Some empirical evidence on IS Strategy Alignment in banking

Abstract

Recent research amongst North-American and European IS managers shows that for both groups the alignment of IS strategy and corporate strategy is a top priority. IS alignment approaches do, however, exist, describing a generic process, independent of the characteristics of any particular industry or company. Here, an attempt is made to apply IS Strategy Alignment to banking, with the aim to identify major issues and to attempt to determine the relationships between these issues, based on a research project in a number of European banks. This work suggests that the main problem in generating improved IS Strategy Alignment is a lack of overall sector knowledge (not skills) amongst banking managers. Awareness of IS issues (even the softer ones) does not cause problems, but the application of these issues in the banking world does. The influence of mind sets on IS Strategy Alignment awareness proved to be important. Based on an experience with the analytical methods used and the results obtained, other methods of empirical investigation are suggested, including new issues in IS Strategy Alignment.