Ronald Ramirez

Information Technology and Intangible Output: The Impact of IT Investment on Innovation Productivity

Prior research concerning IT business value has established a link between firm-level IT investment and tangible returns such as output productivity. Research also suggests that IT is vital to intermediate processes such as those that produce intangible output. Among these, the use of IT in innovation and knowledge creation processes is perhaps the most critical to a firms long-term success. However, little is known about the relationship between IT, knowledge creation, and innovation output. In this study, we contribute to the literature by comprehensively examining the contribution of IT to innovation production across multiple contexts using a quality-based measure of innovation output. Analyzing annual information from 1987 to 1997 for a panel of large U.S. manufacturing firms, we find that a 10% increase in IT input is associated with a 1.7% increase in innovation output for a given level of innovation-related spending. This relationship between IT, research and development (R&D), and innovation production is robust across multiple econometric methodologies and is found to be particularly strong in the mid to late 1990s, a period of rapid technological innovation. Our results also demonstrate the importance of IT in creating value at an intermediate stage of production, in this case, through improved innovation productivity. However, R&D and its related intangible factors (skill, knowledge, etc.) appear to play a more crucial role in the creation of breakthrough innovations.

Research Note---Does Technological Progress Alter the Nature of Information Technology as a Production Input? New Evidence and New Results

Prior research at the firm level finds information technology (IT) to be a net substitute for both labor and non-IT capital inputs. However, it is unclear whether these results hold, given recent IT innovations and continued price declines. In this study we extend prior research to examine whether these input relationships have evolved over time. First, we introduce new price indexes to account for varying technological progress across different types of IT hardware. Second, we use the rental price methodology to measure capital in terms of the flow of services provided. Finally, we use hedonic methods to extend our IT measures to 1998, enabling analysis spanning the emergence of the Internet. Analyzing approximately 9,800 observations from over 800 Fortune 1,000 firms for the years 1987--1998, we find firm demand for IT to be elastic for decentralized IT and inelastic for centralized IT. Moreover, Allen Elasticity of Substitution estimates confirm that through labor substitution, the increasing factor share of IT comes at the expense of labor. Last, we identify a complementary relationship between IT and ordinary capital, suggesting an evolution in this relationship as firms have shifted to more decentralized organizational forms. We discuss these results in terms of prior research, suggest areas of future research, and discuss managerial implications. *This paper is dedicated to the memory of Paul Chwelos, respected colleague and dear friend.

Information technology infrastructure, organizational process redesign, and business value: An empirical analysis

We extend current research examining synergies between information technology, process redesign, and firm performance in three ways: analyze a firms entire IT and BPR portfolio, examine production and market value performance implications, and conduct analysis using a unique dataset of 228 firms between 1996 and 1999. We find a contingent association between IT, process redesign, and performance. The interaction of IT and BPR portfolios is positively associated with firm productivity and market value. However, we find mixed evidence of a difference in these impacts across different types of BPR. Insights for business investment in IT and process redesign are discussed.

Information technology innovation diffusion: an information requirements paradigm

Abstract.  Information technology (IT) innovation research examines the organizational and technological factors that determine IT adoption and diffusion, including firm size and scope, technological competency and expected benefits. We extend the literature by focusing on information requirements as a driver of IT innovation adoption and diffusion. Our framework of IT innovation diffusion incorporates three industry‐level sources of information requirements: process complexity, clock speed and supply chain complexity. We apply the framework to US manufacturing industries using aggregate data of internet‐based innovations and qualitative analysis of two industries: wood products and beverage manufacturing. Results show systematic patterns supporting the basic thesis of the information processing paradigm: higher IT innovation diffusion in industries with higher information processing requirements; the salience of downstream industry structure in the adoption of interorganizational systems; and the role of the location of information intensity in the supply chain in determining IT adoption and diffusion. Our study provides a new explanation for why certain industries were early and deep adopters of internet‐based innovations while others were not: variation in information processing requirements.

Virtual team effectiveness

Organizations utilize virtual teams to gather experts who collaborate online to accomplish organizational tasks. The virtual nature of these teams creates challenges to effective collaboration and team outcomes. This research addresses the social effects of knowledge sharing on virtual teams. We propose a conceptual model which hypothesizes a relationship between knowledge sharing, trust, collaboration, and team effectiveness in virtual team settings. The findings suggest that knowledge sharing positively influences trust and collaboration among virtual team members. The findings also suggest that while trust positively influences virtual team collaboration, it does not have a significant direct effect on team effectiveness.

Digital Transformation in Police Work: A Sociomaterial Perspective on Police Body Worn Cameras (BWC)

The need to augment human capabilities through computer-based technologies, and a belief in the “objectivity” of data has contributed to the popularity of wearables. Such is the case with BWCs and their proliferation in police organizations. Unfortunately, BWCs have not been studied from an IS perspective, using specific or complementary theories applied in IS. We address this gap with a case study of a mid-sized police department, using a sociomaterial lens. We find that BWCs have triggered significant unanticipated changes in police practice. The impacts of these changes are not uniformly distributed. Rank-and-file patrol officers carry the burden upfront, while evidence technicians are burdened on the backend. We contribute by providing an actual account of the changes and impacts of BWCs in policing; providing initial evidence of how BWCs meet policing goals; and demonstrating the applicability of sociomateriality in explicating wearable technologies in general, and BWCs in particular.

IT for Information-Based Partnerships: Empirical Analysis of Environmental Contingencies to Value Co-Creation

We empirically examine IT value co-creation in supply chains, incorporating key contingencies of the competitive environment. Prior research suggests that IT used for strategic informationbased partnerships may benefit supply chains facing higher volatility, enabling tightly coupled integration and enhanced strategic response to changing consumer preferences. Analyzing a unique dataset comprising over 6,000 U.S. manufacturing plants, we obtain three principal results. First, value co-creation using either IT for strategic information-based partnerships (ITIP) or merely IT for transaction efficiency (ITT) is positive and significant. Second, the co-created value from ITIP is larger than that for (ITT), suggesting that information-based partnerships, while perhaps requiring a greater investment, yield a higher return. Third and most importantly, co-created value from using IT for information-based partnerships is positively moderated by demand volatility, i.e., value is greater in higher demand volatility environments. However, we find the opposite is true for using IT for efficient transactions. This is a new contribution to the literature and has important theoretical and practical implications.