How to create information management capabilities through web 2.0

Abstract

Over the last two decades investment in information technologies (IT) has been sufficiently high to be considered economically relevant. However, it has not been easy to prove that there are positive effects of these investments on organisational performance. This study questions the validity of directly relating web 2.0 initiatives to firm performance without taking into consideration other complementary assets such as managerial skills in IT, organisational restructuring and a culture of change. If these factors are not present, IT may not in fact produce any benefits whatsoever. The authors approach this problem using the resource-based view and propose the construct information management capability as a measure to gather the integration of the various co-specialised and complementary capabilities, whether technological or human and organisational, necessary in order to obtain competitive advantages in information use. A scale is created to measure this construct, the reliability and validity of which are demonstrated.

Keywords:

• organisational performance
• web 2.0
• restructuring
• management capability
• information technologies