Doctoral Dissertation Research: IT is Risky Business: Routine and Mindful Behavior in Achieving IT Infrastructure Reliability

现代私营和公共组织在各种流程、关键任务信息、通信和连续性方面极大地依赖于信息技术（IT）平台。同时，由于复杂性、人为错误、软硬件故障、恶意攻击等原因，对IT可靠性的威胁也在不断增加。这项研究借鉴了关于常规行为和集体正念的组织理论。（即集体警惕性和细节意识）从组织科学中开发和测试一个模型，该模型将失败类型和正念的各个方面与成功和不成功的失败反应联系起来。我们从两个方面来描述故障：故障的类型和问题发生的背景下的先验经验的程度。我们假设组织对失败的反应取决于组织所表现出的各种类型的正念。此外，我们将集体正念的概念（之前主要在组织环境中进行了研究）扩展到组织间环境。我们能够通过对故障事件的实地研究来测试所提出的模型。由领先的软件和服务供应商的客户经验丰富。增强对正念各个方面的理解，从而改进故障响应，将对改善招聘、培训、保留、供应商联盟、结构/治理和文化/气候实践产生实际影响，从而实现更高的IT可靠性。

Modern private and public organizations are enormously dependent on information technology (IT) platforms for all sorts of processes, mission-critical information, communications and continuity. At the same time, threats to IT reliability are constantly increasing due to complexity, human error, hardware and software failure, and malicious attacks. This study draws upon organizational theories about routine-based behavior and collective ?mindfulness? (i.e., collective vigilence and awareness of detail) from the organizational sciences to develop and test a model relating failure types and various aspects of mindfulness to successful and unsuccessful responses to failures. We characterize failures on two dimensions: the type of breakdown and extent of prior experience with the context in which the problem occurred. We hypothesize that organizational response to a failure is contingent on the various types of mindfulness exhibited by the organization. In addition, we extend the concept of collective mindfulness, which has previously been examined primarily in organizational settings, to inter-organizational settings. We are able to test the proposed model through a field study of failure ?incidents? experienced by the customers of a leading software and services vendor. An enhanced understanding of the aspects of mindfulness that yield improved failure response will have practical implications for improving hiring, training, retention, vendor alliances, structure/governance and culture/climate practices so as to achieve greater IT reliability.