Rui Dinis Sousa

Reviewing Business-IT Alignment Instruments Under SAM Dimensions

Business-IT alignment has been on the top of the concerns of IT executives for many years and how to assess it has been under research. Among many proposals, one of the best known and cited in the literature, showing some relevant empirical work, is the Luftmans Strategic Alignment Maturity SAM categories assessment. Taking it as a framework, seven other proposals are examined using SAM categories as dimensions of business-IT alignment: communications, competency/value measurements, governance, partnership, technology scope and skills. Except for one proposal revealing a tactical level approach, this review shows that business-IT alignment assessment has been studied essentially at the strategic level. Among the examined dimensions across the several proposals, governance is the best covered one while the human resource skills dimension is considerably neglected. Having still room for improvements, either in the governance or the technology scope dimensions, the SAM assessment seems a well balanced instrument. The empirical work already found on SAM provides a good starting point to get an acceptable validated instrument. However, if in terms of content validity, SAM is one of the most promising instruments, there is still much work to do on what concerns its operationalization. Future research should strive for a rigorous, strong instrument on every component of construct validity, namely, the convergent, discriminant and nomological components.

Developing an Instrument to Assess Information Technology Staff Motivation

Motivation is a key factor that influences individual effort, which, in turn, affects individual and organizational performance. Nevertheless, motivation at work depends on the organizational rewards and incentives, according to individual goals. This paper reports on the development of an instrument designed to measure the motivation of Information Technology people at their workplace. Psychology theories and work addressing intrinsic and extrinsic motivation have been studied. Some motivation instruments were reviewed and analyzed. Specificities and special characteristics regarding IT workers were evidenced and combined with other more general motivation factors. The instrument has been developed according to the five dimensions of the Worldatwork framework, resulting in a set of 30 scale items addressing 23 variables. Besides measuring the IT motivation levels, the tool may also help any organization to understand the weaknesses and strengths regarding incentive policies, and therefore, assist on the definition of new ones.

eHealth key issues in Portuguese Public Hospitals

Hospital managers, health and IT Professionals have their work increasingly supported and dependent on information systems and technologies. To be more effective and efficient in the way health care is delivered, considerable improvements in health information systems and technologies still have to be made at the local and national levels. This is a study that seeks for a deeper understanding of the Portuguese hospitals main stakeholders concerns regarding their interaction with Information Technology, so opportunities for improvement can be later identified. Seven public hospitals have been selected to participate in this study. In each hospital, managers, IT and health professional were interviewed leading to the discussion of some global and shared perceptions that resulted in a list of eHealth key issues in public Portuguese hospitals.

Enterprise social network success: Evidences from a multinational corporation

In a globalized world, where companies operate across different locations and work becomes increasingly complex, collaboration in a diversity of ways is required among employees to perform tasks more effectively. Following a case study methodology that involved six interviews across three different country locations, this research addresses the phenomenon of Enterprise Social Networks (ESN) in a multinational corporation with a focus on the assessment of ESN success.

Preparing Future IST Professionals for ODE: An Examination of Courses in IST Degree Programs

The information system and technology (1ST) scholarly field emerged during the 1960s with the establishment of academic degree programs and research centers focusing on the use of computers to support management — particularly management information systems -MIS.