PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to analyse the benefits and challenges of using a wiki as an intranet/content management system in a company.Design/methodology/approachCombined with elements of action research, a longitudinal case study of implementing a wiki in a department of a Slovenian company was conducted. Interviews, surveys and a log analysis were used for the data collection. The Delone and McLean information systems success model was the underlying theoretical approach to explore the information, systems and service quality.FindingsWhile a wiki may bring important benefits and change to a company's information/knowledge management, the main challenges remain the same as with earlier technological solutions. Additional problems arise due to cultural issues, the lack of control over quality and the fact that service quality largely depends on the users.Research limitations/implicationsA single case study within one company was conducted.Practical implicationsThe findings are important for any manager or developer intending to implement a wiki as an intranet solution as they identify and classify potential challenges.Originality/valueAs one of the first longitudinal case studies of implementing a wiki, several new challenges of Web 2.0 applications and of creating online environments for knowledge sharing are identified, while well‐studied problems concerning other projects seeking to develop information systems also apply. A novel extension to the Delone and McLean model is proposed.
In transition economies, information and communication technology (ICT) is vital for successful companies and may compensate for an underdeveloped infrastructure and lack of resources. The development of complex ICT systems requires skilled ICT professionals who are often difficult to acquire. In this paper, we address this specific issue of transition economies and propose a novel global software development approach that aims to compensate for the lack of skilled ICT professionals by outsourcing independent development tasks globally to remote developers. The proposed approach was empirically tested in a pilot study at three different locations at University of Ljubljana in Slovenia. The test demonstrated the feasibility of the approach and indicated that task specification quality and developer skills are important success factors. The findings of the pilot study are primarily relevant for software development companies in transition economies even though the approach may also be applicable in other settings where lack of locally accessible skilled ICT professionals is present.
Organisations are investing heavily in various social media applications. Several case studies show that such undertakings may be promising at first glance, but often amount to little. More attention has to be paid to the factors that influence the business value of a social media application. The paper proposes a framework which argues that the business value of a social media activity depends on having a correctly identified purpose of its implementation (scope and targeted benefits), on the technological solution and also on user involvement (user groups, users' motivation and skills). The framework is evaluated with a longitudinal case study of a wiki in a software development company where an assessment of the business value of the wiki at two different points in time was made. The case study shows how the interplay of components led to failure at one time point and success at the other.
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