THE ALIGNMENT BETWEEN INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY (ICT) STRATEGY AND BUSINESS STRATEGY OF PROFESSIONAL CONFERENCE ORGANIZERS

by Ce Mo and Nina Mistilis

The concept of ICT/business alignment has been discussed in the literature, but almost always in the context of large firms from the manufacturing and retailing industry. In addition, prior research has predominantly conceptualized and operationalized ICT/business alignment at the firm level; very few attempts have been made to explore the issue at the process level. In this study, we examine the key concept of strategic ICT/business alignment at the business process level rather than at the dominant firm-level. A unified framework that captures the antecedents of strategic ICT/business alignment, the strategic alignment, and performance outcomes is proposed and empirically tested in the context of the Australian professional conference organizers (PCO); partial least square (PLS) technique is suggested for the data analysis. The contribution of this study is twofold. First, it adds to the tourism literature by exploring the strategic alignment issue from the perspective of the tourism event sector. Second, it contributes to the alignment literature by adding insights from the business process perspective to explain the relationship between the achievements of alignment and various firm specific IS resources as well as the contingency factors.

Keywords: Professional conference organizer (PCO); Strategic alignment; Information communication technology (ICT)

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