Decentralizing IT with the adoption of End-User Development: two case studies
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5753/isys.2018.355Keywords:
End-user development, IT governance, shadow IT, Digital transformation, Case studyAbstract
Context: Digital transformation is changing the industry and the way information technology (IT) is used. Most programs are already written by end users who know the business and need to meet goals with IT, although the governance established is not always adequate. It becomes crucial to understand how to decentralize the IT function to end users in order to prepare the organization for the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century. Objective: Based on a socio-technical perspective, this paper investigates how organizations decentralize IT with the adoption of End-User Development (EUD). Method: Two case studies were conducted in organizations that have been looking for EUD decentralization at least for the last 3 years. A conceptual framework for case analysis was described. Results: Previous maturity in IT governance was an important factor in the ability to decentralize by using EUD, although both cases have not achieved a high degree of decentralization yet. Shadow IT remained in the two cases. None of the two organizations have sought innovation with decentralization initiatives, although this is a fundamental view of the IT function in the 21st century.
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References
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Barker, S. and Fiedler, B. (2011). Developers, decision makers, strategists or just end-users? redefining end-user computing for the 21st century: A case study. Journal of Organizational and End User Computing, 23(2):1–14.
Benbasat, I., Goldstein, D. K., and Mead, M. (1987). The case research strategy in studies of information systems. MIS Quarterly, 11(3):369–386.
Bharadwaj, A., Sawy, O. A. E., Pavlou, P. A., and Venkatraman, N. (2013). Visions and voices on emerging challenges in digital business strategy. MIS Quarterly, (2):633–661.
Bradley, R. V., Byrd, T. A., Pridmore, J. L., Thrasher, E., Pratt, R. M., and Mbarika, V.W. (2012). An empirical examination of antecedents and consequences of IT governance in us hospitals. Journal of Information Technology, 27(2):156–177.
Bygstad, B. (2016). Generative innovation: a comparison of lightweight and heavyweight IT. Journal of Information Technology, 32(2):180–193.
Chua, C., Storey, V., and Chen, L. (2014). Central IT or shadow IT? factors shaping users’ decision to go rogue with IT. In Myers, M. D. and Straub, D. W., editors, ICIS. Association for Information Systems.
DeLone, W., Migliorati, D., and Vaia, G. (2017). Digital IT Governance, pages 205–230. Springer International Publishing, Cham.
Dittrich, Y., Bolmsten, J., and Eriksson, J. (2017). End User Development and Infrastructuring – Sustaining Organizational Innovation Capabilities, pages 165–206. Springer International Publishing, Cham.
Ferneley, E. (2007). Covert end user development: A study of success. Journal of Organizational and End User Computing, 19(1):62–71. Figueiredo, R. M. d. C., Venson, E., Melo, C. d. O., Ramalho, C., Modesto, A. S., Melo,
L. S. d., Nobre, A. J., Moraes, J. M., Ferreira, M. H. P., and Martins, P. (2017). Desenvolvimento pelo usuário final: conceitos, estratégias e casos de adoção: relatório de pesquisa. Technical report, Universidade de Brasília.
Fischer, G. (2009). End-user development and meta-design: Foundations for cultures of participation. In End-User Development, 2nd International Symposium, IS-EUD 2009, Siegen, Germany, March 2-4, 2009. Proceedings, pages 3–14.
Fischer, G., Giaccardi, E., Ye, Y., Sutcliffe, A. G., and Mehandjiev, N. (2004). Meta-Design: A Manifesto for End-User Development. Communications of the ACM, (9):33.
Frey, T. and Buxmann, P. (2011). The importance of governance structures in IT project portfolio management. In 19th European Conference on Information Systems, ECIS, Helsinki, Finland, June 9-11, 2011, page 17.
Furstenau, D., Rothe, H., and Sandner, M. (2017). Shadow systems, risk, and shifting power relations in organizations. Communications of the Association for Information Systems (CAIS), 41:3.
Gross, J. B. and Rosson, M. B. (2007). Looking for trouble: Understanding end-user security management. In Proceedings of the 2007 Symposium on Computer Human Interaction for the Management of Information Technology, CHIMIT ’07, New York, NY, USA. ACM.
Gyory, A., Cleven, A., Uebernickel, F., and Brenner, W. (2012). Exploring the shadows: IT governance approaches to user-driven innovation. In 20th European Conference on Information Systems, ECIS 2012, Barcelona,Spain, June 10-13, 2012, page 222.
Haes, S. D. and Grembergen, W. V. (2009). An exploratory study into IT governance implementations and its impact on business/IT alignment. Information Systems Management, 26(2):123–137.
Karimi, J., Bhattacherjee, A., Gupta, Y. P., and Somers, T. M. (2000). The effects of mis steering committees on information technology management sophistication. Journal of Management Information Systems, 17(2):207–230.
Ko, A. J., Abraham, R., Beckwith, L., Blackwell, A., Burnett, M., Erwig, M., Scaffidi, C., Lawrance, J., Lieberman, H., Myers, B., Rosson, M. B., Rothermel, G., Shaw, M., and
Wiedenbeck, S. (2011). The state of the art in end-user software engineering. ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR), 43(3):21:1–21:44.
Koffer, S., Fielt, E., and Niehaves, B. (2015). IT consumerization and its effects on IT business value, IT capabilities, and the IT function. In 19th Pacific Asia Conference on Information Systems, PACIS 2015, Singapore, July 5-9, 2015, page 169.
Koffer, S., Ortbach, K., and Niehaves, B. (2014). Exploring the relationship between IT consumerization and job performance: A theoretical framework for future research. CAIS, 35:14.
Lieberman, H., Paterno, F., Klann, M., and Volker, W. (2006). End-User Development: An Emerging Paradigm. Springer Netherlands, 1st edition.
Maceli, M. G. (2017). Tools of the Trade: A Survey of Technologies in End-User Development Literature, pages 49–65. Springer International Publishing, Cham.
Melo, C., Moraes, J., Ferreira, M., and da Costa Figueiredo, R. M. (2017). A method for evaluating end-user development technologies. In 23rd Americas Conference on Information Systems, AMCIS 2017, Boston, MA, USA, August 10-12, 2017.
Niehaves, B., Koffer, S., and Ortbach, K. (2012). IT consumerization - A theory and practice review. In 18th Americas Conference on Information Systems, AMCIS 2012, Seattle, Washington August 9-11, 2012.
Panko, R. R. and Port, D. N. (2013). End user computing: The dark matter and dark energy of corporate IT. J. Organ. End User Comput., 25(3):1–19.
Peterson, R. (2004). Crafting information technology governance. EDPACS, 32(6):1–24.
Ping-Ju Wu, S., Straub, D. W., and Liang, T.-P. (2015). How information technology governance mechanisms and strategic alignment influence organizational performance: insights from a matched survey of business and it managers. MIS Quarterly, 39(2):497 – A7.
Richardson, C. and Rymer, J. R. (2016). The Forrester Wave: Low-Code Development Platforms.
Silic, M. and Back, A. (2014). Shadow IT - a view from behind the curtain. Computers & Security, 45:274–283.
Stanton, J. M., Stam, K. R., Mastrangelo, P., and Jolton, J. (2005). Analysis of end user security behaviors. Computers & Security, 24(2):124–133.
Trochim, W. M. (1989). Outcome pattern matching and program theory. Evaluation and Program Planning, 12(4):355 – 366. Special Issue: The Theory-Driven Perspective.
von Hippel, E. (2005). Democratizing Innovation. MIT Press.
Voss, C., Tsikriktsis, N., and Frohlich, M. (2002). Case research in operations management. International Journal of Operations & Production Management, (2):195–219.
Walters, R. (2013). Bringing IT out of the shadows. Network Security, 2013(4):5–11.
Weill, P. and Ross, J. (2004). IT Governance: How Top Performers Manage IT Decision Rights for Superior Results. Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA, USA.
Weill, P. and Ross, J. (2005). A matrixed approach to designing IT governance. 46:26–34.
Winkler, T. J. and Brown, C. V. (2013). Horizontal allocation of decision rights for on-premise applications and software-as-a-service. Journal of Management Information Systems, 30(3):13–48.
Yin, R. K. (2009). Case Study Research: Design and Methods. Applied Social Research Methods. SAGE Publications.
Zimmermann, S., Rentrop, C., and Felden, C. (2014). Managing shadow IT instances - A method to control autonomous IT solutions in the business departments. In 20th Americas Conference on Information Systems, AMCIS 2014, Savannah, Georgia, USA, August 7-9, 2014.
Zimmermann, S., Rentrop, C., and Felden, C. (2016). Governing identified shadow IT by allocating IT task responsibilities. In 22nd Americas Conference on Information Systems, AMCIS 2016, San Diego, CA, USA, August 11-14, 2016.
Zimmermann, S., Rentrop, C., and Felden, C. (2017). A multiple case study on the nature and management of shadow information technology. Journal of Information Systems, (1):79–101.
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Published
2018-05-21
How to Cite
Melo, C. de O., Figueiredo, R. M. da C., & Venson, E. (2018). Decentralizing IT with the adoption of End-User Development: two case studies. ISys - Brazilian Journal of Information Systems, 11(1), 5–29. https://doi.org/10.5753/isys.2018.355
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