Information Systems in the Organization

Organization

• Centralized:
• Single IT structure
• Consolidation of functions
• Career paths for IS professionals
• Information control
• Economies of scale

• Decentralized
• IT organizations in divisions
• Closeness to local problems
• Responsiveness to operational requirements
• User ownership of costs and problems

• Distributed
• IT units with joint reporting
• Separation of IS and user functions
• Identification of corporate data and functions
• User ownership of user applications

Typical IS Organization

• CIO

• Development

• Operations

• Data
• Administration

• Network
• Architecture

• Steering Committee

Relationship with Users

• Formal - user agreements and contracts
• Utility - IS supplies standard information resources
• Vendor - IS promotes solutions in competition with outside competitors
• Partner - IS and users share common goals and rewards

Consultants/Contractors

• Access to new ideas and standards
• Access to additional resources
• Change agent who can own responsibility
• Managing the relationship

Ongoing Operations

• Operations management
• Job scheduling
• Error management
• Security management
• Help desk
• Change Control
• Planned
• Emergency
• Access and permissions
• Supported
• Permitted
• Prohibited

• CIO, July 15, 1998

Critical Questions for IT

• How does IT influence the customer experience?
• Does IT enable or retard growth?
• Does IT favorably affect productivity?
• Does IT advance organizational innovation and learning?
• How well is IS run?