This thesis seeks to explore how management can work together to adopt an Inter-organisational Information System (IOIS) for Supply Chain Management (SCM) at different levels of collaboration sophistication. 20 common issues associated with collaboration and adoption of IOIS for SCM, were identified from the current literature. Two theoretical frameworks were developed. First, an IOIS for SCM Adoption Framework was constructed to understand the IOIS for SCM adoption process. Secondly, an Inter-organisational Collaboration Framework was constructed and used as a lens to examine and understand the process of inter-organisational collaboration. Five underlying theories, namely agency, needs and motivation, resource dependency, cultural and negotiated order, were drawn on to develop an understanding of collaboration in this latter framework. The study of collaboration for IOIS adoption is exploratory. Eight organisations were approached from three industries and sixteen interviews were carried out with managers who are involved in the supply chain activities. Data was primarily collected using an interview instrument based on literature, and documentary and archival evidence. Interviews were transcribed and cross-case analysis was conducted on the data. Three of the four levels of collaboration sophistication were supported. At the highest level of collaboration, namely cooperation sophistication, the organisations that were studied have growth motivations, same interests and common business objectives, and prepare to develop strategy and finance projects while reengineering their business processes and redesigning their supply chains collectively. Collaboration is not limited to one dimension but multi-dimensional. An organisation collaborates with its partners in one project but that at the same time, they may not want to collaborate on a different project due to differences in business objectives. When there is a disagreement between parties, negotiation is an important process to help resolve their differences. The process of collaboration was summarised into three perspectives: industry, intra-organisational and inter-organisational. These perspectives can assist practitioners who need to understand how to address the process of collaboration in the adoption of IOISs for SCM with their partners.
Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/205399 |
Date | January 2008 |
Creators | Pang, Vincent Ying Kiun, Information Systems, Technology & Management, Australian School of Business, UNSW |
Publisher | Publisher:University of New South Wales. Information Systems, Technology & Management |
Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
Language | English |
Detected Language | English |
Rights | http://unsworks.unsw.edu.au/copyright, http://unsworks.unsw.edu.au/copyright |
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