Organizational culture and information systems strategic alignment

Organizational Culture and Business-IT Alignment: A Compositional Study

In the digital age, the role of information technology (IT) management in organizations is fundamentally changing, especially in aligning business and IT. This study examines the relationship between organizational culture and business-IT alignment. It juxtaposes two four-component models in a novel way and presents a sound methodology for dealing with multiplicative ipsative rating scales of a questionnaire. Such measures have in common that the items’ alternatives relate to each other or the whole and need corresponding compositional data analysis. Linear regression and the resulting log-ratio coefficients reveal a culture/alignment combination of hierarchy with service- and adhocracy with investment orientation. This study claims to be one of the first papers to successfully employ the established compositional methodology on a composition-to-composition model in IT management research.

The role of enterprise information systems strategies enabled strategy-making on organizational innovativeness: a resource orchestration perspective

Purpose

The paper aims to establish the role of enterprise information systems strategies (ISS) enabled by business strategies for attaining organizational innovativeness (ORIN) mediated by performance (decision-making and business processes) under environmental turbulence.

Design/methodology/approach

The research framework is developed based on theoretical grounding and validated with the help of 408 responses from Brazil using SmartPLS path modeling.

Findings

The results of the research suggest that the resource orchestra of enterprise information systems strategy-enabled strategy-making can be a viable alternative to enhance innovation activities in the organizations through the mediated role of performance (decision-making and business process).

Practical implications

The research demonstrates the role of business function (information systems) strategy enabled overall business strategy-making for achieving innovations in the organization. Fortune organizations are exploiting the information systems strategy enabled business strategy for innovations in the organization; such as Amazon, Walmart, Costco, etc.

Originality/value

The proposed and validated model is a contribution to the enterprise information systems strategy theory. This model presents the role of resource orchestras in achieving innovations in organizations.

Effects of organizational culture, affective commitment and trust on knowledge-sharing tendency

Purpose

Prevailing corporate culture coupled with affective trust in co-workers and affective organizational commitment may promote or hinder the tendency for people to share knowledge. This study aims to determine whether knowledge-sharing tendency varies from one form of organizational culture to another by examining the concurrent mediation of affective trust in co-workers and affective organizational commitment and provide insights for appropriate knowledge-sharing initiatives.

Design/methodology/approach

Adult learners (N = 408) enrolled in the MBA and MSc postgraduate programs at five private universities in Singapore participated in a two-part self-administered anonymous survey. Data were analyzed with SmartPLS partial-least squares structural equation modeling using a two-stage analytical technique that examined the measurement and structural models.

Findings

The concurrent effects of affective trust in co-workers and affective organizational commitment complementarily mediated the relationship of organizational culture on the knowledge-sharing tendency for adhocracy, clan and market cultures but fully mediated for hierarchy culture.

Practical implications

This study provides insights for managers to understand the characteristics of their organizational culture and choose appropriate practices for improving knowledge-sharing tendency among its employees.

Originality/value

A model is established to determine the type of organizational culture that facilitates knowledge-sharing tendency. It offers new theoretical insights into how and why affective trust in co-workers and affective organizational commitment impact the relationship of organizational culture on knowledge-sharing tendency. Understanding these relationships can provide valuable insights into various strategies for different organizational cultures to increase employees’ knowledge-sharing tendency.

Achieving Strategic Alignment of Big Data Projects in Saudi Firms

Big data projects can fail due to the lack of alignment between the big data project strategy and the overall business strategy. This research considers organizational culture as an enabler of a better alignment between the two. To test the research hypothesis, a questionnaire was collected from several dozen IT decision-makers in Saudi organizations who have implemented big data projects. Statistical analysis using PLS indicates that the alignment of big data projects and overall business strategy is highly influenced by the five dimensions of organizational culture identified by Smit et al. (2008), namely strategy, leadership, adaptability, coordination, and team relationships

IT Process Alignment in Business Strategy: Examining the Role of Transactional Leadership and Organization Culture

Information technology (IT) is a competitive path and offers the entrepreneurial opportunity of accumulating business knowledge in capturing consumer behavior. This study employed a conceptual framework to investigate the information processing facet of IT–business alignment under the impact mechanism of transactional leadership in the manufacturing sector of Yunnan Province, China. Specifically, organization culture is taken as a moderating factor extracted from situational theory and has been highlighted as important in previous organizational research. This study aimed at investigating the impact of transactional leadership on IT–business process alignment and studying the moderating effect of organizational culture on the relationship between transactional leadership and IT–business process alignment. The empirical findings reveal that contingent reward and management by exception behaviors of entrepreneurs are significant drivers of IT–business process alignment. Furthermore, market culture had a moderating effect on the relationship between entrepreneurs’ transactional behaviors and IT–business process alignment. Similarly, hierarchy culture exerts a moderating effect on the path between contingent rewarding behavior and IT–business process alignment. Here, it exerts an insignificant moderating effect on the management by exception behavior and IT–business process alignment path. The study findings mainly reveal the association of transactional leadership with IT–business process alignment, along with the moderating role of organizational culture. This study contributes to the literature on business knowledge by showcasing empirical evidence—how information processing aids entrepreneurial behavior to capture market opportunities and consumer behavior.

A novel heuristic approach for sustainable social and economic development based on green computing technology and big data

Purpose

Without damaging and consuming natural resources, green computing technology can meet the needs of society for a long time. This paper discusses how to realize the sustainable development of social economy through the innovation of green computing technology.

Design/methodology/approach

For the green computing technology and sustainable social and economic development problems, it builds back propagation (BP) neural network model and analyzes the topological structure of the network model as well as the impact of the training errors allowed by the network on its performance.

Findings

By optimizing the number of input nodes, the number of hidden nodes and the target value, the genetic algorithm (GA) can get the optimal neural network model. The simulation experiment proves that the proposed model is effective.

Originality/value

It can not only reduce the possibility of falling into local optimum, but also optimize the initial weights and thresholds of BP neural network and further improve the stability and test effect of BP neural network model.

Accelerating retail supply chain performance against pandemic disruption: adopting resilient strategies to mitigate the long-term effects

Purpose

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has disrupted global supply chains, revealing dreadful gaps and exposing vulnerabilities. Retailers are challenged to tackle risks and organise themselves to fit into the “new normal” scenario. This global outbreak has established a volatile environment for supply chains; it has raised the question of survival in the market, forcing companies to rethink resilient strategies to be adopted for the post-pandemic situation to mitigate the long-term effects of this virus. This study explores the priorities for retail supply chains (RSCs) to align their business operations and strategies for the post-pandemic world.

Design/methodology/approach

This study has utilised integrated full consistency model (FUCOM) – best–worst method (BWM) for assessment of RSCs to enhance their business performance irrespective of pandemic disruptions. The FUCOM has been employed to identify the priorities of determinants enhancing business performance, whereas RSC strategies are evaluated using the BWM method.

Findings

The current study identifies “Collaboration Efficiency” as the main criterion for accelerating the performance of RSCs in a dynamic social environment. Also, the study concludes that “Order Fulfilment” and “Digital RSCs” are the most appropriate resilient business strategies to mitigate the long-term effects.

Research limitations/implications

Supply-demand balancing is a challenging task at the moment, but highly significant for the future. The pandemic disruptions have placed intense pressure on retailers to deliver products as per consumers' changing behaviours towards the purchase of essentials and other products. Hence, “Order Fulfilment” and “Digital RSCs” should be adopted for meeting customer requirements and to ensure sustainability in the post-pandemic business world.

Originality/value

This work sets out a comprehensive framework which will be helpful for accelerating RSCs performance against pandemic disruption by adopting resilient strategies to mitigate the long-term effects.

Taxonomy of organizational alignment: implications for data-driven sustainable performance of firms and supply chains

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify, characterize, classify and conceptualize different perspectives on strategic alignment still in use, propose a taxonomy and definitions that allow understanding the various coexisting concepts, as well as investigate the implications of strategic alignment for data-driven sustainable performance of firms and supply chains.

Design/methodology/approach

Bibliographic review was used.

Findings

The taxonomy proposes two classes of strategic alignment: (1) Align – more rigorous types of alignment: structure alignment, strategic congruence and strategy alignment; (2) Fit – less rigorous types of alignment: contingency strategic adjustment, strategic coalignment and strategic consistency. Companies are accumulating large amounts of data, which relevance varies widely. The strategic alignment can define criteria to select only the data that have strategic value, which restricts the amount of data to be analyzed. Each of the six types of strategic alignment is appropriate for a given situation in companies and/or supply chains.

Research limitations/implications

The limitations stem from the exclusive use of the taxonomy of strategic alignment, without considering the most diverse perspectives of strategy.

Practical implications

Decision makers will be able to identify more objectively which classes of data should be explored in each situation.

Social implications

Theoretical implications – The taxonomy proposal and the definition of each of the strategic alignment perspectives solve generalized misunderstandings resulting from the lack of a clear delimitation between the perspectives and the conceptual divergence between authors, who use them as equivalent or synonymous.

Originality/value

From 1961 to 2019, no paper was found proposing taxonomy, typology, systematization, ranking, distribution or classification of strategic alignment. The strategic alignment can define criteria to select, within the large amount of data accumulated by the company, only those that have strategic value, what restricts the quantity of data to be analyzed and facilitates the decision of the leaders.