Institutional and Government Markets

Institutional and government markets constitute not-for-profit market with the main objective of general welfare of people. Such markets are characterized by low budgets and captive patrons. Companies serving institutional markets establish and maintain separate departments to meet the specific requirements. Governments are the major and bulk buyers of goods and services in all countries. Government organizations, appointed by governments, have specified procedures which suppliers should follow. Suppliers experience a number of issues while dealing with government organizations. Suppliers require following formal procedures. The procedures may be time-consuming and suppliers may face bureaucracy. Governments adopt digital measures and adopt online buying to streamline the processes, to shorten the time required, and to overcome a number of hurdles. Companies dealing with institutional and government markets should be aware about all these aspects to succeed in the long run and also contribute to the growth of institutional and government markets.

The Municipality’s Role in a Smart Internet of Things Ecosystem

This article explores how municipalities plan and utilize Internet of Things (IoT) for smart city development, as well as how they collaborate with actors in the IoT-ecosystem. To do so, in-depth interviews and secondary information are collected from municipalities in Norway. Overall, the empirical findings confirm that IoT has the potential to make municipalities smarter by improving public services, efficiency of internal management and service delivery. The findings form this study is novel and can help executives to gain practical insight into the theory-heavy subject of smart city development in small and medium sized municipalities

Institutional and Government Markets–Strategies and Initiatives in the Digital Age

Institutional and government markets constitute not-for-profit market with the main objective of general welfare of people. Such markets are characterized by low budgets and captive patrons. Companies serving institutional markets establish and maintain separate departments to meet the specific requirements. Governments are the major and bulk buyers of goods and services in all countries. Government organizations, appointed by governments, have specified procedures which suppliers should follow. Suppliers experience a number of issues while dealing with government organizations. Suppliers require following formal procedures. The procedures may be time-consuming and suppliers may face bureaucracy. Governments adopt digital measures and adopt online buying to streamline the processes, to shorten the time required, and to overcome a number of hurdles. Companies dealing with institutional and government markets should be aware about all these aspects to succeed in the long run and also contribute to the growth of institutional and government markets.

Implementing Social Media - Practical Reflections from County Governments During Hurricane Matthew

Social media is an important avenue for information dissemination and public communication in emergency management. Through social media content analysis and in-depth interviews, this study explores how county level emergency management agencies use their Facebook pages to communicate with the public, using Hurricane Matthew as a case study. The findings reveal some areas of congruence between literature and practitioner experience. The results suggest that public agencies integrate flexible social media strategies, which emphasize one-way communication when the public expects larger volumes of information and directions, and two-way communication when the public might have individualized needs. Furthermore, the findings show that visual content (e.g. pictures) are more likely to garner higher levels of public engagement on Facebook. Last, the study provides several practical suggestions for content creation and interaction on social media for emergency purposes.

Inter-Agency Delivery System

This paper examines the effect of inter-agency delivery systems on the agility of public sector organizations and ease of doing business. The empirical focus is the Nigerian public sector, in relation to the implications of the recent Executive Order regarding how Ministries, Agencies and Departments (MDAs) should operate towards improving the ease of doing business .The study finds that poor inter-organizational linkages in terms of Information and Communication Technology, ICT, and poor interagency collaborative structures constitute serious challenges to the realization of organizational agility and ease of doing business. The paper suggests further investment in establishing a comprehensive government database accessible by various government agencies and enhancing social networking among public agencies through strong ICT and e-governance infrastructure development. By implication, the study reveals that the use of Executive Orders to address fundamental economic and administrative challenges appears perfunctory and superficial without strong ICT support.

The Influence of ICT on the Control of Corruption

Corruption might occur in many places within the government. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) can be used to create a more open and transparent government enabling the Control of Corruption (CoC). The research presented in this paper aims to analyze the effect of ICT on CoC in open government. Using panel data of ASEAN countries over 33 years from 1984 to 2016, this study examined the data utilizing panel Auto-Regressive Distributed Lags (ARDL). The results of this study reinforce the existing literature on the positive effects of ICT on CoC. However, the assumed relationship is more complicated than often assumed. This study shows the presence of a quadratic (non-linear) inverted u-shaped relationship between the ICT development and CoC, which implies that there is no further opportunity for ICT alone to reduce corruption once a threshold is reached. ICT might even be used to facilitate corruption. Hence, ICT needs to be complemented by institutional and organizational measures and education to fight corruption.

Performance Information Artifacts

The field of performance management is premised on the centrality of measurement and performance information use in everyday decision making and practice. Information is managed through the use of information systems, but research shows that implementing these technological systems is not enough. This research responds to recent calls for a better understanding of performance information use and the role of dialogue among stakeholders in promoting learning and system change. Through case analysis and qualitative modeling, it proposes the concept of performance information artifacts, and the need for effective boundary spanners to promote effective learning and knowledge sharing in performance dialogue.

How Blockchain Technology Changes Government

It is widely argued that Blockchain Technology (BCT) is one of the most promising trends nowadays. The most prominent characteristic of this technology is the improved sense of trust to the shared information provided by BCT applications as well as the ubiquitous access to the data ledger. At the same time governments pursue amplified trust from their citizens increasing transparency through shared information and open data. Since BCT supports this strategic goal of governments worldwide, numerous governments try to capitalize on the advances of this technology through testing the results of pilot applications in different vertical governmental sectors. Even though there are several implementations in the Government sector, there is no comprehensive study towards the analysis of the major characteristics of these developments. This paper moves towards the fulfillment of this gap by conducting a thorough analysis of e-Government pilot applications of BCT at a European level providing information to policymakers and practitioners about the grey areas of this technology.

Predicting Customers Use of Electronic Government Services in Nigeria

This study examined how customers’ use of electronic government services in Nigeria were being predicted by supply- and demand-side variables such as; ICT deployment, customer readiness, perceived quality of e-government services, perceived satisfaction with e-government services, web readiness, and web presence quality. The results showed that for business organizations, only web presence quality of government websites, perceived satisfaction with the use of e-government services, and perceived quality of e-government services had predictive relationships with the use of e-government services. For the citizens, all the independent variables significantly predicted the use of e-government services, although ICT deployment predicted negatively citizens’ use of e-government services. The study recommends among others that government agencies should deploy e-government services and channels that will improve the satisfaction to customers rather than providing only sophisticated services.

Inter-Agency Delivery System

This paper examines the effect of inter-agency delivery systems on the agility of public sector organizations and ease of doing business. The empirical focus is the Nigerian public sector, in relation to the implications of the recent Executive Order regarding how Ministries, Agencies and Departments (MDAs) should operate towards improving the ease of doing business .The study finds that poor inter-organizational linkages in terms of Information and Communication Technology, ICT, and poor interagency collaborative structures constitute serious challenges to the realization of organizational agility and ease of doing business. The paper suggests further investment in establishing a comprehensive government database accessible by various government agencies and enhancing social networking among public agencies through strong ICT and e-governance infrastructure development. By implication, the study reveals that the use of Executive Orders to address fundamental economic and administrative challenges appears perfunctory and superficial without strong ICT support.