The Australasian Journal of Information Systems (AJIS) has just published 5 new articles in its Volume 28 Research Article section
The Australasian Journal of Information Systems (AJIS) has just published five new articles in its Research Article section of its volume 28:
Information Systems Research in Australia and New Zealand: A Survey of Research Activity from 2020 to 2022
Marc T. P. Adam, Sultana Lubna Alam
marc.adam@newcastle.edu.au
doi: https://doi.org/10.3127/ajis.v28.5079
Over the past 60 years, the information systems (IS) discipline has become an established research field in Australia and New Zealand. Throughout its history, the discipline has experienced an ongoing formation and evolution of its unique identity, with important links to both business and computing-focused research. As a sociotechnical discipline, IS research considers a wide range of phenomena that emerge when social systems interact with technical systems. Yet, there is a lack of research into how recent socioeconomic and technical developments, such as accelerated digitisation in the aftermath of Covid19, widescale university restructuring, and a revision of the government’s research classification schemes, have affected the IS discipline. Against this backdrop, the present paper seeks to establish the current state of the IS discipline in Australia and New Zealand. Based on a survey of 123 IS researchers, we confirm the sociotechnical nature of the IS discipline in this region, identify research focus areas, provide research output benchmarks at different academic levels, and assess the level of engagement with general and specialised conferences. Our results provide important insights into the positioning of the IS discipline at the nexus of business and computing-focused research.
Business process patterns for improving social sustainability
Thorsten Schoormann, Marco Di Maria
thorsten.schoormann@tu-braunschweig.de
doi: https://doi.org/10.3127/ajis.v28.4949
Business process management (BPM) has the ability to boost transformations towards sustainable entities by innovating organizational structures. While the majority of existing BPM tools and methods focus on economic obligations, social sustainability is often underrepresented. This is problematic because it inhibits business improvement of people’s quality of life (e.g., health and equity), fails to address changing customer demands beyond transactional excellence, and obstructs the consideration of new regulations. Based on a literature review and expert interviews, recurrent problems and best practice solutions for integrating social sustainability into business processes were collected. These were formalized into a set of process patterns and then evaluated through illustrative demonstrations, an applicability check, and interviews with process experts. The paper proposes ten patterns together with a series of examples to guide the analysis and improvement of processes in terms of social sustainability. They support both generating novel ideas and identifying weaknesses. In doing this, our work complements existing tools and methods from sustainable BPM, advances the current body of knowledge in this stream, and opens avenues for a more holistic consideration of sustainability in business processes.
Risks of e-commerce Recommender Systems: A Scoping Review
Eranjana Kathriarachchi, Shafiq Alam, Kasuni Weerasinghe, David Pauleen
e.kathriarachchi@massey.ac.nz
doi: https://doi.org/10.3127/ajis.v28.4869
While recommender systems (RS) used in e-commerce have improved significantly providing customers with a personalised shopping experience, scholars have constantly raised concerns over the risks associated with e-commerce RS. However, a lack of methodological synthesis of risk-generating events associated with e-commerce recommender systems has curtailed systematic investigation of the risks of e-commerce RS. This paper presents a scoping review aimed at addressing this gap by synthesising different risk-generating events involved with the use of e-commerce RS as reported in the literature that could affect the welfare of customers who use those systems. Accordingly, peer-reviewed research studies published from 2003-2023 were extracted from the SCOPUS database and EBSCOhost platform for review. Sixty-two publications with evidence on risk-generating events of e-commerce RS were considered for the review. Twenty risk-generating events were identified through the review. These events were mapped with the corresponding risks based on existing frameworks on risks of e-commerce. We were able to identify several risk-generating events that had not previously been considered in conceptualising the risks of e-commerce RS. Further, we identified the plurality of the outcomes of risk-generating events which could provide guidance for the evaluation of e-commerce recommender systems from a multistakeholder perspective.
Achieving Desired Project Outcomes with Control Modes amidst Technical Uncertainty
Vijay V. Raghavan, Lakshman Mahadevan
lmahadevan@fgcu.edu
doi: https://doi.org/10.3127/ajis.v28.4669
Organizations aim to achieve successful project outcomes in information systems development (ISD) projects by managing the technical uncertainties that arise with adopting innovative technologies. This study, guided by control theory, investigates various control modes—namely, behavior, outcome, clan, and self-control—and their role in enhancing internal efficiency and psychological outcomes among project members in the presence of technical uncertainty. Our findings reveal that outcome and clan control modes are particularly effective at promoting favorable project results amidst the technical uncertainty surrounding innovative technology development, whereas behavior and self-control modes show no significant impact. As a result, prioritizing outcome and clan control modes is recommended for managing ISD projects characterized by technical uncertainty.
Creating an immersive environment of Metaverse for businesses
Harish Kumar, Vijay Kumar Sharma
harish.kumar@iimkashipur.ac.in
doi: https://doi.org/10.3127/ajis.v28.4529
Metaverse is an immersive environment that shares online space with users to interact with an artificial world through avatars or other digital representations. By leveraging the immersive features of Metaverse, businesses can create new opportunities for revenue generation, customer engagement, collaboration, innovative products, services, or innovation. The development and governing of user interfaces and virtual environments are challenging. Since the metaverse concept is emerging, numerous questions remain about designing, executing, and benefiting from it in the business environment. This study identifies enablers that can support creating an immersive Metaverse environment for businesses to gain new business opportunities. The study deploys multi-criteria decision-making techniques, "Total Interpretive Structural Modelling," and "Cross-Impact Matrix Multiplication Applied to Classification" to establish cross-relationships among enablers. The study also provides a hierarchical roadmap for creating an immersive metaverse environment. Recognizing which enablers hold the most influence in a hierarchy can lead to the strategic development of an immersive environment. This study will help researchers, policymakers, technology consultants, and business practitioners explore Metaverse's most impacting enablers to gain competitive advantages and future opportunities for the business.
Thank you for your continuing interest in our work.
Kind regards
Professor Michael Davern and Dr Stuart Black
Co-Editors-in-Chief
Australasian Journal of Information Systems
https://ajis.aaisnet.org
