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An Empirical Investigation into Factors Relating to the Adoption of Executive Information Systems: An Analysis of EIS for Collaboration and Decision Support *
Author(s) -
Rai Arun,
Bajwa Deepinder S.
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
decision sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.238
H-Index - 108
eISSN - 1540-5915
pISSN - 0011-7315
DOI - 10.1111/j.1540-5915.1997.tb01337.x
Subject(s) - executive information system , business , knowledge management , test (biology) , information system , computer science , management information systems , political science , law , paleontology , biology
This study focuses on the organizational adoption of Executive Information Systems (EIS). A distinction is made between two related, complementary EIS capabilities—EIS for collaboration support (EIS c ) and EIS for decision support (EIS d ). EIS c is relatively standardized and replicable, while EIS d has to be developed in situ given the specific characteristics of the user and task. The adoption process is conceptualized as an initial transition from a state of nonadoption to adoption (adoption status) and subsequent internal propagation of the technology (adoption level). Data collected from a national survey are used to test hypotheses between identified contextual variables and the adoption status and adoption level of EIS c and EIS d . Adopters and nonadopters of both EIS c and EIS d do not differ in their organization size, suggesting that the traditional paradigm of “EIS as a technology for large firms” is no longer true. Environmental uncertainty is found to promote the transition from a state of nonadoption to adoption of both EIS c and EIS d while continuing to catalyze the internal propagation of EIS d . While no differences are observed in IS department size between adopters and nonadopters of EIS c , our results suggest that larger IS departments provide the resource base to explore the less standardized of the two capabilities, EIS d . IS support is also found to be critical for the subsequent internal propagation of EIS d . Furthermore, the adoption level of both EIS c and EIS d are found to be promoted by top management support. Implications of these results are discussed for the organizational adoption of EIS.