainability imperative has a direct impact on how organisations operate and define their competitive advantage, this study will provide insights into the BA-powered capabilities leveraged by organisations to achieve their sustainability goals. Previous studies have explored the role of big data analytics capabilities in strengthening dynamic capabilities (DC), and the positive relationship between DC, environmental, social, and economic sustainability, yet have neglected to analyze the BA-powered capabilities that transform organisations for sustainability. This study examines how BA can facilitate the development of socio-technical capabilities to enable organisations to adapt, reconfigure and transform their internal processes to achieve sustainability and understand capabilities required to (i) unlock sustainability-related insights from analytics, and (ii) transform insights into value-creating activities that help attain sustainability goals within organisations

Exploration–Exploitation: How business analytics powers organisational ambidexterity for environmental sustainability

Simultaneous exploration and exploitation (i.e., exploration–exploitation) can help a firm address short-term environmental requirements and ensure long-term environmental viability. Exploration–exploitation, however, challenges organisational practices because they compete for resources and time. While business analytics (BA) offers the potential to overcome these challenges, research to date offers very limited insights into how BA capabilities interact with ambidextrous capabilities to realise environmental value. We address this issue by conducting a comparative case study at a bank and at a real-estate trust through the theoretical lens of dynamic capabilities. We develop a process model to explain how BA powers ambidextrous practices to achieve sustainability outcomes over time. We uncover two mechanisms: a BA-powered context shaping mechanism by which BA powers contextual ambidexterity at the employee level using data availability, timeliness, and analytics culture; and a BA-powered resource linking mechanism by which BA powers structural ambidexterity at intra- and inter-organisational levels using holistic insights and analytics leadership. Our model highlights the contextual factors that condition the extent to which a firm moves along the continuum of exploration–exploitation. We also define a new dimension of sustainability outcomes which we label eco-awareness to explain how BA shapes employees' environmental alertness and enables the paradigm shift in an organisation's sustainability mindset

The Use of Gamification to Increase Engagement and Other Intrinsic Factors with Work Integrated Learning Participants During New Hire Onboarding: An Organisational Case Study

Gamification is a developing approach to increase factors such as engagement, collaboration and motivation amongst learners. With the growing popularity of gamified learning experiences and shifting workplace demographics, the current study aims to shed light on the use of gamification by work integrated learning (WIL) participants within an organisational context. Previous studies have highlighted mixed levels of success when applying gamification techniques to educational settings and have often neglected the development of a conceptual framework to aid successful implementation of this. The current study will critically examine the use of gamification within new hire onboarding and utilise self-determination theory in the design of a gamified mobile application to facilitate this. Findings will add to the body of knowledge and extend practical understanding of the specific gamification features to promote effective outcomes in terms of user engagement and increased motivation in the new hire context

The Negative Aspects of Email and Productivity: Towards Quantification

Email has evolved as the most widely used information system in organisations. Many organisations are now dependent on the use of email to manage internal communication as well as other communication and business processes. With this emergence of the universal use of email have emerged some negative aspects of email usage which have a negative impact on personal and organisational productivity. It is now necessary to recognise these negative impacts of email so that structures may be put in place to minimise and control them and related impacts on productivity. In an approach to quantify the negative impact of email this paper identifies negative aspects of email usage and proposes a model which may be used to quantify each aspect and, in turn, quantify the impact of these aspects on productivity. This approach would allow the confirmation of negative issues of email usage and allow formulation of approaches for their management

Development of Information Systems Project Portfolio Management Capabilities: A Case Study on an Australian Bank

Project Portfolio Management (PPM) has emerged as an effective technique to manoeuvre and align projects and programs with business strategy. Strategic alignment empowers the Information Systems (IS) function and Information Technology (IT) enabled initiatives to support business development. To this end, organisations are using more IS projects and programs to enable them to compete. The literature identifies Information Systems Project Portfolio Management (IS PPM) capabilities but lacks empirical research on how these develop. This research seeks to address this gap by investigating how capabilities develop over time. This case study research adopts the Dynamic Capabilities theoretical lens to validate capabilities against existing research. It retrospectively analyses how these developed over time and examines how other portfolios may be able to embrace and ‘learn’ such capabilities. This study focuses on a portfolio of IS projects within a major Australian banking and financial institution. This study explores the top-down and bottom-up approach in building capabilities over time.

CC\u27s for the CIO (Core Competencies for the Chief Information Officer)

The role of the modern-day Chief Information Officer (CIO) is multi-faceted, dynamic, inherently pressured and complex, and one which requires a multidisciplinary knowledge and skill-set. As the executive charged with the responsibility of managing the fast changing and complex Information Systems (IS) and Information Technology (IT) function, the modern-day CIO must possess and continually develop a wide range of diverse competencies. Today’s CIO is required to take a much broader role in the business, drive business transformation, innovate for competitive advantage and act as a key strategic partner within the wider organisation. This study reports preliminary findings from 30 Australian CIOs on the identification of core competencies and is part of a larger body of work leading to the development of a CIO Competency Framework - for use by both practitioners and researchers to help bridge the gap between practice and theory and aid in CIO succession planning

Sustaining Digital Transformation: The imperative to innovate continuously in the Australian financial services sector

Established organisations in all industries face significant competition from digital disruptors. This is particularly prevalent in financial services, where nimble IT-based start-ups that focus on implementing financial service innovations (FinTechs) pose significant challenges for established organisations. Executives have identified the ability to respond through digital transformation (DT) as a top priority. However, there is a lack of understanding of the specific sub-capabilities required to continuously adapt and how these capabilities can be embedded. This paper presents research in progress on DT as a continuous process in the Australian financial services sector. Specifically, it aims to identify the landscape of key factors that affect the ability of organisations in the Australian Financial Services sector to continually adapt . A preliminary analysis of 19 semi-structured interviews with DT leaders reveals 15 sub-capabilities that support sustained DT

Moving Toward the Next Generation of Graduate Degree Programs in Information Systems

The curriculum recommendations for master’s level degree programs in Information Systems (most recently, MSIS 2006) have served the IS community well and formed a strong foundation on which many departments have built their graduate programs. Changes in technology, the way in which IS/IT solutions are procured and provided, and the need to raise the profile of master’s programs in IS, however, have created a need to review the master’s level model curriculum. This article builds on recent discussion on this topic within the IS community and is intended to move the conversation regarding the curriculum revision forward. Through three program exemplars and integrative discussion, the article identifies and addresses key questions related to the curriculum revision and provides guidance for any department that is currently in the process of modifying its degree program