Do the Different IT-Related Activities Require Different Capabilities? The Relationship Between IT Tasks, Educational Skills and Training Provision

This paper enquires into the relationship between the activities that IT professionals engage in and the educational skills and training provision that is provided to the IT workforce. To this effect, the paper on the one hand examines the degree of complexity and firm-specificity associated with the different types of tasks performed by IT professionals, whereas on the other hand it examines the educational skills and the amount of training that IT professionals need in order to perform such tasks. We test our hypotheses in the context of IT professionals in the IT Services Sector and the Retail & Wholesale sector. The paper holds implications for the IS literature, as well as IS practice in general, as it will help to better understand the optimal allocation of IT skills and investments in IT training, according the types of activities that IT professionals engage in

The building blocks of a cloud strategy:evidence from three SaaS providers

Before looking to enter a cloud-based market, weigh industry characteristics and one's own stock of design capital

Influencing Environmentally Sustainable Consumer Choice through Information Transparency

A number of studies have argued that recent technological and informational affordances have enabled a greater degree of transparency, which can in turn guide consumer behavior towards more sustainable patterns of consumption. This paper examines whether sustainability attribute information influences sustainable product choice. Our hypotheses are driven by construal level theory and tested through a stated choice experiment in the context of a self-developed online grocery store. Our results show that the mere disclosure of sustainability information does not influence consumers to choose a sustainable product. Rather, the effect of sustainability information on sustainable product choice depends on the sustainability attributes provided. We discuss the contributions of our study to the literature and the implications for practitioners

The Value of Competing in Virtual Communities: Use and Exchange Value Creation in Online Auctioning

In this paper, we set out to examine how individual and organizational benefits are created in virtual communities characterized by competitive relationships. Drawing insights from value theory, we argue that individual benefits arise from the use value/satisfaction that users gain from their participation in such communities, whereas organizational benefits are derived from the aggregate monetary value that is created through competition among users, also understood as exchange value. Moreover, we hypothesize that the ways in which users compete and the level of rivalry among users influence the aforementioned types of value creation. We test our hypotheses in the context of a self-developed mobile application that serves as an auctioning platform for hotel rooms. A preliminary analysis grants initial support to our hypotheses. Our research contributes to the relevant literature by highlighting the diverse benefits that competitive relationships can bring and paves the way for further research on alternative community models

If Erring is Human, is System Use Divine?:Omission Errors During Post-Adoptive System Use

Our study contributes to the research on human error during IS use by studying the antecedents of the omission errors that occur during routine instances of computerized work. While attention lapses have been identified as the main mechanism leading to omission errors, we still know little about how such lapses come about during post-adoptive system use. To address this limitation, we draw our theoretical insights from theories of attention and prospective memory to illustrate how the different forms of system use carry the potential to explain patterns of human error. Accordingly, we distinguish between two forms of use history that can consist of features that are either related or unrelated to the execution of a focal task and examine their effects on the frequency of omission errors. We also examine the interaction effects of task variation on the aforementioned relationship. Our hypotheses are tested by analyzing log data associated with the use of a newly introduced mobile application in the context of a sailing sports event. Our results indicate that restricting one's system use on related task features reduces omission errors, whereas a use history based on unrelated task features produces the opposite effects. Further, task diversity positively moderates the relationship between a use history of unrelated features and omission errors, but has no significant moderating effect on the relationship between a use history of related features and omission errors. Our findings hold a number of implications for the literature on human error, and these are discussed alongside with the implications of our study for practitioners and system design

Influencing Sustainable Consumption through Persuasive Agent Design

Although a favorable disposition towards sustainable consumption has been gaining momentum, it fails to materialize into action. This study illustrates how IS design can influence sustainable consumption through the inclusion of persuasive agents. Building on Fogg’s behavioral model for persuasive technology design, we designed a persuasive shopping agent that differentially ‘nudges’ users to purchase sustainable products according to their motivational level towards sustainable consumption. Specifically, we designed a ‘spark’ shopping agent that motivates cynical consumers by highlighting the benefits and corresponding risks of sustainable consumption, and a ‘signal’ shopping agent that simply reminds the caring and sustainable consumers of the availability of sustainable product options. Through a between-subject experiment, we confirm the effectiveness of both agents, although our study finds that users already active in sustainable consumption are not affected by persuasive agent design. Our findings have significant contributions and implications for both research and practice around Green IS design

Influencing Environmentally Sustainable Consumer Choice through Information Transparency

A number of studies have argued that recent technological and informational affordances have enabled a greater degree of transparency, which can in turn guide consumer behavior towards more sustainable patterns of consumption. This paper examines whether sustainability attribute information influences sustainable product choice. Our hypotheses are driven by construal level theory and tested through a stated choice experiment in the context of a self-developed online grocery store. Our results show that the mere disclosure of sustainability information does not influence consumers to choose a sustainable product. Rather, the effect of sustainability information on sustainable product choice depends on the sustainability attributes provided. We discuss the contributions of our study to the literature and the implications for practitioners

Manipulative imputations in a distributed decision support setting:the effects of information asymmetry and information aggregation complexity

According to earlier research, distributed decision support structures are susceptible to deception. We complement the existing works by analyzing group members' attempts to manipulate group decisions supported by distributed communications. Experimentally, we manipulated two systemic features of a distributed support structure: the members' information asymmetry and decision rule complexity. Both of these features refer to structural properties of aggregated information exchange. We confirmed several hypothesized effects: An increase in the information asymmetry in the aggregation of information increases the incidence of the members' manipulative tendency. It also increases the effectiveness of the members' manipulative imputations. However, the complexity of a decision rule negatively moderates both of these effects. We point out the theoretical relevance and managerial implications of our findings. We conclude that managing team members' information asymmetry and complexity of issues under their practical consideration may result in valuable disclosures

Multifarious Roles and Conflicts on an Inter-Organizational Green IS

Under increasing pressure to demonstrate environmental responsibility, organizations realize that they cannot claim to be environmentally sustainable if their supply chains are not. This research seeks to understand how an interorganizational green IS influences environmental sustainability (ES) initiatives within organizations in a supply chain. We examine a green IS taking the form of an interorganizational ES platform. Our analysis gives insight into how role conflicts arising from the various roles played by the platform users compromise the nature of actions associated with platform beliefs. In particular, cooptition conflict arising from participants’ roles as supplier to the platform owner and competitor to other platform participants explains the symbolic organizational content contribution, whereas the professional conflict resulting from participants’ roles as employee of an organization and knowledge peer to participants from other organizations explains the substantive personal content contribution. The lack of organizational substantive content creates content paucity, which platform users respond to by developing off-platform relationships with content contributors. The personal ES knowledge acquired through platform content consumption and the relationships with content contributors help individuals advocate for ES initiatives within their organizations. Our research is among the first to consider green IS at an interorganizational level and the corresponding multilevel perspective of the green IS users as they are at once organizational and individual actors