IS Projects Research Articles

How to Develop Information Systems to Improve Accessible Tourism: Proposal of a Roadmap to Support the Development of Accessible Solutions

The right to tourism has become a crucial aspect of society. Through more accessible tourism, it is possible to improve travel conditions for people with disabilities. Nonetheless, barriers still exist, with the lack of information about accessibility conditions representing a main obstacle. Information systems can help overcome these hurdles. However, it is verified that methodologies to support the development of accessible IS are currently very scarce. Thus, this study intends to develop an accessible IS for accessible tourism and propose a roadmap to support the creation of accessible IS solutions. To obtain the intended accessible tourism solution, an action research methodology was followed, which involved adapting already established frameworks, that combine Agile development and user-centered design techniques. Following the methodology, a web application named access@tour by action was created. This mobile solution is capable of improving information management within the accessible tourism market. From this experimental study, a proposal for a methodological roadmap emerged. This roadmap helps to better understand how to develop accessible IS by demonstrating techniques for gathering accessibility requirements and validating them. The roadmap is adaptable and suitable for IS projects involving accessibility. Both results provide a better perspective on how to integrate accessibility during the development of IS, possibly supporting future researchers in creating accessible solutions.

Enhancing IT Hybrid Projects in The Directorate General Of Customs And Excise of Indonesia: An Improvement Process

The Directorate General of Customs and Excise (DJBC) confronts mounting challenges due to the expanding international trade. To address this issue, an optimal software solution is required for efficient service provision and supervision of transactions. However, the completion of IS projects faces significant delays, with only 25% reaching completion despite the immediate need for a reliable system. These delays stem from various problems encountered during project execution. This research employs the Kerzner Project Management Maturity Model to assess the IS project management maturity level at DJBC and categorise the identified problems. Subsequently, solutions extracted from PMBOK 7 are mapped to address these issues. Findings indicate an average maturity score of 390, falling short of the target of 600 required for level 1 maturity. Additionally, 13 problems have been identified and linked to solutions within the seven standards/domains of PMBOK 7. The research presents two strategic goals: improving project management processes and enhancing client satisfaction, assessed using seven measurement indicators. This study offers valuable insights for DJBC to address project management challenges, enhance maturity levels, and achieve desired outcomes.

Strategic Identification and Selection of Information Systems Projects

Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) stands at the intersection of technology and organizational strategy, serving as a guiding compass for businesses navigating the increasingly complex digital landscape. This research report explores the critical aspects of Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP), focusing on various approaches to SISP and best practices to avoid common mistakes during the process. Systems analysts play a pivotal role in this process, ensuring the alignment of IS projects with organizational goals and objectives. By examining different SISP approaches and highlighting best practices, this report aims to provide valuable insights into effective project identification and selection for achieving organizational success.

Measuring the Performance of Information Systems Project Managers: Indicators and Metrics

Measuring performance is a process used in the domain of project management and quality processes to determine and communicate status and accomplishments measured against specific objectives, schedules, and milestones. This paper is concerned with the calculation of performance indicators of Information Systems Project Management (ISPM). It clarifies the relationships between ISPM domains, performance metrics, and performance indicators. This paper presents a proposed list of metrics for ISPM. Based on these ISPM metrics and a combination of statistical techniques, we built a model for calculating ISPM performance indicators. The quality reviewers can use this model to evaluate and track the performance of IS project managers.

Expert Knowledge, Ambidexterity, and IS in Automotive Industry Engineering Projects (AIEP): Overview of a post Clinical Research

This paper introduces a new form of ambidexterity in IS projects, drawing from the falsification of a clinical research conducted in an automotive engineering company, focusing on process reengineering and ERP implementation. It bridges clinical research (1997-2001) with expert insights (2002-2021). Addressing a gap in IS project literature, particularly within Automotive Industry Engineering Projects (PAUTs), the study highlights that exploration-exploitation strategies may become dysfunctional in turbulent, cyclical environments. The article criticizes the short-sighted results of ERP strategies applied to simple automotive projects, and encourages better dialogue between practitioners and decision-makers, with a view to resourcing the IS in line with business cycles.

Key Performance Indicators (KPI) of Information Systems Project Management

Performance measurements are used in project management and quality processes to determine and communicate status and accomplishments measured against specific objectives, schedules, and milestones. This paper is concerned with the calculation of performance indicators of Information Systems Project Management (ISPM). It clarifies the relationships between ISPM domains, performance metrics, and performance indicators. This paper presents a proposed list of metrics for ISPM. Based on these ISPM metrics and a combination of statistical techniques, we built a model for calculating ISPM performance indicators. The quality reviewers can use this model to evaluate and track the performance of IS project managers.

The Relationship between Discrepancies in Career Anchors of Information Technology Personnel and Career Satisfaction.

The career anchors of information technology personnel (ITP) are critical factors influencing their career satisfaction (CS), and these factors are also influenced by national culture. Although a number of scholars have studied the internal CS of employees, these scholars have not explained how to increase the CS of ITP from both individual and organizational perspectives and to further improve the success rate of IS projects. Thus, this study adopts the goal-achievement gap (discrepancy) theory to explore the gap between the "internal career desires (career wants, CW)" and "external career opportunities (career have, CH)" of ITP in two different cultural societies, namely mainland China and the United Arab Emirates, and whether the gap impacts their CS. The data in this study were collected from the Internet. A survey was posted on Internet discussion forums for full-time ITP participants within organizations in China and the United Arab Emirates; thus, the results of this study are possibly only generalizable to these two countries. Finally, the results of this study provide the following contributions: (1) There are 13 career anchors (technical competence, managerial competence, autonomy, organizational stability, challenge, lifestyle, identity, creativity, variety, service, entrepreneurship, geographic security, and learning motivation) of ITP in China, which can be divided into three categories, and these are totally different from the four categories identified by ITP in the United Arab Emirates. (2) The surface analysis approach (RSA) to test the curvilinear relationship between the CW, CH, and CS of ITP indeed can explain more than the linear SEM (structural equation modeling) test between the CW and CS, CH, and CS separately, both tests are in two different cultural societies, China and the United Arab Emirates.

Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) Methodologies for Information Systems Project Management

The software development life cycle (SDLC) is a framework for planning, analyzing, designing, developing, testing, and deploying software. There are many different SDLC methodologies available, each with its advantages and disadvantages. The best methodology for a particular project will depend on factors such as the size and complexity of the project, the availability of resources, and the preferences of the project team. This paper provides an in-depth overview of the different SDLC methodologies used in the industry for IS project management. The paper discusses five significant SDLC methodologies: Waterfall, V-Model, Iterative, Agile, and Hybrid. It also compares and contrasts the traditional SDLC and Agile methodology and discusses using decision support matrices for selecting SDLC methodologies. By providing this comprehensive overview, the paper will help IS practitioners and project managers make informed decisions about the best approach for their specific projects.

A Proposed Approach for Monitoring Information Systems Projects

This paper aims to evaluate the performance of Information Systems Project Management (ISPM). It clarifies the relationships between ISPM domains, performance metrics, and performance indicators. This paper presents a proposed list of metrics for ISPM. Based on these ISPM metrics and a combination of statistical techniques, we built a model for calculating ISPM performance indicators. The quality reviewers can use this model to evaluate and track the performance of IS project managers.

Pickled eggs: GenerativeAIas research assistant or co‐author?

Pickled eggs: Generative<scp>AI</scp>as research assistant or co‐author?

How enterprise architecture leads to organisational benefits

Enterprise architecture (EA) is an important IS management capability that has attracted much practitioner interest and has many claimed benefits. However, the mechanisms underpinning EA benefit realisation are not fully understood and have only relatively recently begun to receive research attention. Based on twenty-two expert interviews and two in-depth case studies, this theory building paper develops a new EA Benefit Mechanisms Model (the EABMM). It argues that EA benefits depend on the quality of EA service provision and are realised through three key mechanisms. First, EA helps improve IS decision-making by creating a transparent and structured decision process, by providing objective information to inform decisions, and by educating decision makers on good IS investment practices. Second, EA services help improve IS project delivery by improving project coordination through contextual awareness and by accelerating projects through guiding standards. Finally, EA services help an organisation to improve its IS platform by increasing platform alignment with business needs, platform flexibility, IS resource utilisation, and IS resource complementarity. Each of these three benefit mechanisms ultimately contributes to organisational benefits from EA, including higher return on IT investment, increased organisational agility, and competitive differentiation. The paper also highlights a conundrum in demonstrating value from EA.

Predicting Key Predictors of Project Desertion in Blockchain: Experts’ Verification Using One-Sample T-Test

Aim/Purpose: The aim of this study was to identify the critical predictors affecting project desertion in Blockchain projects. Background: Blockchain is one of the innovations that disrupt a broad range of industries and has attracted the interest of software developers. However, despite being an open-source software (OSS) project, the maintenance of the project ultimately relies on small core developers, and it is still uncertain whether the technology will continue to attract a sufficient number of developers. Methodology: The study utilized a systematic literature review (SLR) and an expert review method. The SLR identified 21 primary studies related to project desertion published in Scopus databases from the year 2010 to 2020. Then, Blockchain experts were asked to rank the importance of the identified predictors of project desertion in Blockchain. Contribution: A theoretical framework was constructed based on Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) constructs; personal, behavior, and environmental predictors and related theories. Findings: The findings indicate that the 12 predictors affecting Blockchain project desertion identified through SLR were important and significant. Recommendations for Practitioners: The framework proposed in this paper can be used by the Blockchain development community as a basis to identify developers who might have the tendency to abandon a Blockchain project. Recommendation for Researchers: The results show that some predictors, such as code testing tasks, contributed code decoupling, system integration and expert heterogeneity that are not covered in the existing developer turnover models can be integrated into future research efforts. Impact on Society: This study highlights how an individual’s design choices could determine the success or failure of IS projects. It could direct Blockchain crypto-currency investors and cyber-security managers to pay attention to the developer’s behavior while ensuring secure investments, especially for crypto-currencies projects. Future Research: Future research may employ additional methods, such as a meta-analysis, to provide a comprehensive picture of the main predictors that can predict project desertion in Blockchain.

Performance Measurement of a Rule-Based Ontology Framework (ROF) for Auto-Generation of Requirements Specification

Documenting requirements specification requires a lot of effort from stakeholders and developers. Time and knowledge limitations are also obstacles in creating structured requirements document. Our previous works proposed a framework for automated generation of requirements specifications called Rule-Based Ontology Framework (ROF).The requirements documentation phase produces two outputs: process modeling according to the Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) standard and Software Requirements Specification (SRS) documents following the ISO/IEC/IEEE 29148:2018 standard. In this paper, we do performance measurement of ROF in the IS project case study which includes validating ROF prototype by performing User Acceptance Test (UAT); measuring effectiveness by calculating notation error and requirements error; and measuring efficiency by calculating the time spent in producing documents. The efficiency and effectiveness of both are measured by comparing BPMN graph and SRS document generated by ROF with BPMN graph and SRS document that are created manually by the stakeholders.

Why Business Digitalization Is Still So Risky

Due to rapid IT advances and escalated globalization, business digitalization has been accelerating. However, the average success rate of such endevors remains low. As an attempt to reveal why the digital transformation of a business is still so risky, this research analyzes how commonly encountered risks in IS projects are responded to and how the responses affect project outcomes. Resulting from the authors' previous work, they hypothesize that information systems are much more complex as they play an increasingly pivotal role in executing most business functions, and subsequently, the risk pattern of IS projects may have evolved, and that as businesses keep adding more information systems to the enterprise infrastructure, rather than via a piecemeal approach, a framework for enterprise-wide digital integration must be established to guide and evaluate business digitalization. The finding from this research should largely validate their hypotheses and allow them to call for a refocus of the efforts on digitalizing an enterprise.

Effect of Human Resource Management on Operational Efficiency of Universities in Kenya

Operational efficiency facilitates an organization to increase profitability, improve competitiveness, increase productivity, use freed up capacity and position business for growth and increase organizations’ prospective market significance. The effects of information systems are often indirect and are influenced by environmental, organizational, technological, and human resource factors. The objective of this study was to establish the effect of human resource management on operational efficiency of universities in Kenya. Operational efficiency is defined as aligning resources with core mission and services, reducing fragmented, duplicative operations, and goal of increasing service levels of an organization To maximize organization’s operational efficiency, it is paramount that more dependable means of dealing with the organizational, technological and environmental variations related with IS projects be established. Understanding how teaching, research, extension and prudent utilization of public resources allocated to universities contribute to the overall efficiency of university operations is of great importance for universities to improve their performance. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) is proven to be reliable for appropriately assessing the efficiency of university operations due to its capability of effectively handling the multiple input and output simultaneously in a given situation. This study attempted to establish whether a combination of appropriate IS and HR coupled with institutional factors may lead to enhanced operational efficiency of an organization. Given the pivotal role universities play in the development of a country, this study adapted a multi-theory paradigm to outline a socio-technical information system implementation and organizational change for improved efficiency. To achieve the overall goal, hypothesis were formulated and tested. The interaction effects and relationships of the constructs were specified using SEM diagrams comprising of measurements and models. A cross sectional survey was conducted on all the universities charted in Kenya. A census survey was employed since the total population was considered relatively low and could further be reduced by possibility of non-response. A total of 102 questionnaires were dropped to the 34 universities which had approved the request. Out of the 102 questionnaires, 70 responses were received for a response rate of 68.6 percent. On examination of the completeness of the questionnaires, 11 were found to be incomplete. To complete the missing values, a sub-group mean value replacement function and linear interpolation methods were used. To test for reliability of the individual construct items Cronbach’s Alpha test was used. The results indicate that human resource management practices have a negative effect on the universities’ operational efficiency in Kenya. A major implication of this study is that human resource management practices in universities be improved. Additionally, the findings have implications on the formulation and implementation of IS innovations policy. Keywords: Operational efficiency, Human Resource Management, Data envelopment analysis DOI: 10.7176/JIEA/11-2-07 Publication date: June 30 th 2021

Design science research with focus groups – a pragmatic meta-model

PurposeThe purpose of this research paper is to present a pragmatic and systematic approach to conduct and document Design Science Research (DSR) activities with Focus Groups (FGs), exploring its continuous usage and providing traceability between problem, requirements, solutions and artefacts.Design/methodology/approachThe approach is to conduct the research and produce the meta-model for DSR with FG, a DSR approach was adopted using a conceptual model for Action Design Research already available. The artefact is the result from a specific literature review to define requirements, a careful design and a refinement stage where it was widely used and tested in real IS implementation projects.FindingsRigorous and committed stakeholder engagement is a critical success factor in complex projects. The main outcome of this research is a specific meta-model for DSR with FG that delivers new insights and practical guidelines for academics and professionals conducting and documenting real-world research and development initiatives deep-rooted in stakeholders' participation.Research limitations/implicationsThe meta-model has been endorsed as a practical and useful artefact by the stakeholders participating in the IS projects where it was adopted. However, to fully demonstrate its capabilities and to become more robust, the model has to be further used and tested in other application situations and environments.Originality/valueThe usage of FGs in DSR has already been proposed as an effective way, either to study artefacts, to propose improvements in its design or to acknowledge the utility of those artefacts in field use. The paper provides a sound contribution to this line of research by presenting a meta-model that integrates process and data, as well as a set of practical templates and forms that may be used by researchers and practitioners to conduct their projects.

Magnetic Field Line Random Walk and Solar Energetic Particle Path Lengths: Stochastic Theory and PSP/ISoIS Observation

We thank Junxiang Hu for useful discussions. This research is partially supported by the Parker Solar Probe mission and the IS IS project (contract NNN06AA01C) and a subcontract to University of Delaware from Princeton University (SUB0000165). Additional support is acknowledged from the NASA Living With a Star (LWS) program (NNX17AB79G) and HSR program (80NSSC18K1210 & 80NSSC18K1648) and Thailand Science Research and Innovation (RTA6280002). The IS IS data and visualization tools are available to the community at https://spacephysics.princeton.edu/missions-instruments/isois; data are also available via the NASA Space Physics Data Facility. PSP was designed, built, and is now operated by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory as part of NASA’s LWS program (contract NNN06AA01C). Support from the LWS management and technical team has played a critical role in the success of the PSP mission.

Measuring Information Systems Project Complexity: A Structural Equation Modelling Approach

Complexity has emerged as the new norm in the 21st century, and IS projects play a significant role in organisations to address various socio-political concerns. The purpose of this paper is to understand what are the relevant constructs for measuring IS project complexity. A model for measuring IS project complexity is developed using PLS-SEM. The model reveals that organisational complexity, technical complexity, and uncertainty underpin IS project complexity. Organisational complexity in terms of project team, stakeholder management, and strategic drive should be managed by the project manager. Technical complexity was established in terms of project goals, requirements management, technology management, and norms and standards. Uncertainty in IS projects exists in terms of skills management, the triple constraint, and activity management. Suggestions were provided to guide IS project managers on how to manage each construct and alleviate the level of project complexity. This paper presents an updated and different perspective on measuring and managing IS project complexity. The findings would serve as additional building blocks to further elucidate IS project complexity understanding and assist with improving the value of these projects. Furthermore, the suggestions for IS project managers can lead discussions around how IS projects should be managed to ensure complexity is under control.

The impact of control styles and control modes on individual-level outcomes: a first test of the integrated IS project control theory

ABSTRACT While IS development (ISD) projects are essential for deploying digital technologies in organisations, they are notoriously challenging to control and complete successfully. Prior ISD project control research mostly conceptualises control activities in terms of formal and informal control modes and frequently focuses on performance effects at the project level. We argue that new insight can be gained by moving beyond these conventions to include control enactment as well as individual-level control effects. In this study, we present new findings that could precipitate a change in how researchers think about, and practitioners exercise, control in ISD projects. Specifically, we provide a first test of the recently proposed Integrated IS Project Control Theory by analysing the impacts of control modes (what) and control styles (how) on project team members’ task performance and job satisfaction. Employing data from 171 ISD projects, we find significant support for this theory by confirming the positive impact of an enabling control style on both task performance and job satisfaction, and by demonstrating that control style is more important than control modes in explaining individual-level control effects. Further, the results of a post-hoc analysis suggest complex interaction effects between an enabling control style and formal controls.

Evaluation of Determinants of Software Quality in Offshored Software Projects

Successful offshoring engagements of Indian software vendors is increasingly dependent upon the quality of the projects delivered rather than cost considerations. However, delivering quality software is reliant on effective management of various organizational, technological and people aspects. This research is to identify and evaluate the determinants of quality on software projects delivered by vendors through offshoring. Data related to recently completed projects were collected through a survey of 440 project managers from Indian vendors. Based on structural equation modeling, the authors analyze the influence determinants on specific product quality attributes. It is found that, out of six determinants, technical infrastructure and process maturity have significant influence on most of the attributes of quality in offshored IS projects from India. The authors provide a set of implications for practice and directions for further research.