Transcript Information Systems Strategy, Information Systems and Globalization: when ‘best practice’ meets cross-cultural

Information Systems Strategy, Information
Systems and Globalization:
when ‘best practice’ meets cross-cultural
communication
Bob Galliers, Provost, Bentley
ESRC Seminar
Nottingham University 10 May, 2004
Bentley???
Bentley – the US’s first
business university
Bentley is a business
university.
We do for students
interested in business and
related professions what
the leading technological
universities do for students
of science and engineering.
Bentley – the Business School for the
Information Age
Bentley blends the breadth and technological strength of a university
with the values and student experiences of a small college.
The campus … and the facilities
Center for Marketing Technology
The Trading Room
Today’s agenda
• To surface issues confronting multi-national
companies, relating to cross-cultural
communication and relationship management
• Focusing on:
– Information systems strategy and development
– “Best practice solutions”
• Two case vignettes
Towards a more inclusive framework for
Information Systems Strategizing
Collaborative and
competitive
environment
EXPLOITATION
STRATEGY
(Deliberate)
- codified ‘solutions’
e.g., ERP systems
- standardized
procedures
- rules
- ‘knowledge
mgmt.’
Collaborative Business
Strategy
INFORMATION
INFRASTRUCTURE
STRATEGY
(Socio-technical environment)
- IT, standards, data, architecture
- Information services (sourcing)
- Human resources (skills, roles)
CHANGE
MANAGEMENT
STRATEGY
Socio-political,
technological
and economic
environment
EXPLORATION
STRATEGY
(Emergent)
- communities of
practice
- flexible project
teams
- knowledge brokers,
sharing & creation
- bricolage/
tinkering
ON-GOING LEARNING
& REVIEW
Source: Galliers, 2001
Two vignettes
• Case company A:
– Engineering
– ERP & KMS
– Newell, Huang, Galliers, Pan (Bentley, Nottingham,
NUS)
• Case company B:
– Financial services
– Software development
– Chand, David, Moore and Vasudevan (Bentley)
Case Company A: background
• Multinational engineering company
• Designs and manufactures standard and
custom-built products; provides
consulting services
• Corporate clients from over 70 countries
• 60,000+ employees
• $8 billion sales turnover in 2000
Case company: organization
• Four main product divisions – global basis:
–
–
–
–
Power Generation
Transport
Infrastructure
Gas & Oil
• Fifth division – regional basis:
– Logistics and Warehouse
• Support functions at HQ, e.g.:
– Finance
– HR
• Consulting arm – project-by-project basis
Implementing ERP and KMS in tandem
• Efficiency and innovation
• ERP
– Integrate business functions into single system with shared
database (Lee & Lee 2000)
– Overcome problems of ‘legacy systems’
– Common business processes
– Improved competitiveness through increased productivity
• KMS
–
–
–
–
Improved competitiveness through knowledge utilization
Free flow of knowledge across organization(s)
Knowledge capture and transfer through ICT
Data mining
Efficiency and/or flexibility?
• Burns and Stalker (1961): mechanistic
versus organic organizational designs
• Mintzberg (1979): machine bureaucracies
versus adhocracies
• Senge (1990): adaptive learning versus
generative learning
• March (1991): exploitation versus exploration
Flexibility is achieved at the expense of efficiency
Hannan & Freeman (1989)
Efficiency and/or flexibility?
• Long history of polarity, but empirical evidence
limited and contradictory (Adler et al. 1999)
• Evidence for (Hayes & Wheelwright 1984)
• Evidence against (MacDuffie et al. 1996)
• ‘Ambidextrousness’ (Daft 1998; Tushman &
O’Reilly 1997)
Research method
• Interpretivist case study (Gopal & Prasad 2000; Walsham 1995)
• Data sources:
–
–
–
–
–
37 semi-structured, face-to-face interviews (1998-99)
Interviews via telephone and email
Informal dialogue
On-site observation
Documentation
• Open coding (Strauss & Corbin 1990)
• Adler et al.’s (1999) theoretical framework used as a
‘sensitizing device’ (Klein & Myers 1999)
• Unintended negative consequences (Robey & Boudreau 1999)
• Conceptually clustered matrix (Miles & Huberman 1994)
• Process of reflexivity (Alvesson & Sköldberg 2000)
The ERP initiative: background
• 1995: Four month evaluation study conducted
by IT service provider
• 2nd Q 1996: top management go-ahead, for:
• 3 year project – Europe and North America
• “One of the most important in terms of capital
investment and coverage in company’s history”
The KM initiative: rationale
• “… trying to start KM is more than just catching
up with the latest managerial fashion. The
people at the top are constantly going on about
how critical innovation is to us and how
desperate they are to develop an innovative
culture. But innovation has to come from
somewhere … Personally, I believe KM is the
philosophy that provides the inspiration to create
the innovation.” (Consulting division)
The KM initiative: implementation
• Project team
Corporate Knowledge
Center (CKC)
• Web-based, corporate-wide knowledge
directory (“K-bank”)
– 11,000 personal homepages
– Standard info plus personal info column
• Product-based learning and innovation
communities (LICs) - spread across the globe
– 100 or so
– 60 through CKC workshops/training programs
– 50 with continuously updated websites
Findings
• Complementary or contradictory nature of ERP and KM
systems?
Both judged to be successful, and complementary
– ERP:
• Faster strategic info
• Better coordination of activities
– KM:
• Effective exploration and exploitation of knowledge (March
1991) both intra- and inter-organizationally
• Improved continuous learning (Fiol & Lyles 1985)
Mutual reinforcement of ERP and KMS:
unintended consequences
• Internal boundaries reinforced in products divisions
– Emphasis on individual department performance through ERP
internal competition rather than collaboration
– KM’s LICs set up with representatives from single production
units
no cross-unit learning
• Reduction in social capital
– Reduction in suppliers and service providers
of knowledge for innovation being cut off
critical source
• Creation of inter-group conflict and resistance
– Shift in information ownership from ERP
on KM initiative
negative impact
Case Company B: background
• Founded in 1946
• Headquartered in Boston, MA
• The largest mutual fund company in the
United States
• More than $880 billion under management
as of June 30, 2003
• More than 19 million customers company
wide
• Products include mutual funds, brokerage,
insurance
Globally distributed software development
• Information services in financial markets
• A profit center – competing for company
business with third parties
• USA, Ireland, India
• India – a threat to Ireland, and esp. USA
• Low cost imperative
• Standardized technology, software, methodology
imposed top-down
Research Project Activities
Interviews
– 18 interviews conducted with:
• Engagement Managers in Boston and Ireland
• Project Managers in Merrimack, Dublin, Galway,
and Gurgaon
• Team members in Merrimack, Dublin Galway, and
Gurgaon
Field research
– Site visits to Boston, Merrimack, Dublin, Galway, and
Gurgaon
– Attended 9 Engagement Manager video conferences
(8 in Boston and 1 in Dublin)
Summary of Preliminary Findings
1. The importance and challenge of building team
cohesion among distributed personnel
• Recognizing the role of team cohesion as an important
variable in team productivity
• Allocating people to teams based on past cohesiveness
index
• Installing project initiation techniques that increase
cohesiveness of the team
Summary of Preliminary Findings
2. The need to develop integrative and
collaborative work among distributed teams
– Providing the social networks to develop rapport,
relationships, and trust among team members
– Balance formal and informal communications among team
members
– Building and creating an in-company culture to offset other
cultural differences
Summary of Preliminary Findings
3. The reliance upon standardized processes, best
practices, development methodologies, and
information and communication technologies
– While the standardization of work can aide in
establishing understanding and increased productivity
among distributed teams, it can also have negative
effects, e.g.,
• minimizing innovation
• hurting morale
• limiting development of employee skills
– Needs to be a balance between imposing a global work
culture and allowing one to emerge
Summary of Preliminary Findings
4. Evolution of roles versus planned assignment of
roles
– Emergent sense of anxiety and uncertainty over changing
roles
– Perception of inter-center competition, which can hurt
collaboration
– Importance of articulating and, preferably, negotiating a
shared common vision of the roles and responsibilities of
different solution centers
From “Knowledge Management” to
“Relationship Management”
Through Processes
– Standardized methodologies
– Best practices
– Technological pipelines
Through Technologies
–
–
–
–
Telephone
Conference calls
E-mail
Bulletin boards
Sametime (IM)
Webcams
Video conferences
On-line discussion groups
From “Knowledge Management” to
“Relationship Management”
Through Processes
– Standardized methodologies
– Best practices
– Technological pipelines
Through Technologies
–
–
–
–
Telephone
Conference calls
E-mail
Bulletin boards
Through Face-to-Face
Sametime (IM)
Webcams
Video conferences
On-line discussion groups
Summary Implications
1. Increasing dependence on ICT in accomplishing
distributed work
2. Substitution of face-to-face interaction for
technologically-mediated communication in team building
3. Development of a more fully realized cost model in
project off-shoring, including “hard” and “soft” costs
4. (Over?)reliance on standardized processes and
methodologies in coordinating distributed work
5. More structured approach to communication
Towards a more inclusive framework for
Information Systems Strategizing
Collaborative and
competitive
environment
EXPLOITATION
STRATEGY
(Deliberate)
- codified ‘solutions’
e.g., ERP systems
- standardized
procedures
- rules
- ‘knowledge
mgmt.’
Collaborative Business
Strategy
INFORMATION
INFRASTRUCTURE
STRATEGY
(Socio-technical environment)
- IT, standards, data, architecture
- Information services (sourcing)
- Human resources (skills, roles)
CHANGE
MANAGEMENT
STRATEGY
Socio-political,
technological
and economic
environment
EXPLORATION
STRATEGY
(Emergent)
- communities of
practice
- flexible project
teams
- knowledge brokers,
sharing & creation
- bricolage/
tinkering
ON-GOING LEARNING
& REVIEW
Source: Galliers, 2001