Start Date
11-12-2016 12:00 AM
Description
The existing research on IT governance largely focuses on formal governance mechanisms, paying insufficient attention to relational governance. However, internal social interaction and relationships between actors play a key role in the realization and implementation of formal IT governance. Drawing from relational contract theory commonly used in inter-organizational governance research, the study proposes a definition of relational governance of IT, and identified five relational norms based on extensive literature review and case studies of two firms: role integrity, mutuality, flexibility, conflict resolution, and propriety of means. Through a survey of 107 Chinese enterprises, the study confirms the positive effects of the five relational norms on business/IT alignment. The study also examines drivers of relational IT governance and provides firms ways to intentionally manage relational mechanisms. The study contributes to the literature in that it is among the few studies that focus on the relational side of IT governance
Recommended Citation
Luo, Jifeng; Wu, Zhiyan; Huang, Zheng; and Wang, Liping, "Relational IT Governance, Its Antecedents and Outcomes: A Study on Chinese Firms" (2016). ICIS 2016 Proceedings. 6.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2016/ISStrategy/Presentations/6
Relational IT Governance, Its Antecedents and Outcomes: A Study on Chinese Firms
The existing research on IT governance largely focuses on formal governance mechanisms, paying insufficient attention to relational governance. However, internal social interaction and relationships between actors play a key role in the realization and implementation of formal IT governance. Drawing from relational contract theory commonly used in inter-organizational governance research, the study proposes a definition of relational governance of IT, and identified five relational norms based on extensive literature review and case studies of two firms: role integrity, mutuality, flexibility, conflict resolution, and propriety of means. Through a survey of 107 Chinese enterprises, the study confirms the positive effects of the five relational norms on business/IT alignment. The study also examines drivers of relational IT governance and provides firms ways to intentionally manage relational mechanisms. The study contributes to the literature in that it is among the few studies that focus on the relational side of IT governance