Editorial

Citation

Irani, Z. (2013), "Editorial", Journal of Enterprise Information Management, Vol. 26 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/jeim.2013.08826caa.001

Editorial

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Journal of Enterprise Information Management, Volume 26, Issue 3.

It gives us great pleasure to welcome our readers to the third issue of the 26 volume of Journal of Enterprise Information Management, and express our appreciation to them for their continuous support during the past year. The continuous update of the journal's scope to promote theory and practice has led to an increase in submissions that has allowed us to further the quality of the journal. This issue incorporate excellent “quality” submissions that focus on providing a mixture of conceptual and practical contributions.

The third issue of volume 26 commences with a viewpoint by Yogesh K. Dwivedi, entitled “Through the eyes of the eGov scholarly community: perceptions of the quality of journals publishing electronic government research”. This viewpoint highlights that regardless of eGov research having reached a decade-old landmark, none of the existing research studies have attempted to explore and establish the quality of journals publishing research related to this multidisciplinary area. In order to fill this void, this paper aims to present the findings from a pilot survey exploring the scholarly perceptions of academic journals publishing e-Gov research. The author employed a questionnaire-based pilot survey as the method for conducting this research. The findings from this pilot survey led to the conclusion that there is general agreement that dedicated eGov journals should be included in the journal rankings that currently exist in reference disciplines. This viewpoint is a first attempt towards investigating and establishing the quality of journals published in eGov research. Thus, the most vital contribution of this paper would be to stimulate constructive debate amongst researchers of eGov (and its reference disciplines) on this topic, which (the author hopes) will then lead to the creation of rigorous consensus-based ranking of journals publishing eGov research.

The viewpoint is followed by a research paper by Andrew L. Norton, Yvette M. Coulson-Thomas, Colin J. Coulson-Thomas and Colin Ashurst, entitled, “Ensuring benefits realisation from ERP II: the CSF phasing model”. This research investigates the allocation of resources contributing towards benefits realisation in the context of ERP II. This research employs a case-study investigation based on a five-month placement within the project team of an organisation implementing ERP II. In order to categorise invested resources, a CSF phasing model was developed based on 19 factors for ERP II in addition to six factors that are already discussed in the literature. The motivation for developing the model was to provide greater understanding of not only the CSFs involved in ERP II implementations, but also of where they need to be applied during the implementation lifecycle. The authors claim that this is the first time that CSFs have been allocated to different phases of the implementation lifecycle using a structured model. As a result, resources contributing towards benefits realisation can be more effectively applied, saving the organisation's valuable resources.

Then we have a research paper from Janet Williams, Michael D. Williams and Arthur Morgan, entitled “A teleological process theory for managing ERP implementations”. This paper aims to contribute by presenting a framework that highlights the features of teleological design in organisational change and the multidimensional collaborative role of a central designer or entity within it. By drawing upon the literature on information systems (IS) and organisational development, the paper addresses the following question: in the process of designing change, what dimensions are critical to a successful IT-enabled change program? In order to respond to this question, the authors employed an in-depth interpretive study of eight public-sector organisations. In doing so, two primary methods of data collection were analysed during the investigation; survey questionnaires and in-depth interviews. This paper proposes benefits of applying teleological theory to the context of designing the change, pre- and post-project implementation.

Thereafter, we have a research paper addressing a contemporary issue from Yazan Alshamaila Savvas Papagiannidis, and Feng Li entitled “Cloud computing adoption by SME's in the north east of England: a multi-perspective framework”. This research study is an early attempt to investigate and develop an SME cloud computing adoption model that was theoretically grounded in the technological, organisational and environmental (TOE) framework. By adopting the TOE framework, the authors in this research have shown correlation between the three contexts of this framework. In order to test the model in real-time setting, the authors used qualitative exploratory study using semi-structured interviews to collect data in 15 different SMEs and service providers in the north east of England. The authors identified several influential factors playing a key role in SME adoption of cloud services such as: relative advantage, uncertainty, geo-restriction, compatibility, trialability, size, top management support, prior experience, innovativeness, industry, market scope, supplier efforts and external computing support. The authors assert that the findings from this research have key implications and great value to the research community, managers and ICT providers, in terms of formulating better strategies for cloud computing adoption.

Hereafter, next two papers have examined issues related with supply chain visibility (SCV). Suparna Goswami, Tobias Engel and Helmut Krcmar's research entitled, “Information visibility in supply chain management information systems: a comparative analysis”, highlights the need for evaluating the extent to which different supply chain information systems (SCIS) support the information visibility needs of the network, and provide a mechanism for evaluating different SCIS. This paper, therefore, addresses this need by defining an evaluation framework for assessing the extent to which information visibility is supported by a SCIS. Based on the conceptual understanding of the literature, the authors proposed a framework to compare two SCIS that are commonly used for supply chain (SC) integration: SAP Advanced Planning and Optimization (APO) and the SupplyOn systems. To validate their proposed framework, the authors compared two different SCIS (e.g. SAP APO and SupplyOn) to assess the extent to which these systems meet the information visibility needs within SC and networks. The authors claim that the framework can be used by organisations to assess the extent to which relevant information is accessible within their SC and to select from various SCIS solutions that are available.

Next paper that is contributed by Roland Klueber and Robert M. O’Keefe started with presenting an argument that in regulated industries there is a requisite level of visibility that should be assessed. In line with the argument this research identifies and organises the components of requisite SC visibility (RSCV), producing simple concepts that could lay the foundation to assess the requisite level of visibility. By employing a case study approach, this study found that requisite SCV in regulated environments can be perceived as dependent upon a firm's strategic orientation, partner capabilities, the need for SC compliance to regulations, the desire for operational flexibility and issues within the environment in which the SC operates. The case also suggests that a capabilities, rather than outcomes based, approach has merit. The contributors of this paper claim that using the RSCV concept to manage large-scale SCV initiatives can help firms in highly regulated industries identify the critical factors that increase or limit their SCV. The paper also suggests that when implementing an IT solution for RSCV, networkability across the SC partners is a key limiting factor.

Finally, we have a research paper by John Ward and Elizabeth M. Daniel, entitled “The role of project management offices (PMOs) in IS project success and management satisfaction”. This paper attempts to contribute to an understanding of the role and impact of PMOs in IS projects, by exploring the practices they participate in and the extent to which this participation contributes towards satisfaction with those practices and overall project success and senior management satisfaction. The study uses an exploratory survey method to consider the relationship of both the presence of a PMO and the involvement of the PMO in five key practices that span the project life cycle on project success and management satisfaction. Counter-intuitively, it is found that the presence of a PMO reduces senior management satisfaction with IS projects and has no effect on the overall success rates of those projects. The author claim their research to be the first of its kind that focuses on identifying a reduced level of management satisfaction associated with the presence of a PMO.

Zahir Irani