Information Systems at Northrop Grumman Ship Systems Sector: The Hurricane Katrina Recovery

On August 29th, 2005, Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast causing massive damage throughout Louisiana and Mississippi. Northrop Grumman\u27s Ship Systems sector\u27s facilities in New Orleans, Louisiana and Pascagoula, and Gulfport, Mississippi as well as most of the firms 20,000 employees located in the Gulf were directly impacted by the storm. One data center was destroyed and a second put out of commission for several days. Employees\u27 homes were destroyed and those surviving the storm and their families scattered to safe harbors in neighboring states. Some would never return. Communication to and within the impacted areas was severely disrupted, and the near complete failure of other elements of public infrastructure further delayed the recovery and increased the chaos and suffering. This case looks at Katrina as a very real example of a business continuity disruption that far exceeded the assumptions built into the business continuity plan. It illustrates the essential role that public communication infrastructure plays in disasters such as these, and the risks associated with assuming that communication systems and other public infrastructure will be available in times of cataclysmic failure. The case also demonstrates the unique nature of leadership in a crisis, the problems of pulling together and providing resources to a work force necessary to respond to a crisis, and the unique problems of reassembling, almost from scratch, the necessary information technology infrastructure

IT Self-Service Engagement: A Theory of Trying Perspective

IT self-service engagement, an individual’s attempt to voluntarily solve his or her IT problems without seeking the help of the IT department in an organizational setting, is an emerging phenomenon; it is gaining momentum among employees and organizations alike. By 2017, up to 54% of organizations are predicted to use IT self-service as an alternative to phone and email contact. In this study, we anchor IT self-service engagement within the conceptual framework of the theory of trying. We study what motivates individuals to engage in IT self-service as well as its effects on innovative work behaviors. Sampling more than 200 employees, we show that (a) IT self-service is a concept in its own right, (b) is driven by levels of IT empowerment and subjective norms, (c) manifests itself in heightened levels of innovative work behaviors, and (d) exists irrespective of good or bad service experiences provided by the IT department

U-Commerce: A Conceptual Extension of E-Commerce and M-Commerce

This article elaborates and extends several new concepts that lay the foundation for thinking about next- generation commerce—so-called ultimate commerce, or simply u-commerce. U-commerce extends traditional commerce to a world of ubiquitous networks and universal devices, a world in which users can access networks at any time from any place, using a range of devices to invoke unique and personalized services. Specifically, four constructs are discussed that form the fundamental dimensions of u-commerce: ubiquity, uniqueness, universality, and unison. It is proposed that future developments of information systems will be framed by these constructs

A Phenomenological Inquiry of Virtual Worlds

In synthetic worlds, such as Second Life, World of Warcraft, or SIMS, the dichotomy between reality and virtuality still remains one of the unsolved philosophical inquiries of our time. There remains skepticism regarding the value of virtual experiences versus those of real life. This research presents a starting point for an ethical discourse on the technology of virtual worlds and addresses two questions: What are unique affordances of virtual worlds? And, what are the ethical implications that emerge due to these unique affordances? Four unique affordances of the technology of virtual worlds - self-expression, co-experience, co-creation, and crowd-sourcing, are identified. Questions from positivist, social-constructivist, and phenomenological perspectives of ethics are recognized and preliminary phenomenological insights of societal pressures contributing to the emergence of virtual worlds are ascertained. This research attempts to analyze virtual worlds from multiple ethical perspectives, starting with a broad phenomenological inquiry within which subsequent impact and discovery studies can be framed. Understanding the societal attitudes and moods that make technologies necessary and valuable help uncover the interests and constraints they embody as well as their potential impacts

Toward JUSTIS―A Research Program Aimed at Fostering Business Ethics by Empowering Stakeholders Through Information Systems

As incidents involving corporate social responsibility—or rather the lack thereof—hit headlines at regular intervals, stakeholders are becoming increasingly concerned about ethical issues, thus encouraging researchers to identify problematic business processes and pressing practitioners to start rectifying their questionable courses of action. In the meantime, information systems (IS) are becoming ever more pervasive and ubiquitous and are shaping and altering many of our everyday activities and behavior. We argue that when it comes to promoting ethical behaviors, IS can be used as powerful tools to empower stakeholders, and, thus, it is crucial to consider the role that IS can play in either advancing or deterring ethical—or conversely, unethical—behaviors. In this article, we present a research agenda for a new research program specifically concerned with the task of analyzing the social impact of existing IS and devising new ones that can be used to encourage ethical behavior. JustIS is the name of this program

U-Commerce: An Experimental Investigation of Ubiquity and Uniqueness

U-commerce extends traditional commerce (geographic, electronic, and mobile) to a world of ubiquitous networks and universal devices, a world in which users can access networks at any time from any place, using a range of devices to invoke unique and personalized services. As such, u-commerce presents a new perspective on time and space. Specifically, four constructs are discussed that form the fundamental dimensions of u- commerce: ubiquity, uniqueness, universality, and unison. This report presents an experimental investigation to examine how two of these u-constructs, namely ubiquity and uniqueness, impact individual task performance, perceptions of usefulness and ease of use across differing levels of u-commerce technology and a variety of tasks. A total of 117 senior level MIS students served as subjects using the latest currently available form of u-technology: wireless personal digital assistants (PDA)