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Home/Magazine Archive/March 2006 (Vol. 49, No. 3)/Management Issues of Internet/Web Systems/Full Text
Communications of the ACM
Management Issues of Internet/Web Systems
Internet technologies, and especially Web technologies, have developed extraordinarily rapidly, resulting in Internet/Web systems that differ significantly from traditional systems. By Internet/Web systems, we mean systems that business, government, or consumer clients of a company can interact with through Internet connections, or that a company's own functional areas can interact with through intranets. The most common Internet systems are those with Web interfaces. By traditional systems we mean systems without such interfaces.
The difference between Internet/Web and traditional systems lies in their differing information content, development practices, who the developers are, and who the users are. In a Web system, graphic artistry is an important form of system content, and information content is embodied in the structure of the system even though it may be the result of data processing within a traditional system. Web systems development is characterized by "Internet time" development activities that involve rapid and frequent beta releases before final completion, and by continuous rather than periodic system revisions. These rapid-fire Web systems often are developed by end users in particular functional areas, such as marketing, procurement, finance, or human resources. Many of these developers have no training in formal systems development methodologies. As Sherrell and Chen note, "with the help of easy-to-use Web products, the end users can develop most of a conventional Web site by themselves" [11]. In addition to functional area end users, other potential end users of a Web system include anyone with Internet access. For example, the New York Times Web site had over 21.3 million unique visitors in September 2005 (www.corporate-ir.net/ireye/ir_site.zhtml?ticker=NYT&script= 410&layout=-6&item_id=770997), most of whom were not employees or other people with close associations with the Times. End users of traditional systems tend to be more closely associated with the enterprise, and often all work for the same organization.
These differences have prompted speculation that management issues for Internet/Web systems are substantially different from management issues for traditional systems. For example, Web content management has become an issue for content providers such as the newspaper industry, as managers must decide what content to provide online and whether and how to charge for it. In software development practices, agile software development is becoming increasingly popular. Although this paradigm values the traditional development concepts, it values "individuals and interactions over processes and tools, working software over comprehensive documentation, customer collaboration over contract negotiation," and "responding to change over following a plan" [1]. We believe the emergence of these values for software development, though not limited to the development of Web systems, is greatly influenced by the nature of Web systems development.
The emergence of functional area Web developers also poses significant management problems. Whereas conventional systems builders engage in systematic, step-by-step development that emphasizes rigorous controls and conformance to standards, end user developers tend to be document-oriented (that is, they are oriented toward the Web pages they are creating), focused on the Web site's look and feel, and perhaps not at all knowledgeable about software engineering [10]. These developers lack the experience in formal systems analysis and development. Moreover, sites developed by different users within a firm do not comply with a corporate standard; this situation increases the likelihood of a lengthy process of integrating the sites into a common Web strategy, infrastructure, and identity in the future [11].
The ubiquity of the users presents yet another management challenge. Since clients or consumers now have direct contact with corporate enterprise databases and data warehouses through Web-based applications, end user experience and satisfaction have become a pressing management issue; this issue is much less important for traditional systems. Any Web system problem becomes highly visible to these users and can cause inconvenience or damage to a large number of customers or clients. For example, when AOL's server systems could not scale up to meet demand that was drastically greater than expected, many users were inconvenienced, and some were outraged. As another example, virus attacks can cause worldwide interruptions to e-commerce.
These new or aggravated management issues associated with the Internet and the Web have stimulated discussions and debates in both industry and academia concerning whether management issues of Internet systems are fundamentally different from those of traditional information systems [2, 4]. We take a step toward answering this question by identifying top management issues of Internet systems that are unique or much more significant than they are for traditional systems. In conducting the study, we used a three-round Delphi questionnaire survey in which participants were asked to first rate the importance of each of a set of management issues associated with Internet systems, and then to comment on the importance of each issue as compared to traditional systems. The survey was initialized in Round I with 139 issues. The highest-ranked 45 were continued to Round II, and the top 26 of those constituted the Round III issues. We then compared the results for the Round III issues to the top management issues identified in published Delphi studies of traditional information systems.
The study participants were mostly IT and Internet practitioners from Fortune 500 companies, Internet consultants, academics in MIS, and acknowledged Internet leaders. Also included were authors of Internet-related articles in academic and trade journals and members of professional information systems associations.
The rank order result for the 26 issues in Round III is listed in Table 1. This final rank order is based on each issue's mean score in Round III. The rankings suggest that important management issues associated with Internet systems are dominated by two areas: the big-picture issues involving strategic thinking and planning, and issues involving data security and personal privacy. Of the 26 Round III issues, 12 of the top 15 are closely related to one of these two general areas.
Whereas conventional systems builders engage in systematic, step-by-step development that emphasizes rigorous controls and conformance to standards, end user developers tend to be document-oriented, focused on the Web site's look and feel, and perhaps not at all knowledgeable about software engineering.
Privacy/Security: Elevated Importance Compared with Traditional Systems
Six of the 15 top-rated issues (numbers 1, 6, 8, 11, 12, and 15) are related to personal privacy and data security, making it a high importance area (see Table 2). These issues span consumer concerns (numbers 1 and 6), corporate data security concerns (numbers 8, 11, and 12), and intellectual property rights (number 15). Compared to top management issues associated with traditional information systems identified in four previous Delphi studies [57, 9], the present study's result highlights a major difference in management issues facing the two types of systems. Two of the previous four studies did not identify privacy and data security related issues as top management issues at all. The other two identified "Security and Control" at a low importance level of 14th [7] and 18th [5], respectively. In those studies, privacy- and security-related issues were much less important than in our Internet/Web study.
To understand whether this difference was due to the systems studied (traditional versus Web) or to the passage of time, we examined the respondents' comments concerning privacy and security issues. Many commented to the effect that "many organizations have a false sense of security with regards to Web systems," or that "any Web site can be penetrated." One person commented that liability from loss associated with Web transactions would bring an "endless number of personal tragedies and lawsuits related to [loss of private information through hacking]." It is evident from respondent comments that, although some security issues are the same as those associated with traditional systems, others are unique to or greatly amplified by Web systems. For example, consumer privacy and security concerns as a result of insecure Internet transactions are a non-issue for traditional systems simply because a traditional system normally does not offer consumer access to the data files, or limits such access to phone access using a password, which is not regarded as hacking-prone. We thus conclude that privacy and security issues represent important and unique management challenges for Internet/Web systems when compared with traditional systems.
Strategic Concerns: Old and New Issues Compared With Traditional Systems
Another six of the 15 top-rated issues (numbers 25, 1314) in our study are related to Internet strategic thinking and planning. When comparing these issues to those identified in Delphi studies for traditional systems, we found a close correspondence for issues relating to planning and strategic alignment. However, one aspect of strategic planning is more evident in Internet systems than in traditional systems: the rapidity of technology change and its effects on Internet planning, and how Internet systems play a role in achieving a company's long-range strategies and goals. Here, we discuss these issues and their correspondence to those identified by the Delphi studies for traditional systems.
#2 Ranked: Holistic Thinking about Company Activities. The managers of many companies need to carefully think through long-term implications of the Internet/Web for the entire range of company activities.
There is a close correspondence between this issue and those identified in the past four Delphi studies. The first of those studies (1984) ranked "Long Range Planning and Integration" as the number-one issue. The second (1987) placed "Strategic Planning" in the top position. The third study (1991) ranked "Improving Strategic Planning" as third in importance. The fourth study (1996) ranked it 10th.
The next Internet strategy issues continue the big picture and strategic thinking concerns. These two are related to alignment and linkage.
#3 Ranked: Linking Internet Strategic Planning with Corporate Strategic Planning. Internet strategic planning should be linked to corporate strategic planning.
#4 Ranked: Aligning Internet Development Projects with Corporate Strategies. When developing Internet development projects, managers should carefully consider how these projects should or would be linked to company strategies.
A close correspondence is found between these two issues and those found for traditional systems. The second study (1987) ranked "Alignment in Organization" as fifth in importance, the third study ranked it as seventh, and the fourth ranked it as ninth.
The following three issues, although related to the proceeding three, were not identified as important for the traditional systems in the past four studies.
#5 Ranked: Prioritizing Company's Internet Objectives. The managers of many companies should fully think through which Internet systems benefits are most important and should have development priority.
The high rank of this issue indicates concern that the objectives of Internet systems are not being properly thought through prior to developing applications. One participant commented that establishing objectives is a particularly acute problem for traditional companies that only now are establishing a Web presence. The elevated importance of this issue points to the rapidity of change associated with Internet technologies. The next two issues also arise from the changing nature of Internet technologies.
#13 Ranked: The Site Objective Requires Definition. A carefully defined objective of a Web site can serve as a design guideline that specifies the nature and scope of the problem or opportunity being pursued.
#14 Ranked: Recognizing Potential Benefits Available from the Internet. More of the activities and processes that could be dramatically improved with Internet systems should be considered during the design of Internet systems.
Many sites are developed in a quick-and-dirty way before the site objective is carefully established. The rapidly evolving nature of the technologies also makes it difficult to evaluate and judge the potential benefits of Internet systems.
To understand whether this difference was due to the systems studied or to the passing of time since the previous four studies, we again examined respondent comments. One person said, "The holistic thinking was an important problem but also very hard to tackle given the pace of development in the field." Another commented, "It was not uncommon that a company throws money to be on the Net as if that were its goal per se." Other participants commented, "Because Web systems development results were on the Web so evident to the public, it became too easy to enter e-commerce as a goal, not as a means to achieve company goals, to buy into fashionable, and grossly overpriced, solutions, or to cause resource allocations that are out of kilter with organizational needs." Taking participants' comments together, we conclude that, although some of the strategic issues are the same as those associated with traditional systems, the rapidity of change in Internet technologies poses unique challenges for the management of these systems.
Many sites are developed in a quick-and-dirty way before the site objective is carefully established. The rapidly evolving nature of the technologies also makes it difficult to evaluate and judge the potential benefits of Internet systems.
Conclusion
This article explores the differences in the top management issues between Internet/Web systems and traditional information systems by comparing the findings of our Delphi study of Internet/Web systems management issues with the findings of four previous Delphi studies of traditional systems management issues.
Our study reveals that two themes are dominant in Internet/Web systems management: strategic planning and related strategic activities, and personal privacy and data security. Comparing the importance of these issues to their importance in previous studies, we conclude that strategy and strategic activities are dominant management issues for both types of systems, and that privacy and security have attained an importance unparalleled in traditional systems.
For strategic management-related issues, a new challenge is presented by the rapid technology change related to Internet-based systems. This is evidenced by the proliferation of publications and books by practitioners [3, 8] who attempt to enlighten Internet/Web systems developers about Internet strategy, setting objectives, and strategic linkages. Examination of these publications shows that there is almost no agreement with respect to Internet/Web planning processes and that nothing approaching best practices has yet emerged for Internet strategy development. This suggests that a change in the fundamental concepts of systems planning and development may be called for and that more research into new systems development methodologies for Internet-based systems may be warranted.
For privacy- and security-related issues, more systems development and management attention needs to be devoted to improving and monitoring the privacy and security of Internet/Web systems. This appears to be happening. For example, CIO magazine has recently published the results of a large-scale study focused on information security best practices with respect to companies around the world [12]. According to that study, one characteristic of best-practice companies is that they spend more of their IT budget on information security (14% versus 9% for other companies). While this does not necessarily indicate a restructuring of system development practices, it does indicate that IT resource allocation is shifting toward an increased focus on information security [12].
References
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