Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Abstract Information technology (IT) professionals have discussed the potential value of an organization’s IT infrastructure. Unique characteristics of this infrastructure determine its value to the organization. One characteristic, flexibility, has captured the attention of managers in organizations. A flexible IT infrastructure has even been touted by some as the next competitive weapon. Despite this suggestion, empirical evidence has been sparse. The purpose of this paper is to offer an exploratory analysis into the relationship between flexible IT infrastructure and competitive advantage. A canonical correlation analysis is used to explore this relationship. The findings support the view that there is a positive relationship between flexible IT infrastructure and competitive advantage. <s> BIB001 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> The notion of the agile workforce has been discussed as central to creating the agile organization, which achieves superior environmental responsiveness in contexts of turbulence and change. Previo... <s> BIB002 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Agility is vital to the innovation and competitive performance of firms in contemporary business environments. Firms are increasingly relying on information technologies, including process, knowledge, and communication technologies, to enhance their agility. The purpose of this paper is to broaden understanding about the strategic role of IT by examining the nomological network of influences through which IT impacts firm performance. By drawing upon recent thinking in the strategy, entrepreneurship, and IT management literatures, this paper uses a multitheoretic lens to argue that information technology investments and capabilities influence firm performance through three significant organizational capabilities (agility, digital options, and entrepreneurial alertness) and strategic processes (capability-building, entrepreneurial action, and coevolutionary adaptation). We also propose that these dynamic capabilities and strategic processes impact the ability of firms to launch many and varied competitive actions and that, in turn, these competitive actions are a significant antecedent of firm performance. Through our theorizing, we draw attention to a significant and reframed role of IT as a digital options generator in contemporary firms. <s> BIB003 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Information systems researchers have a long tradition of drawing on theories from disciplines such as economics, computer science, psychology, and general management and using them in their own research. Because of this, the information systems field has become a rich tapestry of theoretical and conceptual foundations. As new theories are brought into the field, particularly theories that have become dominant in other areas, there may be a benefit in pausing to assess their use and contribution in an IS context. The purpose of this paper is to explore and critically evaluate use of the resource-based view of the firm (RBV) by IS researchers. ::: ::: The paper provides a brief review of resource-based theory and then suggests extensions to make the RBV more useful for empirical IS research. First, a typology of key IS resources is presented, and these are then described using six traditional resource attributes. Second, we emphasize the particular importance of looking at both resource complementarity and moderating factors when studying IS resource effects on firm performance. Finally, we discuss three considerations that IS researchers need to address when using the RBV empirically. Eight sets of propositions are advanced to help guide future research. <s> BIB004 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> We examined the influence of information technology (IT) acceptance on organizational agility. The study was based on a well-established theoretical model, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). We attempted to identify the relationships between IT acceptance and organizational agility in order to see how the acceptance of technology contributes to a firm's ability to be an agile competitor. Structural equation modeling techniques were used to analyze the data. Results from a survey involving 329 managers and executives in manufacturing firms in Malaysia showed that actual system or technology usage had the strongest direct effect on organizational agility. Meanwhile, perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of IT influenced organizational agility indirectly through actual systems or technology use and attitudes towards using the technology. The results have several implications for IS management. <s> BIB005 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Information System Development (ISD) agility is concerned with why and how ISD organizations sense and respond swiftly as they develop and maintain Information System applications. We outline a theory of ISD agility that draws upon a model of IT innovation and organizational learning. The theory adopts March's concepts of exploration and exploitation to investigate agility in the context of ISD organizations. Depending on their learning focus, ISD organizations make choices as to what sensing and responding swiftly means. This is reflected in how they value speed in relation to other ISD process goals, including quality, cost, risk and innovative content. The paper examines two specific Research Propositions: (1) ISD organizations locate themselves into different innovation regimes with respect to their need for exploration and exploitation, and (2) their perceptions of agility differ in those regimes as reflected in their process goal priorities. We validate these propositions through an empirical investigation of changes in ISD organizations' process goals and innovation practices over a period of over 4 years (1999-2003), during which time they shied away from exploration to exploitation while innovating with Internet computing. These ISD organizations viewed agility differently during the studied time periods as reflected in how they traded innovative content or speed vis-a-vis the other process goals of cost, risk, and product quality. In conclusion, this paper discusses implications for future research on agility in ISD organizations. <s> BIB006 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Organizational agility has recently received a great deal of attention as a significant business capability for competing in the current dynamic business environments. Further, researchers have hypothesized that information technology management enables organizational agility and competitive success. However, few large scale empirical efforts have yet been conducted to examine the hypothesized nomological networks surrounding IT capabilities, organizational agility, and competitive performance. This research utilizes data from a large-scale field survey and archival performance data to test a model of the relationships among IT capabilities, organizational agility, and firm performance. The results of a structural equation model analysis indicate that IT capability enables operational innovation capability and operational excellence capability, which in turn affect the development of two types of agility. These two types of agility, entrepreneurial and adaptive agility, are found to be associated with firms' sustainable competitive advantage. These findings provide a better understanding of the strategic role of IT in contemporary businesses. The study benefits both academics and practitioners by providing conceptual advancements of research constructs and theoretical extension of IT-enabled organizational agility. <s> BIB007 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Abstract. Niche companies are per definition idiosyncratic. They survive in a competitive world by mastering a small market niche, providing what their customers need. This often requires a flexible organization, and the ability to customize products. To be more efficient, many of these companies rely on extensive use of IT, often by installing general Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems. These systems have grown from isolated systems that handle planning based on incoming orders and the component structure of the various products, to systems with ambitions to embrace the total functioning of the company including vendor and customer relation management. In this paper, we present four case studies. One company is a part of a large enterprise, but performs niche functions within this enterprise. The other three are small- or medium-sized enterprises. Each of these performs in small niche markets. Common to all is the fact that they encounter problems with the utilization of their ERP systems. The major problem seems to be that the ERP system has an inherent business model that may not conform to the needs of the company. Without a good understanding of the underlying models and the constraints under which the fundamental algorithms operate, it is difficult to use these systems correctly. Even excellent systems may give bad results if they are applied to situations where they are not suited. Further, the monolithic structure of an ERP system, with a rather complicated parameter setting, is often insufficient to mould the system to the needs of a niche company. We discuss these problems based on our four case studies, and offer alternative approaches that may be considered. <s> BIB008 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> This study develops a research model of how the technical, behavioral, and business capabilities of IT personnel are associated with IT infrastructure capabilities, and how the latter are associated with IT-dependent organizational agility, which is conceptualized as comprising IT-dependent system, information, and strategic agility. Analysis of crosssectional data collected from 293 IT managers generally corroborates the hypothesized relationships, showing that the technical and behavioral capabilities of IT personnel have a positive effect on infrastructure capabilities. The analysis also provides evidence that the effect of infrastructure capabilities on IT-dependent strategic agility is direct, as well as mediated by IT-dependent system and information agility. The validity of the findings is strengthened by demonstrating that the hypothesized research model fits the data better than two alternative theoretically-anchored models describing different relationships between the same constructs. This study advances understanding of the interrelationships between two major subsets of IT capabilities, and their relationships with the agility afforded by IT. <s> BIB009 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> An electroconductive laminated window having an electroconductive coating applied to one interior substrate surface with a pair of bus bars electrically connecting a source of electrical potential thereto. The bus bars include an electroconductive layer having volume resistivity less than about 10-2 ohm-cm interposed between and conformable to the surface configurations of the electroconductive coating and a flexible metallic current carrying member. The metallic current carrying member is preferably a mesh of thin copper foil which is substantially bendable in its own plane, and the electroconductive layer is preferably a metallic layer substantially free of non-metallic components, consisting of a mixture of finely divided electroconductive particles and finely divided metal alloy particles having a fusion temperature between about 70 DEG C. and about 150 DEG C. <s> BIB010 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Agility at the individual business unit and organizational levels presents a challenge for many information system (IS) departments. Business unit agility demands the ability to sense and respond to changes in local competitive environments, whereas organizational agility demands the ability to sense broader market opportunities and respond with changes that are organization-wide. The former requires experimentation and customization of system designs, while the latter demands uniformity and standardization. Although flexible and customizable software might assist organizations in adapting systems to meet these challenges simultaneously, coordination across multiple business units also demands effective organization and governance of system design and development. This paper presents a longitudinal case study of an insurance company that was effective at sensing and responding to changes in the environment at the business unit level, but less effective at sensing and responding at the organizational level. Using the platform logic as a theoretical lens, we analyze this case and offer insights into how multi-unit organizations can manage system design at the organizational and business unit levels, thereby supporting agility through the development of effective organizing and governance mechanisms. Our analysis outlines relational and integration mechanisms and explains how these arrangements helped the organization to attain greater enterprise agility and support its overall strategy. <s> BIB011 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Organizations are increasingly engaged in competitive dynamics that are enabled or induced by information technology (IT). A key competitive dynamics question for many organizations is how to build a competitive advantage in turbulence with digital IT systems. The literature has focused mostly on developing and exercising dynamic capabilities for planned reconfiguration of existing operational capabilities in fairly stable environments with patterned “waves,” but this may not always be possible, or even appropriate, in highly turbulent environments with unexpected “storms.” We introduce improvisational capabilities as an alternative means for managing highly turbulent environments; we define this as the ability to spontaneously reconfigure existing resources to build new operational capabilities to address urgent, unpredictable, and novel environmental situations. In contrast to the planned role of dynamic and operational capabilities and the ambidexterity that they jointly offer, improvisational capabilities are proposed to operate distinctly as a “third hand” that facilitates reconfiguration and change in highly turbulent environments. ::: ::: First, the paper develops the notion of improvisational capabilities and articulates the key differences between the two “reconfiguration”---improvisational and dynamic---capabilities. Second, the paper compares the relative effects of improvisational and dynamic capabilities in the context of new product development in different levels of environmental turbulence. Third, the paper shows how IT-leveraging capability in new product development is decomposed into its three digital IT systems: project and resource management systems, organizational memory systems (OMS), and cooperative work systems---and how each of these IT systems enhances improvisational capabilities, an effect that is accentuated in highly turbulent environments. ::: ::: The results show that although dynamic capabilities are the primary predictor of competitive advantage in moderately turbulent environments, improvisational capabilities fully dominate in highly turbulent environments. Besides discriminant validity, the distinction between improvisational and dynamic capabilities is evidenced by the differential effects of IT-leveraging capability on improvisational and dynamic capabilities. The results show that the more the IT-leveraging capability is catered toward managing resources (through project and resource management systems) and team collaboration (through cooperative work systems) rather than relying on past knowledge and procedures (through organizational memory systems), the more it is positively associated with improvisational capabilities, particularly in more turbulent environments. ::: ::: The paper draws implications for how different IT systems can influence improvisational capabilities and competitive advantage in turbulent environments, thereby enhancing our understanding of the role of IT systems on reconfiguration capabilities. The paper discusses the theoretical and practical implications of building and exercising the “third hand” of improvisational capabilities for IT-enabled competitive dynamics in turbulence. <s> BIB012 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Understanding how IT contributes to a firm's competitive advantage has long been of interest. While managers have made significant investments in IT, inflexible legacy systems hinder their ability to respond quickly to market opportunities. Our study examined how the flexibility of an organization's IT infrastructure enhanced information generation and dissemination and that this increased their ability to respond to rapidly changing environments. Our discussion of these information building and information leveraging effects was grounded in the resource-based view of the firm. We empirically tested our model using data collected from senior executives of 105 manufacturing and service firms. We found that IT infrastructure flexibility was positively related to information generation and dissemination. Moreover, information generation was significantly related to organizational responsiveness. Finally, organizational responsiveness was positively related to the firm's competitive advantage. These results showed the importance of developing a flexible IT infrastructure that can be quickly adapted and reconfigured to meet information processing demands in dynamic environments. <s> BIB013 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> IS Facilitates Organizational Agility <s> Firms are increasingly dependent on external resources and are establishing portfolios of interorganizational relationships (IRs) to leverage external resources for competitive advantage. However, the systems of information technology (IT) and process capabilities that firms should develop to manage IR portfolios dynamically are not well-understood. In order to theorize how key structural IT capabilities (IT integration and IT reconfiguration) and competitive process capabilities (process alignment, partnering flexibility, and offering flexibility) operate as systems of complements, we draw on the competitive dynamics perspective and resource dependency theory and on the literature for IT business value, interorganizational systems, and interorganizational relationship management. We also theorize how a firm's IR portfolio moderates the effects of structural IT capabilities on competitive process capabilities and why a firm's environmental turbulence moderates the effects of complementary process capabilities on competitive performance. We test our model using survey data from 318 firms in 4 industries. Our results provide broad support for the following: (1) structural IT capabilities and process capabilities operating as a system of complements, (2) the effects of structural IT capabilities on competitive process capabilities being contingent on IR portfolio concentration, and (3) the effects of complementary process capabilities on competitive performance being contingent on environmental turbulence. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of how firms should develop complementary systems of structural IT capabilities and competitive process capabilities to manage IR portfolios dynamically and leverage external resources. <s> BIB014
The facilitating perspective argues that OA is directly or indirectly associated with IS. Results from a survey BIB005 involving 329 managers and executives in manufacturing firms in Malaysia showed that actual system or technology usage had a strong direct effect on organizational agility. Meanwhile, perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of IT influenced organizational agility indirectly through actual systems or technology use and attitudes toward using the technology BIB005 .  opines that agile organizations and agile information systems are the same thing, due to the dependency of contemporary organizations on their information system from operational to strategic management level. He argues that agile information systems enable agile organizations and vice versa. In that perspective, an agile information system must be able to align information system architectures with the changing information needs of an organization in responding to changes. IS has the capability to quickly compile and analyze data and information, streamline and automate business processes without any effort, as well as build inter-organizational relationships BIB007 BIB010 . BIB004 find that IS enables firms to track shifts in customer choices much more rapidly, hence enables organizations to quickly react to changes in customer preferences. IS support for organizational learning, exploration, and exploitation is a critical enabler of OA BIB006 . Further, the availability of IS that provides consistent and accurate information and the uptake of new working models have positive association with creating agility BIB002 . BIB003 argue that the transformation from the traditional economics of physical components to digital economics demonstrates the enabling effect of IT/IS on organizational agility. IS competencies and the entrepreneurial alertness provide digital options that are generated through the digitization of knowledge and the business process, which in turn facilitates agility. Researchers in new product development BIB012 identify the IS-leveraging capabilities that are reflected through three IS systems (1) as project and resource management systems and (2) organizational memory systems and cooperative work systems that facilitate the organization's ability to spontaneously reconfigure existing resources to build new operational capabilities to address urgent unpredictable and novel environment situations. Scholars advocating the facilitating perspective of IS on organizational agility share a common argument that the alignment between IS and business process is the most essential element that moderates the positive contribution of IS to organizational agility. The IS development effort to align the IS with process changes in a dynamic basis allows every decision for a change to be implemented in the system immediately, thus, facilitating agility BIB008 . Organizational agility also requires IT infrastructure flexibility. IT infrastructure flexibility generates information building, and this directly impacts a firm's ability to respond to environmental change BIB013 . Similarly to the other key areas of an organization, flexible IT infrastructure enables organizations to respond quickly to strategic moves by competitors BIB001 ]. BIB009 signify a positive effect of ITdependent system agility on IT-dependent information agility, and of both on IT-dependent strategic agility. IS Volume 31 Article 8 infrastructure flexibility maintains a certain level of standardization and works as a business platform that is capable of introducing changes throughout the organization en masse BIB011 ]. An integrated IT infrastructure enables an organization to share information, coordinate activities, and align processes with its partners while IT reconfiguration enables an organization to accommodate new applications and reduces the effort a firm needs to change or recombine resources to support evolving requirements to manage its inter-organizational relationship portfolio BIB014 . 