TURKU SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS IS AGILITY RESEARCH: AN ASSESSMENT AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS Salmela, H., Tapanainen, T., Baiyere, A., Hallanoro, M., Galliers,

TURKU SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS

IS AGILITY RESEARCH: AN ASSESSMENT AND FUTURE

DIRECTIONS

Salmela, H., Tapanainen, T., Baiyere, A., Hallanoro, M., Galliers, R.D.

CONTENTS

• Background• Research objective• Study design

• Findings• Nine IS research streams that address agility• Summary of research in the four selected areas

• Discussion

TURUN KAUPPAKORKEAKOULU

BACKGROUND

• Large research project with industry in 2006-2009• Development of methods for improving agility of the IS

organization• Four companies and four public sector organizations• Funded by the Finnish … (Tekes)

• Literature reviews• Initial literature review in 2006• Update in 2013-14: two new journals (JAIS, ISJ) +

recent articles in the initial 16 journals


RESEARCH OBJECTIVE

The aim of this literature review was simple: to identify studies from prior

IS research that address agility in the IS organisation context.


STUDY DESIGN• Five-phase approach as recommended by

Webster and Watson (2000). • Keyword search (full text), screening (title, abstract, full

text), backward search, forward search -> classification and analysis

• 18 Journals investigated• The AIS ‘basket of eight’ journals: MISQ, ISR, JMIS,

EJIS, ISJ, JAIS, JIT, JSIS• Six other high quality scientific journals (Database, DS;

DSS; I&M; IJIM; Man.Science) Four practitioner-oriented journals (CACM; HBR; ISM; SMR).


STUDY DESIGN• Keywords (based on Sherehiy et al. 2007),

were:• agility; agile; flexibility; flexible; adaptability; adaptive,

and organic. • In business journals, the keyword “information system”

was used to limit the search to the IS field.• Search was limited to articles published from 1990

onwards.


A TYPOLOGY CREATED WHILE CLASSIFYING AGILITY/FLEXIBILITY ARTICLES


Field of Research Relation to flexibility/agilityStrategic IS management

How the CIO and the senior management should make top-level decisions about IT in a volatile or turbulent environment?

Business agility and the value of IS applications

What is business agility and how do IS applications (e.g. DSS, CRM; SCM; BI; KMS) promote business agility e.g. by supporting rapid sensing and responding?

Design of IT infrastructure

How the IT infrastructure should be designed and maintained in order to enable timely support for rapid business changes?

Skills and competences of IS professionals

What kind of skills and competences of IS professionals are critical in the context of rapid business changes?

Design and governance of the IS organization

How should the IS organisation (including IS outsourcing relationships) be structured and governed to support rapid and continuous business change?

Methods used in IS development

What kind of methods should be used in IS development projects to deal with ambiguous and evolving business requirements?

Methods used in SW development and programming

What kind of methods should be used in software development and programming to deal with ambiguous and evolving system’s requirements.

FOUR RESEARCH STREAMS ADDRESSED

• Flexible IT infrastructure

• New (change-ready) IS organization

• Agile IS development

• IS personnel skills, mindfulness and (change agent) roles


FLEXIBLE IT INFRASTRUCTURE

“Infrastructure flexibility determines the ability of the IS department to respond quickly and cost-efficiently to systems demands, which

evolve with changes in business practices or strategies. The ideally flexible infrastructure would be one that was designed to evolve,

itself, with emerging technologies and would support the continuous redesign of business

and related processes” (Duncan, 1995, p. 44).



FLEXIBLE IT INFRASTRUCTURE

• Main research method• Mainly survey research

• Journals• MISQ, JMIS, I&M, JSIS,

DSS• Seminal articles

• Allen and Boynton 1991; Duncan; 1995; Byrd and Turner, 2000

• Empirical research• Fast expansion of research and

publications after the year 2000

• Antecedents of ITI flexibility• Enterprise architecture

methods, IS organization and IS personnel expertise

• Value of flexibility• Timely BPR, project

success, competitive advantage firm performance

• Assessment• Accumulation of knowledge

related to IT infrastructure• Diversity in models and

constructs

AGILE IS DEVELOPMENT

“The continual readiness of an ISD method to rapidly or inherently create change, proac-

tively or reactively embrace change, and learn from change while contributing to per-ceived

customer value (economy, quality, and simplicity), through its collective compo-nents

and relationships with its environment.”(Conboy, 2009, 340).



AGILE IS DEVELOPENT

• Main research method• Case research

• Journals• ISR, ISJ, EJIS

• Seminal article• Conboy, 2009 often quoted.

• Emprical research• Fast expansion of research and

publications after the year 2006

• Antecedents of ISD agility• Use of agile methods,

adoption through individual and organizational learning

• Value of ISD agility• Traditional ISD success

measures, (e.g. intention to use); innovativeness

• Assessment• Accumulation of knowledge

surrounding ISD• Closely related: Felxibility to

change and flexibility to use.

IS PERSONNEL SKILLS - MINDFULNESS

“For individuals, mindfulness involves (1) openness to novelty, (2) alertness to

distinction, (3) sensitivity to different contexts, (4) awareness of multiple perspectives, and

(5) orientation in the present (Butler and Grey, 2006, quoting from Sternberg 2000 and

Langer 1997).



IS PERSONNEL SKILLS – CHANGE AGENTRY AND MINDFULNESS

• Main research method• Conceptual

• Journals• MISQ (commentary papers)

• Articles• Marku and Benjamins, 1996;

Butler and Grey, 2006.• Emprical research

• None

• Antecedents• Adoption of a new change-

agent role, to replace the old traditional one

• Value of ISD agility• Mindfulness has implications

to operations, development, and management of IT

• Assessment• Two broadly cited papers, but no

empirical research

CHANGE-READY IS ORGANIZATION

“Change-readiness is the ability of an information systems (IS) organization to

deliver strategic IT applications within short development cycle times by utilizing a highly

skilled internal IS workforce. (Clark et al., 1997, p. 425).



CHANGE-READY IS ORGANIZATION

• Main research method• Conceptual

• Journals• CACM, SMR, ISM

• Seminal articles• None

• Emprical research• Only one, MISQ

• Antecedents• Provides many prescriptions

for building a change-ready organization

• Value of change-ready organization• Adoption of change-reainess

improves IS organization’s performance against many success measures

• Assessment• Provides best prescriptions for

agility – widely referenced• Closely related to research on

fdynamic contracts.


OVERLAP OF RESEARCH STREAMS

Change-readyIS organization

IS personnel role and mindfulness

Flexible IT infrastructure

Agile IS development


FUTURE DIRECTIONS• Early conceptual research

• Change and volatility creates new demands for organizations and personnel

• Subsequent empirical research• Detailed advice on how to promote agility in different IS

tasks• Future

• Agility addressed with new concepts, e.g. IT infrastructure capability

• Agility related to new themes – global ISD teams, etc.• Agility related to new tasks – dynamic contracting


FINAL THOUGHTS• Is there a need for a broader “theory” for

explaining agility? • Principles for promoting agility in different tasks appear

to have similarity• Similar background literature (dynamic capabilities,

mindfulness..) is being used for many tasks• Could there be an organisational theory of agile

organizing?• Would a broader approach be more relevant

for practitioners?

Documents

TURKU SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS IS AGILITY RESEARCH: AN ASSESSMENT AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS Salmela, H., Tapanainen, T., Baiyere, A., Hallanoro, M., Galliers,