Strategic Alignment: A Model for Organizational Transformation via Information Technology

Abstract As organizational transformation emerges as an important theme among both management scholars and practitioners, it is perhaps a truism that the organizations of the 1990s will be significantly different from those of the last few decades. Although several factors are thought to influence and propel the organizational transformation process, as the chapters in this volume demonstrate, a major force lies in the recent developments and capabilities offered by information technologies (IT) namely, computers and communication technologies. This is mainly due to the acceleration in recent years of the power and capabilities of these technologies, with a corresponding improvement in the cost-performance ratio (Scott Morton, 1991). Over the last few years, several different arguments have been offered to highlight the potential of IT to influence competitive characteristics (see, e.g., Keen, 1986; McFarlan, 1984; Parsons, 1983; Porter & Millar, 1985; Rockart & Scott Morton, 1984; Wiseman, 1985) as well as to enable and shape business transformations, but there is a glaring lack of systematic frameworks to conceptualize the logic, scope, and patterns of organizational transformation enabled by information technology (IT). To help address this deficiency, this chapter develops and presents a conceptual model with a set of propositions and management implications.