Abstract

Organization design theory is applied to issues in information systems (IS) management of application software maintenance. Following the suggestion of Galbraith (1973, 1977), it is argued that inceased uncertainty in the maintenance task requires organizational adaptation to reduce the IS need for information processing in support of this task, or, alternatively, to increase the capacity for the same. Sources of uncertainty in the maintenance task are identified, and a number of related propositions are developed and enumerated. A corresponding set of design alternatives for maintenance management is also presented and given theoretical interpretation.

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