The impact of information technology on organizations : a study of enterprise resource planning system influences on job design and organizational culture

摘要

The primary purpose of this research is to study the linkage between perceived job design characteristics and information system environment characteristics before and after the replacement of a legacy information system with a new type of information system (referred to as an Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP system). A public state University implementing an academic version of an ERP system was selected for the study. Three survey instruments were used to examine the perception of the information system, the job characteristics, and the organizational culture before and after the system implementation. The research participants included two large departments resulting in a sample of 130 workers. Research questions were analyzed using multivariate procedures including factor analysis, path analysis, stepwise regression, and matched pair analysis.Results indicated that the ERP system has introduced new elements into the working environment that has changed the perception of how the job design characteristics and organization culture dimensions are viewed by the workers. The understanding of how the perceived system characteristics align with an individualu27s perceived job design characteristics is supported by each of the system characteristics significantly correlated in the proposed direction. The stronger support of this relationship becomes visible in the causal flow of the effects seen in the path diagram and in the step-wise regression. The perceived job design characteristics aligning with dimensions of organizational culture are not as strong as the literature suggests. Although there are significant correlations between the job and culture variables, only one relationship can be seen in the causal flow.This research has demonstrated that system characteristics of ERP do contribute to the perception of change in an organization and do support organizational culture behaviors and job characteristics.