The development of information infrastructures for international trade to improve supply chain visibility and security has gained momentum due to technological advances. An information infrastructure is a shared, open, and evolving assemblage of interlinked information systems providing distinct information technology capabilities. Examples of information infrastructures are the internet, electronic market places and music platforms. Information infrastructures can be highly beneficial as shown by the aforementioned examples, yet often fail to deliver expected benefits. This research focuses on the cultivation of information infrastructures which refers to a softer, less disruptive design approach compared to traditional design approaches in which systems are defined through specified functional requirements within strict boundaries. Drawing on different stakeholder views within a European Union project for international trade, this research provides a taxonomy of twelve cultivation challenges and four engagement reasons one can expect in the design phase of information infrastructures. Organizational theory is used to discuss underlying explanations. The paper concludes that the cultivation of an information infrastructure for international trade could be highly rewarding, yet is a challenging and long-lasting endeavor which requires multidisciplinary expertise. Practitioners can use the insights provided by this research to increase their understanding of information infrastructure cultivation to ultimately increase adoption rates.
Sourcing has become a popular practice for public sector managers aiming for transformations to save costs and improve service delivery. Nevertheless, public sector sourcing often fails due to stakeholder resistance and power struggles, stressing the need for stakeholder analysis. This paper presents a decision enhancement service for STakeholder ANalysis called STAN. The design of STAN is based on sourcing decision issues and observations obtained from public sector sourcing cases, expert interviews and literature. Foundations are derived from the stakeholder and resource dependency theories. STAN enables to identify stakeholder consensus levels that are visualized on sourcing scenario overviews. The assumption is that providing decision-makers insight in stakeholder consensus levels enables them to effectively decide which scenario to pursue and whom to account for. Evaluation results are derived from three public sector sourcing case studies, suggesting that STAN achieves what it is designed for: providing insight in stakeholder consensus levels for decisionmaking.
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