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Fall 2008 (Vol 49, Issue 1) Table of Contents SOCIAL NETWORKING IN BALTIMORE: CONNECTION VERSUS COLLECTION Social networking is a powerful way to increase collaboration, communication, and innovation. A useful technique to measure and analyze these informal networks is social network analysis. In order to better understand the social networks used by child welfare organizations in Baltimore, a social network analysis was conducted. The surprising results are that these organizations were very loosely connected at best. Keywords: none provided STATUS OF BUSINESS PROCESS COURSES IN AACSB-ACCREDITED UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAMS OF BUSINESS A large number of corporations are improving business processes applying enablers such as information systems and workflows. This trend causes a strong demand for college graduates prepared with the knowledge on business processes. This article reviews the course titles and descriptions listed on the websites of AACSB-accredited undergraduate programs of business and finds that only a small number of them offer one or more courses on business processes. The article recommends that more IS or ISDS departments take the initiative and offer courses that include identification, modeling and assessment of the current processes, design and deployment of the new improved processes, and process-oriented information systems as an enabler. The titles of these courses need to include a key word that gives an idea about the contents. Those who develop business process courses or refine existing courses in undergraduate programs of business will find a guideline in this article. Keywords: Business Process, IS Curriculum, Enterprise Resource Systems INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY CONTINUANCE: A THEORETIC AND EMPIRICAL TEST This paper proposes a theoretical extension of the information technology (IT) continuance model by linking continuance intention to behavior and elaborating the contingent factors that shape IT continuance intention and behavior. Drawing on recent findings in the cognitive psychology literature, it conceptualizes perceived behavioral control as consisting of two dimensions — IT self-efficacy and facilitating conditions — and links these two dimensions respectively to IT continuance intention and behavior. Field data from a longitudinal survey of document management system usage among administrators and staff personnel at a governmental agency in Ukraine provides empirical support for our extended model. Our study advances the emerging body of research on IT continuance by extending the theoretical boundaries of the IT continuance model, and contributes to IT acceptance and usage research by clarifying the conceptualization and effect of the PBC construct. Keywords: Information Technology Usage, Continuance, Expectation-Disconfirmation Theory, Survey Research INNOVATE WITH COMPLEX INFORMATION TECHNOLGOIES: a THEORETICAL MODEL AND EMPIRICAL EXAMINATION Complex information technologies (CITs), such as ERP packages, have become the core component of modern organizations. Corporate investments in CITs have soared to a record high. Firms need to creatively apply the technologies in order to adapt to the ever-changing environments and realize the full potential of the technologies. We approach this issue from the perspective of ‘Innovate with IT’, a post-acceptance usage behavior that describes innovative use of information technologies to support individual task performances. Drawing upon the IS Continuance (ISC) model, as well as the managerial and individual factors that facilitate higher level IT use, a model is theoretically developed to understand employees’ novel use of CITs. A field study was conducted in a large manufacturing firm using ERP packages to empirically validate the model. The results suggest that the ISC model, personal propensity toward IT innovations, and management support jointly nurture employees’ creative use of complex technologies. Keywords: Post-acceptance Use, Innovate with IT, Complex Information Technologies A STUDY OF INTRANET USAGE AND RESISTANCE IN MALAYSIA'S PORT INDUSTRY This paper examines the impact of user resistance on Intranet usage and its influence on the performance of port middle managers in an organizational context. Based on the literature review, a comprehensive research framework was developed on the relationship between perceived usefulness and usage as well as between perceived usefulness and user resistance. It also depicts the relationship between usage and performance as well as user resistance and performance. The current study also examines the cause and effect of usage and user resistance under mandatory and voluntary usage. A total of 357 middle managers from various organizations in the Malaysian port industry were sampled. The structural equation modeling (SEM) results indicate that usage significantly explains the variance on performance of managers. Perceived usefulness has relationships with usage and but not with user resistance. However, usage does not predict user resistance, and vice-versa. Practical implications are suggested at the end of the paper. Keywords: Perceived Usefulness; Usage; User Resistance; Performance; Middle Managers, Port Industry; Malaysia A STRUCTURAL MODEL OF DATA WAREHOUSING SUCCESS Data warehousing is an important area of practice and research, yet few studies have assessed its practices in general and critical success factors in particular. Although plenty of guidelines for implementation exist, few have been subjected to empirical testing. Furthermore, no model is available for comparing and evaluating the various claims made in different studies. In order to better understand the critical success factors and their effects on data warehousing success, a research model is developed in this paper. This model is useful for comparing findings across studies and for selecting variables for future research. The model is tested using data collected from a cross sectional survey of data warehousing professionals. Partial Least Square (PLS) is used to validate the structural relations identified in the model. The resulting model has three groups of success factors. Technical factor is found to positively influence information quality, whereas both operational and economic factors have a positive effect on system quality. Structural relations are also found among the dependent variables. System quality positively influences information quality, which in turn positively affects individual benefits. Individual benefits in turn has a positive relation with organizational benefits. Keywords: Data Warehousing, Critical Success Factors, Information Systems Success, Modeling A HYBRID DECISION SUPPORT MODEL FOR SELECTING HIGHLY QUALIFIED SUPPLIERS Few people would disagree that the Web has become a major platform for complex and demanding enterprise applications in many domains, but many would agree that a vast majority of these applications have been being developed off the top of a developer’s head in an adhoc fashion, contributing to problems of user disorientation, content management, maintainability, and quality. In this paper we propose a Web application development methodology in which we decompose the application domain into a host of business logic and then organize them into a hierarchy. The façade of individual business logic is then visually identified by using presentation tier logic elements, including pages, components, and links. This process is called the business logic collocation. Once collocated, each business logic module then goes through a process called the business logic collation where it is further elaborated in the manner that reflects the remaining two components of business logic, which are workflow and rules. Keywords: Business Logic, Collocation, Collation, Methodology, Web Application MEASURES OF UNCERTAINTY IN RULE-BASED SYSTEMS: ONE IS NOT ENOUGH The solution of most commercial rule-based expert systems consists of two components — the conclusion reached and its calculated measure of belief, expressed as a single number. In non-deterministic domains, this number is often the most critical factor in analyzing the solution. However, as this paper reviews, a robust calculus for this number has yet to be documented. Thus reliance on it alone poses a risk to users of commercial systems. This paper demonstrates how supplemental statistics can be calculated and used to decrease this risk. We hope these ideas will lead to better commercial expert systems and better user decision making. Keywords: Confidence Factors, Probability, Certainty Factors, Bayesian Systems, Expert Systems, Rules, Belief MEASURES OF UNCERTAINTY IN RULE-BASED SYSTEMS: ONE IS NOT ENOUGH This paper describes an empirical study to reveal factors influencing defect correction effort in software development. In the study we collected various attributes (metrics) of defects found in a typical medium-scale, multi-vendor information system development project in Japan over a six-month period. We then statistically analyzed the relationship between the defects’ attributes and the correction effort. The analysis confirmed the well-known principle “defects are the more expensive the later they are detected” by revealing that defects detected in the “system test” were 4.88 times more expensive than those detected in the “coding/unit test”. Another principle “defects are more expensive the longer they survive in software” was also confirmed by revealing that defects, which survived two or more development phases, were 4.44 times more expensive than those detected immediately. We also identified other factors, such as defect reproducibility, severity, and the cause of detection delay, that had a significant influence on the correction effort. Keywords: Defect Classification, Statistical Analysis, Failure Report, Testing THE ROLE OF BUSINESS RENOVATION AND INFORMATION IN E-GOVERNMENT Transition to e-government is not a simple introduction of information technology. It requires a radical change of the ways and mechanisms of operating the administration, which means a major business process change. Therefore, business renovation is a prerequisite for successful informatization. In the paper, the methodology for the business renovation in public sector is developed and demonstrated with the case of a Slovenian Ministry. The case highlights some of the main problems and develops a possible approach to the modeling, renovation and informatization of business processes in order to achieve efficiency, effectiveness and data quality improvement gains. Keywords: Business Renovation, Business Process Modeling, Informatization, E-Government, Case Study A HYBRID DECISION SUPPORT MODEL FOR SELECTING HIGHLY QUALIFIED SUPPLIERS It is important to select highly qualified suppliers within a limited time for e-Procurement in B2B e-marketplaces. Our study presents a hybrid e-Procurement decision support model that is composed of two modeling processes; first is the screening of candidate suppliers by multi-criteria decision making, and second is optimization modeling based on rule-based reasoning for supplier selection and allocation. This enables purchasers to specify purchase requirements effectively and find optimal suppliers that satisfy the requirements. We show with experiments that the purchase requirements for filtering suppliers reduce the risk that gives purchasers infeasible solutions, and also reduce the computational time for solving the optimization model. This study contributes significantly to the selection of highly qualified suppliers in B2B e-marketplaces. Keywords: e-Procurement, Supplier Selection, Multi-Criteria Decision Making, Rule-Based Reasoning, Optimization Modeling
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