Benefits of Customer Relationship Management on Customer Satisfaction

The purpose of this study is to investigate the efficacy of customer relationship management (CRM) benefits for customers in relation to customer satisfaction. A model has been developed and empirically tested through data collected from a survey of 150 customers of three Malaysian companies. The results indicate that the benefits of CRM for customers have had a significant positive effect on their satisfaction towards marketing companies. Personalized services, responsiveness to customers' needs, customer segmentation, customization of marketing, multichannel integration, time-saving and improving customer knowledge are the benefits that we proposed would affect customer satisfaction and significantly improve marketing performance. Additionally, the results reveal that all the benefits found, with the exception of time-saving, enhanced customer satisfaction. This paper contributes to the existing literature by incorporating the benefits of CRM for customers, and the relationships of these benefits with their satisfaction in the proposed model.

Extending IMPLEMENT Framework for Enterprise Information Systems Implementation to Information System Innovation

Enterprise Information systems implementation is one of the most challenging parts of IT strategy for an organization, since implementation brings in efficiency in the system and justifies the investments made. Therefore, it becomes increasingly important to study the perspectives of implementation to understand the current dynamics. The purpose of this paper is twofold, first is to explore the type of literature that exists in information system implementation and secondly to determine the research methodologies incorporated therein for the information system field's implementation in specific. The basic content analysis is done to review the articles on information system implementation. A total of 47 articles were selected from peer reviewed journals and conferences. The study was conducted to assess the methodology used, the strategies followed along with the issues and challenges faced in the implementation. It presents an arena of the studies done in information system implementation in past 20 years (typically 1993 to 2013). The IMPLEMENT framework has been proposed to synthesize the literature finding for smooth functioning of IS implementation process. The factors influencing the adoption of information system innovation are described. The comprehensive framework for information innovation process is developed. This framework is then mapped to IMPLEMENT framework. This study would encourage the practitioners in the information systems domain to improve upon their organizational capability and incorporate other best practices.

Continuous Assurance and Business Compliance in Enterprise Information Systems

The increase of reliability and compliance of business processes is currently a major concern of organizations which simultaneously intend to achieve their organizational objectives and be compliant with external regulations. Thus, organizations are frequently looking for methods, tools and solutions which enable them to improve business compliance, and reduce the likelihood of situations that may jeopardize their operational performance and corporate image. This chapter aims to bring together a set of results and conclusions from a research project whose purpose was to conceptualize and validate an innovative solution which simultaneously monitors and audits organizational transactions executed in Enterprise Information Systems. A prototype was developed and deployed in a near-real environment. From the results, we conclude that the prototype offers Continuous Assurance services and is applicable to any organizational transaction, regardless of its type, dimension, business area or even its information system support technology. This independence is guaranteed by the abstraction level of an ontological model which is used to represent the organizational transaction we intend to monitor and audit. A case study enabled us to confirm the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposal in business compliance.

Improving Logistics Costs Through ERP Alignment

This paper examines the alignment success factors necessary to improve logistics cost when implementing an ERP system taking a work system theoretical perspective. Organizations attempting to decrease logistics costs via an ERP implementation must consider the processes and activities involved in aligning participants, information, technology, and business process in these ERP implementations. We used a two-step approach, conducting a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to assess the psychometric properties of our measures and then conducting an independent sample t-test between two groups, one which experienced decreased logistic costs and the second which experienced the same or increasing logistic costs. This research has provided more insight into the practice of ERP implementations and has reemphasized the need to judge ERP success relative to impact on firm performance.

Data Envelopment Analysis for Measuring and Evaluating Efficiency on IT Outsourcing Operations

During the last decades, the IT service sector has been one of the fastest growing segment in the global economy, consequently, Information Technology (IT) outsourcing providers face several challenges: contracts are based on a multi-service configuration; high degree of variance between clients; market dynamism through rivalry, accelerated innovation, client requisites and relationship management. As a result, service providers employ several tools and methods to find the best fit between standardization (mainly for productivity increase) and customization (primarily for client satisfaction), because IT outsourcing operational context display a multi-input and multi-output set of variables that need to be known and managed, thus efficiency measurement is essential to delivery optimised IT operations. The purpose of this work is to identify, describe, evaluate and present a model based on Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), which is a linear programming technique able to manipulate multiple inputs and outputs. DEA allows the identification of the most efficient operation that enables providers to set the best operational strategy to follow. To develop our research, design science research was applied, and eighteen contracts were used to evaluate our model's utility the results show the importance of quantitative measures in a dynamic business environment like IT outsourcing. This work is a major contribution for measuring efficiency in IT outsourcing operations.

Leveraging Enterprise Resource Planning Systems to Digitize Business Functions

The successful implementation of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system is a challenge to many organizations. Though an intervention, ERP brings in large scale tangible and intangible benefits to an organization. It poses significant intervention on firm level endogenous dimensions; internal stakeholders, internal organization, business processes and technology. Though literature recognizes that ERP intervention brings about technological change during ERP implementation, hardly any article has conceptualized these interventions in evaluating its performance. Drawing on the Socio Technical system perspective the objective of this article is to conceptualize the ERP intervention on the endogenous dimensions of the organization and develop a comprehensive conceptual model to assess the success or failure of ERP system implementation. The conceptual model, Process-Variance and Adapted Socio-Technical (PVAST), proposed in this article will enable decision makers and practitioners to measure ERP project performance at every stage of its life cycle in a coherent method and adopt corrective measures.

An Exploratory Study on the Influencers of the Perceived Relevance of CIO's Activities and Skills

This paper presents the results of an exploratory study developed to identify the current CIO's main activities, to verify whether CIO's demographics and CIO's business context influence the perception of the importance of CIO activities and to identify CIO's main skills. The results show that managing projects, interacting with top management teams, optimizing business processes and making strategic decisions are main CIO's activities; and that the importance recognized to these activities is influenced by characteristics such as the CIO's age or the hierarchical structure of the organization. Regarding CIO's skills, understanding business processes and operations, and strategic thinking and planning, are the ones CIOs identified as being the most important.

Information Technology Paraphernalia for Supply Chain Management Decisions

Technology and world around have always been advancing time to time. One can speak of diverse areas to show how important IT is in daily business life, and of much Supply chain is one such area with more scope for Information Technology (IT) and has become a determinant of competitive advantage across the organizations. In order to survive in today's competitive environment the firms need to manage the future supply chain. In order to deliver quality information to the decision-maker at the right time and in order to automate the process of data collection, collation and refinement, the companies have to make IT an ally, harness its full potential and use it in the best possible means. IT is beneficial for cooperation and integration within the stakeholders of the supply chain. The chapter throw a light upon the stature of various technology based Tools in Supply Chain Management (SCM). The study also highlights the contribution of technology in helping to restructure the entire supply chain process to achieve higher service levels, lower inventory and the supply chain costs.

Contemporary Issues in Enterprise Information Systems

The widespread usage of enterprise information systems (EIS) by various companies operating in different countries has led to digitalization of inter and intra-organizational business functions like customer relationship management (CRM) and supply chain management (SCM). This study considers current issues in EIS implementations in the context of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems in different countries, industries and companies. Due to the increasing demands and varying needs of different parties, ERP implementations are getting more complex, which means considering a greater number and variety of critical success factors (CSFs). This study therefore reviews the current literature related to CSFs and their classifications before introducing a new conceptual model of 40 CSFs for successful EIS implementations.

Approaches for Automating ERP Category Configuration for SMEs

Disruptive business models, such as software as a service and open source software, have made Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) packages and related software more accessible for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). However, the consulting required to configure an ERP to meet the specific needs of an organization remains a major financial burden for SMEs. One configuration task which is common to many ERPs is category configuration. With the help of automated category configuration support, managers of small businesses can perform category configuration on their own and reduce part of the consulting cost. This chapter presents the design of generic automation approaches for ERP category configuration, their implementation and their application to the open source ERP package ERP5. The approaches are based on similarity of example data, automatic vocabulary consolidation through Wikipedia redirects and (meta-) templates. The empirical evaluation through a laboratory experiment with one hundred test persons and a survey supports the validity, effectiveness and utility of the designed artefact.