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This paper studies economic determinants of IS outsourcing. It argues that a focus on comparative economic theories and models can improve our ability to explain outsourcing within the larger context of organizational strategy and environment. Specifically, the research constructs of production cost, transaction cost, and financial slack are examined simultaneously to understand what influences the outsourcing decision. To empirically test these relationships, information was gathered from senior IT managers in 243 U.S. banks. Financial indices from the archives of the Federal Reserve Bank were a second important source of data. Results of the study show that IS outsourcing in banks was strongly influenced by production cost advantages offered by vendors. Transaction costs played a role in the outsourcing decision, but they were much smaller than production costs. Finally, financial slack was not found to be a significant explanator, although firm size was a significant control factor. The paper has important implications for research and practice. For researchers, the findings provide evidence that financial criteria can be key factors in outsourcing decisions and compare the relative effects of production and transaction costs. For practitioners, the findings suggest that managerial sourcing strategies need to weigh both costs when hiring systems integrators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Calls for new directions in MIS research bring with them a call for renewed methodological rigor. This article offers an operating paradigm for renewal along dimensions previously unstressed. The basic contention is that confirmatory empirical findings will be strengthened when instrument validation precedes both internal and statistical conclusion validity and that, in many situations, MIS researchers need to validate their research instruments. This contention is supported by a survey of instrumentation as reported in sample IS journals over the last several years. A demonstration exercise of instrument validation follows as an illustration of some of the basic principles of validation. The validated instrument was designed to gather data on the impact of computer security administration on the incidence of computer abuse in the U.S.A. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Describes an ethnographic study of the impacts of the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities campus' Integrated Information Center (IIC) on a selected group of faculty end-users. Technologies used in searching for literature sources; Faculty preference for habitual patterns of persistent use; Qualitative analysis.

Few cross-cultural studies have investigated how firms diffuse new information technologies (IT). Still fewer have advanced a theoretical perspective on possible cultural effects. In a world moving rapidly toward corporate multinationalism, this oversight seems notable. As foreign managers locate plants and offices in the U.S. and as American managers establish foreign subsidiaries and offices abroad, it is important for these managers to know in advance as much as possible about the impact of culture on technological innovation. Japan and the U.S. are cases in point. Both have subsidiaries and actively market goods and services in the other country, far flung enterprises for which IT seems to be a natural coordinating mechanism. Yet while U.S. companies exploit the advantages of IT such as E-mail, Japanese firms do not. The Japanese, however, do utilize FAX extensively. Culture is one fruitful explanation for these differences. To examine these two markedly different cultures and the effect of these differences on technological innovation, a large Japanese airline and financial institution were chosen as representative Asian sites. The IT experiences of 209 Japanese knowledge workers are contrasted with those of 711 knowledge workers in comparable firms in the United States on certain dimensions. Using Hofstede's work on culture and social presence/information richness theory as grounding, it was hypothesized that high uncertainty avoidance in Japan and structural features of the Japanese written language could explain Japanese perceptions about new work technologies such as E-Mail and FAX. Furthermore, the theoretical conceptualization in the paper attempts to account for Japanese departures from the U.S. experience. Results from empirical tests verified many, but not all of the predicted differences between Japanese and American knowledge workers. In general, cultural effects seem to play an important role in the predisposition toward and selection of electronic communications media. Surprisingly, responses to traditional media such as face-to-face and telephone were remarkably similar between cultures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Describes the results of the survey employed to measure the impacts of the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities campus' Integrated Information Center (IIC) on the end-users. Instrument development and validation; Test of the technology to performance model and impacts of the IIC; Impacts of the IIC.