Management's Contribution to Internet Commerce Benefit - Experiences of Online Small Businesses

Abstract

In this day and age, IT applications are no longer just about in-house business software applications or local area networks. Today’s IT issues are invariably linked to the Internet and Internet Commerce applications. Is there any difference between traditional IT applications and e-commerce? Can we apply what we have learned from earlier small business IT experiences to e-commerce? Does the largely external nature of e-commerce systems mean that management needs to play a different role than in the past? These and many other questions need to be properly addressed. The aim of this study was to explore the answers to some of these questions and bridge the knowledge gap between traditional small business IT systems (such as Accounting, Inventory Management, and so forth) and Internet Commerce systems. The results may help management to rethink how they can secure Internet Commerce benefit, and avoid activities that are non-effective.