Country-level characteristics, organizations and ICT adoption: an in-depth study in the publishing industry Gianvito Lanzolla & Fernando Suarez Cass Business School & Boston University

Agenda Research focus Methodology Results Policy implications Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Research focus To study the relationship between country-level characteristics and ICT adoption within organizations Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Studying ICT adoption: methodological issues ICT adoption Defining and capturing ICT adoption Independent variable –Firm-level characteristics –Organizational environment Functional form & Causality ICT adoption = f( firm-level characteristics,...., organizational environment ) Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

ICT adoption ICT breakdown (What) –e.g. in which technologies and for which processes organizations allocate their ICT budget, what organizations adopt ICT adoption process (How) –e.g. how organizations implement ICTs, how organization adopt ICT adoption timing (When) –e.g. timing in ICTs implementation Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Organizational environment Firm’s ecosystem – e.g. a firm’s network of business relationships, local environment, etc. Industry characteristics – e.g. service vs. manufacturing industries Country-level characteristics – e.g. institutional form, market structures, general infrastructures, etc. Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Organizational characteristics IT managerial capabilities (Mata et al., 1995; Sambamurthy and Zmud, 1992) IT skills (Katz, 1974; Ross et al., 1996) A firm’s absorptive capacity (Cohen & Levinthal, 1990) Technology readiness (Davis and Bagozzi, 1989) “Complementary workplace organization” and resources (Bresnahan et al., 2002; Clemons and Row 1991) Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Methods Comparative study across 5 countries –UK, US, Italy, China, Brazil In-depth study on a single industry (publishing) based on primary data (survey) –cross sectional study Integrative, theory-driven methodology to measure organizational characteristics Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Sample China –53 returned questionnaires “G8” countries (US, UK and Italy) –30 returned questionnaires Brazil –60 retuned questionnaires! Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Measures ICT adoption patterns –Breakdown by ICT functionalities, Breakdown by ICT technical features, implementation process, adoption timing Country-level characterises –GDP/capita Organizational characteristics –Age, Size, Organizational Complexity, Organizational Form (state controlled or privately controlled) Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

(1) Breakdown by ICT functionalities Breakdown by ICT functionalities Primary Activities Secondary Activities Operations Management Administrative processes Procurement Marketing & Sales Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Breakdown by ICT functionalities: Results 1.Emerging countries allocate proportionally more resources in ICTs to support secondary activities than “G8” countries 2.There is no significant country-level effect in resource allocation in primary activities (After controlling for organizational level characteristics) Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

(2) Breakdown by ICT technical features Communication infrastructures Application software Internet oriented software Software maintenance Integrations solutions Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

(2) Breakdown by ICT technical features: Results 1.Emerging Countries allocate proportionally more resources in communication infrastructures than “G8” countries 2.No significant country-level differences are found for the other technical features (After controlling for firm level characteristics) Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

ICT implementation process Learning process that enable the organization to make cognitive, interpersonal, and organizational adjustments that allow new routines to become ongoing practice (Edmondson, Bohmer and Pisano, 2001) –Project manager authority –ICT project endorsement –Reward and motivation system Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

ICT implementation process: Results 1.In G8 countries, project managers benefit from higher authority 2.In G8 Countries the level of ICT projects endorsement is higher 3.No statistically significant differences for country level characteristics in team rewards systems (After controlling for firm level characteristics) EndorsementProject manager authority

(4) ICT adoption timing Centralized computing LAN Web Servers Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

(4) ICT adoption timing: Results 1.G8 countries have been earlier adopters of LAN and centralized computing (cc) 2.There seem to be no country-level effect in web server adoption timing (After controlling for firm level characteristics) CC LANWeb Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Policy implications Country-level characteristics still trigger significant differences in what, how and when organizations adopt ICTs ICT policies may need to be country specific –ICT policies are not totally transferable from one country to another, –Emerging countries countries need to find their “own” policies. For instance, in “emerging countries”, policies to help firms improve ICT implementation should be considered –The implementation process is crucial for the successful use of new technologies Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School