Identifying capabilities for the IT function to create agility in information systems

In this paper, we identify the necessary capabilities of the IT function to create agility in existing information systems. Agility is the ability to quickly sense and respond to environment perturbations. We contrast the agility perspective from a widely used industry framework with research perspectives on agility in the IS literature. We suggest Beer’s Viable System Model (VSM) is a useful meta-level theory to house agility elements from IS research literature, and apply VSM principles to identify the capabilities required of the IT function. Indeed, by means of a survey of 34 organisations, we confirm that the meta-level theory better correlates with reported agility measures than existing practice measures do on their own. From a research perspective, the incorporation of the VSM mechanism helps to explain ‘why’ the IT function is capable of creating agility. From a practical perspective of ‘how’, the findings point to a new set of capabilities of the IT function for future versions of the industry frameworks to enable agility.

Agility in information systems : enabling capabilities for the IT function

This research identifies how the IT function can create agility in existing information systems. Agility is the capability to quickly sense and respond to environmental perturbations. We contrasted perspectives on agility from a widely used industry framework and that of the IS research literature. Beer’s Viable System Model was a useful meta-level theory to house agility elements from IS research and it introduced cybernetic principles to identify the processes required of the IT function. Indeed, our surveys of 70 organizations confirmed that the applied theory better correlates with reported agility than does existing industry best practice.

The research conducted two quantitative surveys to test the applied theory. The first survey mailed a Likert-type questionnaire to the clients of an Australian IT consultancy. The second survey invited international members of professional interest groups to complete a web-based questionnaire. The responses from the surveys were analyzed using partial-least-squares modeling. The data analysis positively correlated the maturity of IT function processes prescribed by the VSM and the likelihood of agility in existing information systems. We claim our findings generalize to other large organizations in OECD member countries.

The research offers an agility-capability model of the IT function to explain and predict agility in existing information systems. A further contribution is to improve industry ‘best practice’ frameworks by prescribing processes of the IT function to develop in maturity.

Impact of nursing information systems on residential care provision in an aged care provider

The challenge of an ageing population has placed a great pressure on the Australian aged care sector in the coming decades. Technology-enabled solutions such as health information systems (HIS) can be seen as a way to improve care quality, safety and process efficiency. Compared to the overall healthcare sector, the adoption of HIS in the aged care sector has been slower. One reason for this is that aged care providers are not well informed therefore not yet convinced of the positive impacts of technology solutions on their service provision. This paper reports findings from an evaluation of the impact of HIS adoption at an aged care provider in Victoria. The evaluation was conducted in two distinct areas, residential aged care and residential disability services. Overall, the findings show positive impacts of the system on individual work of the care staff and on service provision of the organisation as well as suggesting opportunities for improvement in later implementation stages. The evaluation will also inform other aged care and disability service providers of the benefits of HIS and useful lessons in adoption of technology solutions.

Information systems in and of the information age

The previous decade has been well known in Australia for the methodological wars. This culminated in a modest increase in interpretivist research. However, critical theory and postmodernist methodologies have not been taken up with any great enthusiasm both here in Australia or elsewhere. This paper attempts to outline the practical and historical reasons and the theoretical difficulties for the failure of these paradigms in contemporary IS. Secondly, it attempts to identify why IS must embrace these paradigms for the future, and the emerging postmodernist approaches in particular, in the light of the rise of ubiquitous information systems. The paper proposes a new set of research questions for the discipline.

Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and their role in sustainable planning : a case study from a Local Government Area (LGA) in Australia

A case study is used to demonstrate the application of Geographical Information Systems (GIS) to inform sustainable development. The suitability of the landscape to support tourism accommodation in a Local Government Area (LGA) is modelled by integrating existing datasets, including conservation areas, residential zones, major roads and known locations of tourism operators into a logistic regression framework. By using a data-driven approach an indication of the relative importance of each explanatory variable can be accounted for, therefore informing planners of the importance of different assets. In a region where tourism is reliant upon natural features, this use of information systems in conjunction with quantitative statistical modelling can value-add to existing datasets. The provision of this kind of knowledge is important as it would otherwise not factor into the decision-making process had the datasets been considered independently of each other – a concept that applies to both the public and private sectors.

Using geographic information systems (GIS) to assess the role of the built environment in influencing obesity : a glossary

Features of the built environment are increasingly being recognised as potentially important determinants of obesity. This has come about, in part, because of advances in methodological tools such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS). GIS has made the procurement of data related to the built environment easier and given researchers the flexibility to create a new generation of environmental exposure measures such as the travel time to the nearest supermarket or calculations of the amount of neighbourhood greenspace. Given the rapid advances in the availability of GIS data and the relative ease of use of GIS software, a glossary on the use of GIS to assess the built environment is timely. As a case study, we draw on aspects the food and physical activity environments as they might apply to obesity, to define key GIS terms related to data collection, concepts, and the measurement of environmental features.

A performance model of speculative prefetching in distributed information systems

Previous studies in speculative prefetching focus on building and evaluating access models for the purpose of access prediction. This paper investigates a complementary area which has been largely ignored, that of performance modelling. We use improvement in access time as the performance metric, for which we derive a formula in terms of resource parameters (time available and time required for prefetching) and speculative parameters (probabilities for next access). The performance maximization problem is expressed as a stretch knapsack problem. We develop an algorithm to maximize the improvement in access time by solving the stretch knapsack problem, using theoretically proven apparatus to reduce the search space. Integration between speculative prefetching and caching is also investigated, albeit under the assumption of equal item sizes.

Internal organizational factors influencing sustainable implementation of information systems : experiences from a local government in Indonesia

Many information systems (IS) studies have found that information systems implementation sustainability is determined by internal organizational factors. In general these studies have been conducted in private organizations and these factors may not be applicable to IS implementations sustainability within public organizations. This study examines what internal organizational factors play a role in the sustainable implementation of e-government initiatives using a case study of local e-government in Indonesia. It also considers how these factors contribute to sustainable systems by strengthening stakeholders’ commitment through invoking feelings of involvement as responsibilities are assigned to them. The study concludes that the internal factors contribute to collective action that influences sustainable implementation of information systems. Limitations and future research are briefly discussed.

Power and discourse in information systems practice : a narrative research method

Relationships of authority and control and their effect on information systems actors has interested IS researchers since at least the 1980’s. The study of power itself has also troubled organisational and sociological theorists, from which information systems researchers have drawn various lines of attack. Our approach to power rests on an historical synchronic theory that seeks to uncover the places and operation of power through an examination of narrative ‘testaments’ which are analysed not from the perspective of the giving individual but from the structural elements of discourse that they may represent. This paper compliments previous research methods on the topic of power especially in expert reports and systems development methodologies; provides specific guidance on how to apply the notion of discourse synchronically; and reconstructs the commercial practice of information systems, not as a broad church, but as one of competing and epistemologically incommensurate discourse, where the fates of the powerful are balanced against the fearful and silent disciplined.

Information systems development projects as complex adaptive systems

This research considers information systems development (ISD) projects as complex adaptive systems. We investigate the question whether complex adaptive systems (CAS) theory is relevant as a theoretical foundation for understanding ISD, and if so, which kind of understanding can be achieved by utilizing the theory? We introduce key concepts of CAS theory such as interaction, emergence, interconnected autonomous agents, selforganization, co-evolution, poise at the edge of chaos, time pacing, and poise at the edge of time to analyse and understand ISD in practice. We demonstrate the strength of such a CAS approach through an empirical case study presentation and analysis. While our work contributes to a complexity theory of ISD, the case examination also provides practical advice derived from this perspective to successfully cope with complexity in ISD in an adaptive manner.

A theory of change framework for developing cross-faculty programs : an information systems perspective

Information systems (IS) is a discipline that draws upon many other disciplines to bridge theory and practice and address the information and knowledge needs of individuals, organisations and society. We propose that an ideal education in IS would be delivered via cross-faculty programs of study that are not combinations of units from different faculties and disciplines, but programs which include a coherent and cohesive set of units co-designed and co-delivered by teaching staff from more than one faculty. This allows students, and teachers, to appreciate the different content and perspectives within the same context, as they will experience in the workplace, and allow them to develop deeper understandings of the complexity that can arise in their roles as mediators and communicators in finding appropriate IT solutions. Such a model poses a radical change, and thus the framework we offer uses a ‘theory of change’ agenda.

Supporting emotion communication in information systems

Society is becoming increasingly reliant on Information Systems to meet its everyday communication requirements, yet many current implementations lack support for important conversational cues. One such cue is emotion communication. Emotion communication carries with it many signals that affect our behaviour, the interpretation of the message and provide a catalyst to other forms of communication such as empathy and the formation of social ties. Emotion itself can affect the very decision to communicate, or the way in which one may respond to a given communication. To explore the ways in which systems may better support emotion communication between members of a social group, a cloud-based information system was developed and trialled which both large and small groups. This paper presents results on how Information Systems can best support emotion communication in social groups.

State of multilevel research perspective in the information systems discipline

Existing distinctions among macro and micro approaches have been jeopardising the advances of Information Systems (IS) research. Both approaches have been criticized for explaining one level while neglecting the other; thereby, the current situation necessitates the application of multilevel research for revealing the deficiencies. Instead of studying single level (macro or micro), multilevel research entails more than one level of conceptualization and analysis, simultaneously. As the notion of multilevel is borrowed from reference disciplines, there tends to be confusions and inconsistencies within the IS discipline, which hinders the adoption of multilevel research. This paper speaks for the potential value of multilevel research, by investigating the current application status of multilevel research within the IS domain. A content analysis of multilevel research articles from major IS conferences and journals is presented. Analysis results suggest that IS scholars have applied multilevel research to produce high quality work ranging from a variety of topics. However, researchers have not yet been consistently defining “multilevel”, leading to idiosyncratic meanings of multilevel research, most often, in authors’ own interpretations. We argue that a rigorous definition of “multilevel research” needs to be explicated for consistencies in research community.

Feeding back and enhancing authentic learning in quality course assessment design : locating information systems education in rigorous educational research

Locating information systems education foursquare within rigorous and substantial educational research is crucial if the discipline is to receive the scholarly attention that it warrants. One way to do that is to highlight how current information systems course design in Australian undergraduate and postgraduate programs exhibits the strongest possible elements of contemporary learning theories. This paper analyses selected features of the design of an information systems postgraduate course in an Australian university, including the use of peer review of journal entries and writing professional reports to enhance authentic learning and maximise quality assessment design. The analysis is framed by the principles of instructional design theory (Snyder 2009). The authors argue that, by demonstrating theoretically grounded and effective educational practice, the course highlights the value of being located in wider educational research, and of bringing the two fields more closely together.