Doctoral Dissertation Research: Information Technology and New Organization Forms: A Study of IT Adoption and Use among Mass Merchandisers, 1982-1986

信息技术与新的组织形式：对美国大众企业家的纵向研究：1980-1996本论文研究了信息技术与组织之间关系的三个方面：信息技术密集型组织形式在整个产业集团中的采用和传播，信息技术的战略应用，以及信息技术对管理实践和组织结构的影响。 具体的研究问题是：是否采用IT的大规模采购主要是由公司的战略意图，竞争压力，或行业协会和标准制定机构。 大型采购商如何运用资讯科技取得持续竞争优势。 IT何时以及如何负责全新的或逐步改进的组织形式，即工作设计、任务流流程、管理实践、决策等。 本论文的实证工作是基于一个新的，独特的数据集，包括全文文章和年度报告，描述了组织结构调整和战略调整，促进了IT的实施（如网络和电信系统，电子邮件，互联网和万维网，数据库和软件应用程序，和硬件）。对企业的经营效率的“硬”措施的结果进行验证。 本论文是嵌入在新的组织形式的信息时代（NOFIA），在欧洲，亚洲和北美领先的组织学者的合作奋进的研究项目。NOFIA项目由Arie Y教授领导。杜克大学福库商学院新组织形式研究中心主任卢因说。该项目的总体目标是记录新的主要组织形式的演变，并预测其规模。

ABSTRACT Information Technology and New Organization Forms: A Longitudinal Study of US Mass Merchandisers: 1980-1996 This dissertation research examines three aspects of the relationship between information technology (IT) and organizations: the adoption and spread of IT-intensive organization forms throughout an industry group, the strategic use of IT, and the impact of IT on and management practices and organization structures. The specific research questions are: Whether the adoption of IT by mass merchandisers is driven primarily by the firms' strategic intentions, by competitive pressures, or by industry associations and standard-setting bodies. How mass merchandiser's use IT to achieve sustained competitive advantage. When and how IT has been responsible for radically-new or incrementally-improved organization forms, i.e. job design, task-flow processes, managerial practices, decision-making, etc. The empirical work on this dissertation is based on a new, unique dataset consisting of full-text articles and annual reports describing organizational restructurings and strategic reorientations that were facilitated by the implementation of IT (e.g. network and telecommunications systems, e-mail, the internet and world-wide web, database and software applications, and hardware). Findings are validated against `hard` measures of firms' operating efficiencies. This dissertation is embedded in the Research Project on New Organizational Forms for the Information Age (NOFIA), a collaborative endeavor of leading organizational scholars in Europe, Asia, and North America. The NOFIA project is led by Professor Arie Y. Lewin, Director of the Center for Research on New Organization Forms, Fuqua School of Business, Duke University. The project's overall goals are to chronicle the evolution of the new dominant organizational forms and anticipate their dimensions.