Managing High-Achieving Information Systems Professionals

Abstract:

The research reported here is part of an ongoing longitudinal study of career maturation and progression involving a national sample of information system (lIS) professionals. The present study describes the job characteristic preferences and self-described personal attributes and work traits (dependent variables) of persons entering I/S careers with three levels of demonstrated academic achievement (independent variable). A second analysis combined the respondents’ sex and level of achievement to create a gender-sensitive independent variable. While high achievers enter the workplace with distinguishing work-related profiles, the results suggest that the commonalities among high-achieving females and males vastly overshadow their differences. The results are discussed in terms of recruitment, socialization, and commitment, motivation and performance, and career progression.

Key Words and Phrases::

• career progression
• gender or sex differences
• high performing personnel
• human resource management
• information systems professionals
• managing high achievers
• personnel management

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Stanley J. Smits

Stanley J. Smits received his Ph.D. in counseling psychology from the University of Missouri in 1964. He is currently a Professor in the Department of Management at Georgia State University specializing in organizational behavior and a Licensed Applied Psychologist in Georgia. Prior to 1986, he spent ten years in academic administration where his responsibilities included serving as the Director of Research for the College of Business Administration and Interim Chairman of the Department of Computer Information Systems. His research interests in I/S career progression were stimulated by his participation in the AACSB-sponsored Information Systems Faculty Development Institutes at the University of Minnesota (1984) and Indiana University (1985).

Ephraim R. McLean

Ephraim R. McLean is a Professor of Information Systems and holder of the George E. Smith Eminent Scholar’s Chair in Information Systems at Georgia State University. Prior to coming to Georgia State, he was a member of the faculty of the Graduate School of Management at UCLA for eighteen years, serving as both head of the information systems area and Director of the Computers and Information Systems Research Program. Dr. McLean earned his B.M.E. from Cornell University in 1958 and his master’s in 1967 and doctorate in 1970, both from M.I.T.’s Sloan School of Management. Author of over seventy papers published in such journals as Information Systems Research, MIS Quarterly, Communications of the ACM. Information & Management, Harvard Business Review, and Sloan Management Review, his research interests include I/S strategic planning and assessment, management of information systems, end-user computing, decision support systems, and I/S personnel.

John R. Tanner

John R. Tanner is a Professor of Management and Quantitative Methods at the University of Southwestern Louisiana. Prior to his current position, he was a Professor of Management Information Systems at Western Kentucky University. He received a B.S. in business administration from the University of Southwestern Louisiana in 1967, an M.B.A. from the University of Arkansas in 1968, and a Ph.D. from the University of Arkansas in 1973. His research interests include career patterns of students majoring in management information systems; analyzing relationships between research productivity and teaching effectiveness of faculty; attitudinal analyses of business faculty’s perceptions of the abilities of students in their fields; and studying the financing methods and decision rules governing real estate organizations.