Editorial

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Journal of Enterprise Information Management, Volume 28, Issue 6.

It gives us great pleasure to welcome our readers to the sixth issue of the 28th volume of Journal Enterprise Information Management (JEIM), and express our appreciation to all our readers and contributors over the past year.

The sixth issue of volume 28 commences with a research paper by Muhammad Sharif Abbasi, Ali Tarhini, Tariq Elyas and Farwa Shah, entitled “Impact of individualism and collectivism over the individual’s technology acceptance behaviour: a multi-group analysis between Pakistan and Turkey”. In this paper, the authors report that developments in information technology (IT) and the internet enhanced the growth/interest in usage but equally presented persistently inherent challenges to understanding the extent to which an individual accepts a specific technology. Given that fact, in the line of research that suggests that behavioural models of technology acceptance failed to serve equally across the cultures (national), and across the external factors (institutional factors), this study aims to develop an extended model of technology acceptance. This model includes behavioural beliefs (perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived ease of use (PEOU), subjective norms (SN) and management support (at institutional (IS) and governmental (GS) levels) to examine the academics’ internet acceptance behaviour within the Pakistani and Turkish context. In addition to this, impact of cultural dimension Individualism-collectivism is also examined on the basis of moderator construct. Based upon 380 academics’ response on survey, findings revealed that proposed model achieved acceptable fit with the data (i.e. R2=39 per cent in intention). Using partial least squares (PLS) multiple group analysis (MGA) revealed that culture showed a moderating effect on hypothetical relationships. Specifically, the effects of management support were stronger for the respondents having high on collectivist society (i.e. Pakistan).

The above paper on technology acceptance behaviour is followed by another research paper by Vikas Thakur and Ramesh Anbanandam, entitled “Supplier selection using grey theory: a case study from Indian banking industry”. In this paper, Vikas and Ramesh propose a multi-attribute decision-making (MADM) model based on grey theory to select the optimal supplier and finally, the proposed model has been applied to select the best supplier for “optimizing digital banking” in the Indian context. The authors argue that to predict the exact numerical value for the attributes is very difficult as it involves a very high degree of uncertainty and current methodologies such as data envelopment analysis (DEA), mathematical programming, goal programming, analytic hierarchy process (AHP), analytic network process (ANP), fuzzy-set theory, genetic algorithm, mainly fail do to deliver. According to Deng (1989), grey theory can deal with this uncertain information by giving the opportunity to decision makers to express their preferences in terms of linguistic variables. Researchers such as Wang, 2005 used fuzzy-based approach to deal with the uncertainty in selecting the suppliers. The authors argue that grey theory is better than the fuzzy theory in dealing with uncertainty, because grey theory can handle fuzziness more flexibly. The latter argument is supported by Goyal and Grover (2012) who agree that grey theory helps the decision makers to evaluate the alternatives when incomplete information is available. This optimal selection helps to provide the best supplier for “optimising digital banking” services under uncertainty. The authors argue that since the infrastructure of Indian banking, system is not so strong due to the lack of implementation of latest technology; hence, it is very much desirable to outsource the digital banking system to some external partner. Hence, grey theory approach is the best methodology in the situation like this where insufficient information and decisions have to be made in uncertainty.

Anabel Gutierrez, Elias Boukrami and Ranald Lumsden present research entitled “Technological, organisational and environmental factors influencing managers’ decision to adopt cloud computing in the UK”. This research is focused on UK end-users market where cloud services have witnessed a 27 per cent increase in first-time users over the last 18 months (Cloud Industry Forum, 2013). To help organisations better consider their future IT adoptions, this research therefore aims to determine the factors influencing managers’ decision to adopt cloud computing (CC) in the UK, underpinned by the technology-organisation-environment (TOE) framework (Tornatzky and Fleischer, 1990). Data were collected through a self-created questionnaire based survey that was completed by 257 mid-to-senior level decision-making business and IT professionals from a range of UK end-user organisations. The derived hypotheses are tested using various data analysis techniques including principal component analysis and logistic regression. The findings indicate that four (i.e. competitive pressure, complexity, technology readiness and trading partner pressure) out of the eight factors examined have a significant influence on the adoption decision of CC services in the UK. Among these four factors, “trading partner pressure” was the most significant factor for the adoption decision of cloud services reflecting organisations’ concerns on legal regulations, co-creation and customisation, service linkage and vendor locking which adds complexity to the process of selecting an appropriate vendor.

The above CC adoption research is followed by another research by Björn Link and Andrea Back, entitled Classifying systemic differences between software as a service- and on-premise-enterprise resource planning. This paper responds to the following two research questions:

RQ1. What ERP operation mode differences exist between SaaS and On-Premise?

RQ2. What advantages can be gained by choosing the SaaS or the On-Premise ERP operation mode?

As a result, this research aims to generate a list of general ERP operation mode differences and add up all comparative advantages between the ERP operations modes. In this respect, the paper contributes in two ways to the extant literature: first, none of the extant research studies have compared ERP operation modes. Researchers such as Loh and Koh (2004) and Lechesa et al. (2012) argue that ERP operation modes must be considered separately from other applications, as ERP systems differ fundamentally from other applications e.g. they are of extremely high strategic relevance to the company, have high implementation costs and a long implementation period and must be adapted to the operational processes. Second, current literature on ERP does not present any classification of application-unspecific operation mode differences that is as extensive and complete as this contribution. This research study collects, arranges and completes the existing knowledge about application-unspecific operation mode differences and applies this knowledge specifically to ERP operation modes. Therefore, this paper classifies systemic operation mode differences and states strategies for the selection of ERP operation modes, enabling the ERP implementing customer to select the appropriate ERP operation mode in light of the company’s characteristics. A multiple case study was conducted to verify and refine the ERP domain on operation modes differences. The findings indicate that the most significant decision factors between ERP operation modes are flexibility, customisation, cost and operation and maintenance. Typical criteria for selecting SaaS-ERP are a lack of IT-capacity or capabilities, as well as high need for flexibility, due to business development, seasonality, growth, collaboration and/or expansion.

Then we have Farhad Panahifar, Cathal Heavey, P.J. Byrne and Hamed Fazlollahtabar with a systematic literature review paper, entitled “A framework for collaborative planning, forecasting and replenishment (CPFR): state of the art”. This paper contributes by classifying and categorising CPFR literature in terms of concepts and factors in the form of a framework for successful CPFR implementation. As a result, the authors respond to the following research question, what they claim, remains largely unanswered:

RQ3. What are the constructs and efficient frameworks for successful CPFR implementation?

This question is addressed by identifying and analysing the main constructs for successful implementation of CPFR. This paper then reviews the scope and value of CPFR using a devised state-of-the-art taxonomy for the classification of selected bibliographical references and as a result, proposes a conceptual framework by identifying areas which need more research. The systematic literature review (based on a total of 93 papers published from 1998 to 2013 on CPFR) is conducted by following the steps outlined by Soni and Kodali (2011). The empirical findings indicate that four main constructs that influence the successful implementation of CPFR:

identifying and strengthening CPFR enablers;

identifying and managing CPFR barriers;

selection of appropriate trading partner; and

incentive alignment of trading partners.

The findings indicate that there are many documented CPFR successes in the literature and that as a technique CPFR still has a significant part to play in modern organisational management. Nevertheless, what is also notable is the documented potential promise and the identified “failing” to meet this promise in the literature. To build on this promise the authors assert that there is a need for researchers to move away from simply analysing the implementation of CPFR to concentrate more on the individual and collective components of CPFR.

Following the above systematic literature review paper, we have another literature review paper by Andreas Jede and Frank Teuteberg, entitled “Integrating cloud computing in supply chain processes: a comprehensive literature review”. In this paper, Andreas and Frank argue that the extant normative literature lacks a paper that systematically analyses the interrelation between CC and supply chain management (SCM) in detail. In essence, the authors aim to make this literature review paper a reference point in the intersection of both research fields, i.e. CC and SCM, and acquire in-depth understanding of the current state of research areas and identify future research challenges. The latter is translated into the following two research questions that the authors respond through this systematic literature review paper:

RQ4. What are the currently discussed (region-specific) core research topics with regard to CC in the realm of SCM?

RQ5. How are these topics connected to the most important and efficiency-related influence factors for adopting CC within the SC?

This paper is based on the methodology of a systematic literature analysis, which has proven useful for the identification of the respective current status in scientific research (Fettke, 2006; Levy and Ellis, 2006). Furthermore, the framework proposed by Dibbern et al. (2004) has also been followed during the classification phase of the individual paper, whereas, the execution of the analysis phase is closely related to the five-stage model of Fettke (2006). The five-stage model consists of:

issue description and definition of the research field;

literature search;

literature evaluation;

literature analysis; and

interpretation.

A total of 99 papers are investigated by combining qualitative and quantitative content analysis. Through this paper, the authors claim to present the actual state of CC usage in SCM processes. The outcomes indicate that the linkage between CC and SCM will get stronger in future. Furthermore, the authors perceive that practice has not realised the full potential of this connection and theory lacks both a general research basis and empirical SCM-related papers that ground on real application scenarios. By means of prototyping, expert interviews, action research and further empirical studies the underlying research field should be investigated more in detail. This will support managers and operational users to understand cross-organisational interconnections and facilitate necessary learning processes.

Finally, we have Sanjay Sharma and Sachin Modgil with their research paper, entitled “Supply chain and total quality management framework design for business performance – case study evidence”. This research paper aims to classify the significance of integration of SCM practices with total quality management practices to augment business performance. The objective is to focus on the two important dimensions, i.e. supply chain and total quality management (TQM) of an organisation with distinct reference to the concepts, exploration and exploitation. The need of integration of SCM and TQM practices is supported by emphasis, such as, organisations having integrated supply chain and quality management practices are able to achieve competitive advantage over their competitors. The latter argument is supported by Flynn and Flynn (2005) who state that organisations with sound total quality practices can achieve best supply chain performance. The research reports on 20 factors related to business performance and to understand, which factor(s) fall in exploration or exploitation with reference to TQM and SCM simultaneously, the mixed mode method was adopted. This study leads to some interesting applied implications for practitioners as it offers:

a framework in which the supply chain and total quality management practices can be implemented with respect to an organisational structure (i.e. mechanistic or organic structure);

environmental conditions (i.e. uncertain environment and rapidly changing product life cycle); and

identification of customer orientations (i.e. whether customer is price sensitive or customer makes buying decision on account of trust or relation to the product).

The authors assert that the concept of supply chain exploitation and supply chain exploration with different orientations of quality management has not been comprehensively studied and reported. This paper provides a frame of reference for researchers for establishing a framework of strategies for supply chain and quality practices, with respect to the exploitation and exploration scenario.

We would very much like to thank our contributors for their excellent high quality contributions to this regular issue and hope JEIM readers will find the papers stimulating, original and valuable.

Zahir Irani and Muhammad Kamal

References

Cloud Industry Forum (2013), “UK Cloud adoption trends for 2013”, Cloud Industry Forum reports (online), High Wycombe, available at: http://cloudindustryforum.org/downloads/whitepapers/cif-white-paper-8-2012-uk-cloud-adoption-and-2013-trends.pdf (accessed 2 August 2015)

Deng, L.J. (1989), “The introduction of grey system”, The Journal of Grey System, Vol. 1 No. 1, pp. 1-24

Dibbern, J., Goles, T., Hirschheim, R. and Jayatilaka, B. (2004), “Information systems outsourcing: a survey and analysis of the literature”, ACM SIGMIS Database, Vol. 35 No. 4, pp. 6-102

Fettke, D.W.I.P. (2006), “State-of-the-art des state-of-the-art”, Wirtschaftsinformatik, Vol. 48 No. 4, pp. 257-266

Flynn, B.B. and Flynn, E.J. (2005), “Synergies between supply chain management and quality management: emerging implications”, International Journal of Production Research, Vol. 43 No. 16, pp. 3421-3436

Goyal, S. and Grover, S. (2012), “Applying fuzzy grey relational analysis for making the advanced manufacturing systems”, Grey Systems: Theory and Application, Vol. 2 No. 2, pp. 284-298

Lechesa, M., Seymour, L. and Schuler, J. (2012), “ERP Software as service (SaaS): factors affecting adoption in South Africa”, in Møller, C. and Chaudhry, S. (Eds), Re-conceptualizing Enterprise Information Systems, Springer, Heidelberg, pp. 152-167

Levy, Y. and Ellis, T.J. (2006), “A systems approach to conduct an effective literature review in support of information systems research”, International Journal of an Emerging Transdiscipline, Vol. 9 No. 1, pp. 181-212

Loh, T.C. and Koh, S.C. (2004), “Critical elements for a successful enterprise resource planning implementation in small- and medium-sized enterprises”, International Journal of Production Research, Vol. 42 No. 17, pp. 3433-3455

Soni, G. and Kodali, R. (2011), “A critical analysis of supply chain management content in empirical research”, Business Process Management Journal, Vol. 17 No. 2, pp. 238-266

Tornatzky, L.G. and Fleischer, M. (1990), The Processes of Technological Innovation, Lexington Books, Lexington, MA

Wang, X.Y. (2005), “Application of fuzzy decision optimum model in selecting supplier”, The Journal of Science Technology and Engineering, Vol. 5 No. 15, pp. 1100-1103