SAMENVATTING ISS
Module 1
Role of a CIO
Explain the main role of CIO, i.e., IT-business alignment
- Chief information officer: Head of information technology; the highest level IT executive or
manager in a firm or business unit.
CIO’s main role is aligning business and IT
He has three main responsibilities:
- Intellectual alignment (aligning business strategy and IT strategy)
- IT alignment (aligning IT infrastructure with IT strategy)
- Operational alignment (aligning IT infrastructure with business infrastructure)
Business strategy: Strategic positioning (Porter)
Miles and Snow argue there are three generic strategies
Sabherwal & Chan suggest three IS Strategy types
- IS for Efficiency Defenders
- IS for FlexibilityProspectors
- IS for ComprehensivenessAnalyzer
, Module 2
IS Stragety: Module 2 video
4 types of alignment:
1: Business alignment: The degree to which the higher level, externally focused business strategies
are aligned with the lower level, internally focused business infrastructure and processes.
2: Strategic alignment: The degree business strategy supports and is supported by the IT strategy .
3: IT alignment: The degree wo which the higher level, externally focused IT strategies are aligned
with the lower level, internally focus IT infrastructure and processes.
4: Operational alignment: The lower level, internally focused operational level of alignment deals
with how the business infrastructure and processes align with the IT infrastructure and processes.
(2,3 & 4 shows CIO focus!)
Business Strategy-IT Governance Alignment: Alignment between business strategy & IT strategy
Strategic Positioning
Differentiation Cost Leadership
CIO REPORTS TO CEO Alignment Misalignment
CFO Misalignment Alignment
Business Strategy Porter
Differentiation Cost Leadership
Focus is on New product development and Reducing cost and increasing
customer intimacy efficiency
IT can help Integration among marketing, R&D, Process automation, close supervision
strategy by and engineering: collaborative of labor, tight cost management
delivering tools applications
Report to CEO CFO
Why? CEO had a broader cross-functional CFO helps CIO find cost patterns and
view of the firm and its needs for position IT to cut costs
customer intimacy and original
products
,IT Alignment (Alignment between IT strategy & IT operation)
IS Strategy-Business Application Alignment: investing in the appropriate information systems based
on the selected IS strategy type:
IS strategy types
Business applications (below) IS for efficiency Is for IS for
flexibility comprehensiveness
Operational support systems High Low Medium
Market information systems
Market information systems Low High High
Inter-organizational systems High Medium High
Strategy support systems High High High
Operation alignment (alignment between business operation & IT operation) Examples:
Misfit aspect Deficiency Imposition (opleggen)
Process Some tasks required by the business Unnecessary tasks to be performed by
the business
Data misfit Required data quality (inaccurate, Use, collection, or processing of
inconsistent, obsolete etc…) unnecessary of redundant data.
Role misfit Some roles do not support their Unwanted roles or unwanted
responsibilities and authorities responsibilities and authorities for a
role
Control misfit Required control by the business Too much control
(too little control)
Culture The norms New unwanted norms
Summary:
,Video 01: understanding theories
Components of theories:
- Constructs: measurable variables
o Properties of a thing (e.g., organization, person, group)
Theory 1: Alignment -> Firm performance
- Relationships (hypotheses): associations between those variables:
o Casual, correlation
o Example: Alignment is an antecedent of firm performant
Types of relationships can be a negative and also positive influence.
Nomological models: A nomological model includes two or more hypotheses that are visually
presented.
Strength of numbers within nomological model:
- Strong: 0.30 and above
- Weak: 0.10 and lower
- No* or ^ means the number can be assumed 0.
(these numbers are overly-simplified, just to show an
example)
Quickly finding hypotheses in theoretic al paper:
- Look for Nomological models
- Search for H1 or Hypothesis
- Search for Proposition
, Video 02: CIO competencies
● Explain business competence and its dimensions
Business competence:
- Set of business and interpersonal knowledge/skills
- It has two dimensions:
o Organization-specific knowledge/skills
o Interpersonal & management knowledge/skills
Business competence: Antecedent (correlatief is een grammaticaal begrip uit de taalkunde en is de
naam voor het woord waarnaar een ander woord, meestal een betrekkelijk voornaamwoord,
verwijst)
Knowledge/skills:
- Organization overview: know organization goals and objectives, core capabilities, success
factors, external environment.
- Organization units: know different divisions main challenges, language processes, inter-
dependencies.
- Organizational responsibility: feel responsibility for outcomes not directly related to IT.
- IT-business integration: know how IT and business can be integrated to increase
organizational performance.
- Knowledge networking: know the right contacts and sources inside and outside the
organization to ask for answers to business questions.
- Interpersonal communication: be effective at working in teams, communicating with
different people, and communicating in non-technical language.
- Leadership: know and be effective in managing projects, change and risk management and
directing people
IT Competence: the set of IT-related knowledge and experience that a manager possesses.
2 dimensions: IT knowledge & IT experience
Knowledge/skills:
- Technology: Knowledge of current and emerging technologies that are both generic to all
industries and specific to the organization and its competitors.
- Application: Knowledge of current and emerging IT application portfolio, where applications
refer to the ways IT is or could be used by organizations to achieve their business goals.
- System Development: understanding both system development methods and project
management practices in order to understand the potential benefits, dangers, and
limitations of IT.
- IT Management :Knowledge of vision and goal setting, allocation of resources, and
monitoring of progress.
- Access to IT Knowledge: Knowing who to contact to obtain more information about IT-both
inside and outside of the organization and secondary sources of knowledge (e.g., libraries,
the Web).
- Experience in IT Projects: Involvement in the life cycle of IT projects, such as initiation, cost-
benefit analysis, development, and implementation.
