The Impact of Leadership Orientation on Strategic Information System Planning Processes, with an Application to Libyan Organizations

Abstract

The planning stage in the development of an information system (IS) is important for IS/business alignment. Accordingly, academics and practitioners in both developed and developing countries are concerned about the impact of leadership orientation on strategic IS planning (SISP). The focus of this research is to identify the nature of the relationship between leadership orientations and IS planning approaches in the context of Libyan organizations. To investigate this relationship, a postal survey was conducted to collect data from 117 executives responsible for IS planning. The questionnaire asked about leadership values and SISP approaches using multi-item, multi-scaled questions. The results show that “controlling” and “competing” leadership orientations have a positive direct effect on all SISP approaches. Coordinator leadership orientations exhibited the highest positive association with rational, adaptable, and intuitive SISP approaches. The results of this research will have important implications for Libyan organizations, especially as they attempt to rebuild the country's economy after the Libyan revolution. These implications are discussed in detail in the paper.

Keywords:

• competing value framework of leadership
• strategic information system planning
• multiple indicators multiple causes model
• structural equation modeling methodologysss
• developing countries

Notes on contributors

Dr. Esam Osman got his PhD from the University of Plymouth in the area of SISP in developing countries. Dr. Osman's research interests include the adoption and impact of ICT on developing countries, developing SISP models for developing countries and leadership impact on SISP process.

Dr. Ibrahim El Beltagi is a senior lecturer in information and knowledge management at the Graduate School of Management, University of Plymouth. Dr. El Beltagi's publications largely related to electronic commerce, adoption of ICT, information systems in developing countries, social networking and knowledge management. He has had more than 40 journal and conferences papers published or accepted for publication in many national and international journals and conferences.

Professor Glenn Hardaker is recognized as an innovator of education reform initiatives in the application of e-learning and more recently Islamic education. He has been a teacher and researcher of innovation and learning for over 20 years. His research is focused on inclusion, innovation and learning. He is also Editor of Multicultural Education & Technology Journal and Campus Wide Information Systems.

Notes

1. Convergent validity was tested via EFA by examining the loadings of each item on the derived factors. Relatively high factor loadings indicate convergent validity (McKinney et al., 2002). Convergent validity can be verified by examining the correlations between the factors that are calculated in the examination of unidimensionality with CFA. Correlations among the factors (construct components) provide evidence of convergent validity (Bagozzi & Phillips 1991).

2. Discriminate validity refers to the clarity of the construct components. As with convergent validity, discriminate validity is evaluated with both EFA and CFA. In the exploratory model, the lack of cross-loadings of an item on the factors is evidence of discriminant validity (McKinney et al., 2002). In the confirmatory model, correlations among the factors that are statistically less than 1 indicate discriminant validity (Smith et al., 1996).

3. In bootstrapping, the sample is considered to be a population; from this population, bootstrapping consists of taking random samples from this population, preferably between 500 and 2000 (Blunch, 2012; Preacher et al., 2007). Therefore, the bootstrapping method magnifies the effect of unusual features in a data set (Kline, 2005).