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Using coevolutionary and complexity theories to improve IS alignment: a multi-level approach

  • Research Article
  • Published:
Journal of Information Technology

Abstract

The misalignment of information systems (IS) components with the rest of an organization remains a critical and chronic unsolved problem in today's complex and turbulent world. This paper argues that the coevolutionary and emergent nature of alignment has rarely been taken into consideration in IS research and that this is the reason behind why IS alignment is so difficult. A view of IS alignment is presented about organizations that draws and builds on complexity theory and especially its focus on coevolution-based self-organized emergent behaviour and structure, which provides important insights for dealing with the emergent nature of IS alignment. This view considers Business/IS alignment as a series of adjustments at three levels of analysis: individual, operational, and strategic, and suggests several enabling conditions – principles of adaptation and scale-free dynamics – aimed at speeding up the adaptive coevolutionary dynamics among the three levels.

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Notes

  1. We use the term Business (‘B’) capitalized, to refer to all aspects or elements of corporate strategy, or subunit strategies that are individually important or that are part of an overall corporate strategy, to which IS strategy needs to be developed with respect to.

  2. The notion of fit here refers to the degree to which the IS mission, objectives and plans support and are supported by the business mission, objectives, and plans.

  3. IS structure has been defined as the locus of responsibility, the total set of centralized/decentralized solutions for the management of IS (e.g., computer operations, networking, and emerging technologies), and the management of the use of IS (Brown and Magill, 1994). In other words, IS ‘structure’ refers to the formal rules that are readily observable through written documents or rules that are determined and executed through formal position. Formal structure, thus, includes dimensions such as formalization (amount of written documentation), specialization (degree to which tasks are subdivided), standardization (extent to which work activities are performed in a uniform manner), hierarchy of authority (who reports to whom and the span of control of each manager), complexity (the number of activities and subsystems within the organization), centralization (the hierarchical level that has authority to make a decision), etc.

  4. We attend to two aspects of organizational components, structural and social. The first refers to the formal dimension of alignment. The second investigates the actors in organizations, examining their values, communications with each other, and ultimately their understanding of each other's domains (Dougherty, 1992). This component has been referred to as social or cultural dimension (Reich and Benbasat, 2000). We further refer to both dimensions as operational including both the formal and the informal aspect.

  5. Eldredge and Gould (1972) coined the term, punctuated equilibrium,in 1972. It describes a view of evolution not as continual gradual change but of long periods of near stability intermittently disturbed by short bursts of new species creation. The two paleontologists found that evolution happens, not as a continuous steady process, but as a response to changed environments that isolate of small populations away from the main gene pool of a species.

  6. The punctuated equilibrium model was created to explain the discrepancy between Darwin's notion of ‘gradualism” (very slow evolutionary change) vs what appears in geology as gaps in the fossil record. In this respect it is a descriptive theory. We disagree with Orlikowski's critique that it necessarily favors stability – this sets it up as a normative theory – which it isn’t. It recognizes that both very slow and very rapid changes can occur.

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  1. Department of Information Systems and Decision Sciences, GSCM, Montpellier Business School, France

    Hind Benbya

  2. UCLA Anderson School of Management, University of California, Los Angeles, USA

    Bill McKelvey

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Benbya, H., McKelvey, B. Using coevolutionary and complexity theories to improve IS alignment: a multi-level approach. J Inf Technol 21, 284–298 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.jit.2000080

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