@article{KobusWestnerStrahringer, author = {Kobus, J{\"o}rn and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Enabling digitization by implementing Lean IT}, series = {The TQM Journal}, volume = {30}, journal = {The TQM Journal}, number = {6}, publisher = {Emerald insight}, pages = {764 -- 778}, abstract = {Purpose With the rise of digitization, IT organizations are challenged to provide efficient service delivery and offer innovative digital solutions while maintaining a constant resource capacity. To address this challenge, some IT organizations have adopted Lean Management (LM). Although LM is a standard production mode in manufacturing, it is less familiar to IT organizations. The purpose of this paper is to identify 12 lessons learned from companies who implemented LM in their IT organization (Lean IT) to free up their IT resource capacity from existing day-to-day operations so they could use it to enable their digitization strategy. Design/methodology/approach A case study of two major international companies from different industries. Data were collected from 25 structured interviews. Findings The lessons learned provide insights into how these companies implemented Lean IT, the potential outcomes they aimed for, what they did to achieve those outcomes, how they facilitated the implementation of Lean IT, and restrictions they encountered during the implementation. Research limitations/implications The findings are based on a limited range of IT organizations. Practical implications The lessons learned inform those implementing Lean IT because they explain how companies have implemented Lean IT to facilitate digitization and the benefits and pitfalls they encountered. A comparison of Lean IT and Lean Production shows that LM is transferable to IT organizations if domain specific requirements are respected. Originality/value This paper reports the unique experience of companies implementing Lean IT, which can inform other companies in a similar situation.}, subject = {Unternehmen}, language = {en} } @article{KopperWestnerStrahringer, author = {Kopper, Andreas and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Kontrollierte Nutzung von Schatten-IT}, series = {HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik}, volume = {54}, journal = {HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik}, publisher = {Springer}, doi = {10.1365/s40702-016-0286-x}, pages = {97 -- 110}, abstract = {Basierend auf einer systematischen und umfangreichen Analyse von Praxisbeitr{\"a}gen zum Thema Schatten-IT, die zwischen September 2015 und August 2016 erschienen sind, beschreibt der vorliegende Artikel Governance-Aspekte zu diesem Ph{\"a}nomen. Er erg{\"a}nzt damit vorhergehende akademische Studien. Es zeigt sich, dass unter Praktikern der Eindruck vorherrscht, dass IT-Abteilungen unter zunehmendem Druck stehen, schneller auf sich {\"a}ndernde Anforderungen aus den Fachbereichen reagieren zu m{\"u}ssen. K{\"o}nnen IT-Abteilungen diesen Erwartungen nicht entsprechen, beschaffen sich Fachbereiche und Nutzer selbst L{\"o}sungen in Form von Schatten-IT. Als m{\"o}gliche Antwort darauf kann sich die IT-Abteilung agiler organisieren und die IT-Architektur im Unternehmen modernisieren. Eine weitere M{\"o}glichkeit besteht darin, sich das innovative Potenzial von Schatten-IT zunutze zu machen und deren Umsetzung aktiv durch organisatorische und technische Maßnahmen zu unterst{\"u}tzen. IT-Sicherheitsmanagement und technische Schutzmechanismen k{\"o}nnen helfen, die so entstandenen L{\"o}sungen abzusichern und die Risiken zu minimieren. Nach vorherrschender Ansicht entwickelt sich die IT-Abteilung als Konsequenz aus all diesen Maßnahmen zu einem nutzerorientierten, internen Service-Provider und strategischen Partner f{\"u}r die Fachbereiche.}, subject = {IT-Abteilung}, language = {de} } @article{KobusWestnerStrahringer, author = {Kobus, J{\"o}rn and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Einf{\"u}hrung von Lean Management in IT-Organisationen}, series = {HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik}, volume = {53}, journal = {HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik}, number = {6}, pages = {879 -- 893}, abstract = {In der Produktion gilt „Lean Management" als einer der de-facto Standardmanagementans{\"a}tze. Lean Management in IT-Organisationen (Lean IT) ist dahingegen in der Praxis weniger verbreitet und in der Wissenschaft kaum erforscht. Dieser Beitrag aggregiert und erweitert die Ergebnisse mehrerer Forschungsarbeiten. Dabei werden vorrangig zwei Aspekte diskutiert: (1) Ein m{\"o}gliches Einf{\"u}hrungsmodell f{\"u}r Lean IT. Dieses verkn{\"u}pft f{\"u}nf Rollen (Sponsor, Programmleiter, Navigator, Linienf{\"u}hrungskraft und Linienexperte) mit vier Phasen (Vorbereitung, Analyse, Gestaltung und Implementierung). (2) Besondere Herausforderungen f{\"u}r Linienf{\"u}hrungskr{\"a}fte, die aufgrund der „bottom up"-Ausrichtung bei Lean-IT-Einf{\"u}hrungen stark gefordert werden. Neben einer klaren Vision f{\"u}r die Organisationseinheit und dem Verst{\"a}ndnis, an welcher Stelle Lean IT die Organisationseinheit konkret unterst{\"u}tzen kann, ben{\"o}tigen sie Offenheit, Ver{\"a}nderungswillen und die Bereitschaft Verantwortung an Mitarbeiter zu delegieren. Außerdem sollten sie {\"u}ber ein ausreichendes Zeitbudget f{\"u}r die Einf{\"u}hrung verf{\"u}gen, um ihrer gestaltenden und qualit{\"a}tssichernden Funktion nachkommen zu k{\"o}nnen.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssystem}, language = {de} } @article{BaryWestnerStrahringer, author = {Bary, Benedikt von and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Adding experts' perceptions to complement existing research on information systems backsourcing}, series = {International Journal of Information Systems and Project Management}, volume = {6}, journal = {International Journal of Information Systems and Project Management}, number = {4}, publisher = {SciKA}, issn = {2182-7788}, doi = {10.12821/ijispm060402}, pages = {17 -- 35}, abstract = {This paper extends the existing literature on information systems (IS) backsourcing by the perception of practitioners. For this purpose, we conducted a series of qualitative, semistructured interviews with IS sourcing experts. The interview questions focused on the participants' perceptions and experiences with the topic, on identifying reasons for and against IS backsourcing, and on revealing relevant trends pertinent to IS backsourcing. We then compared those findings with two previously conducted comprehensive literature reviews on academic and practitioner literature on IS backsourcing. By following this approach, we contribute to the existing research by verifying previous findings, for example, the most important reasons why companies decide in favor of IS backsourcing. Additionally, we were able to enhance previous contributions as we highlight the significance of differentiating between the scope of IS backsourcing by looking at the underlying services which are potentially backsourced. Further, we identified the importance of managers' personal preferences as an additional reason for IS backsourcing, for example, based on personal experiences or a perceived need for change. Based on our findings, we created a comprehensive overview of all aspects connected to the IS backsourcing process and derived opportunities for further research to contribute to the IS backsourcing research agenda.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssystem}, language = {en} } @article{KobusWestnerStrahringeretal., author = {Kobus, J{\"o}rn and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne and Strode, Diane}, title = {Lean Management in IT Organizations}, series = {Journal of Information Technology Theory and Application (JITTA)}, volume = {19}, journal = {Journal of Information Technology Theory and Application (JITTA)}, number = {1}, publisher = {Association for Information Systems (AIS)}, issn = {1532-3416}, pages = {55 -- 85}, abstract = {Lean management (LM) is well established in manufacturing organizations, and LM adoption in service organizations has recently increased. However, we lack research that focuses on the success of lean management implementations in IT organizations (lean IT). This paper contributes to knowledge of the success factors of lean IT implementation and the relative importance of each factor based on the insights of field experts. The experts identified, agreed on, and ranked 12 implementation success factors for lean IT in a Delphi study using the best/worst scaling technique. The most important factors were leadership involvement, change culture and work ethic, employee involvement, and performance management. Factors of intermediate importance were implementation facilitation, training and education, clear vision and direction, long-term focus, communication, and a holistic approach. Least important factors were existing skills, organizational changes/standardization, and financial resources. This paper contributes a more nuanced understanding of the relative importance of lean IT success factors, proposes relationships between them, and comprehensively explains how to use the rigorous best/worst scaling method in a traditional ranking-type Delphi study.}, subject = {Lean Management}, language = {en} } @article{KobusWestnerStrahringer, author = {Kobus, J{\"o}rn and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Change management lessons learned for Lean IT implementations}, series = {International Journal of Information Systems and Project Management}, volume = {5}, journal = {International Journal of Information Systems and Project Management}, number = {1}, pages = {47 -- 60}, abstract = {Lean Management is a standard production mode that has been familiar to production organizations for several decades. To date, however, academic literature has presented surprisingly little information about the application of Lean Management in Information Technology (IT) organizations, or what is called Lean IT. Drawing upon an empirical qualitative case study of the IT departments of two multinational companies, in this paper we identify change management lessons learned for Lean IT implementations, as well as seven characteristics of a corresponding change management approach. As an extension of our work, researchers should validate and expand our initial findings, preferably in a quantitative setting.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssystem}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{WulfWestnerSchoenetal., author = {Wulf, Frederik and Westner, Markus and Sch{\"o}n, Maximilian and Strahringer, Susanne and Loebbecke, Claudia}, title = {Preparing for a Digital Future: Cloud Strategy at Continental AG}, series = {Proceedings of the 40th International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS 2019): Munich, Germany, December 15-18}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 40th International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS 2019): Munich, Germany, December 15-18}, pages = {1 -- 16}, abstract = {This paper is directed towards IT executives aiming to promote the adoption of cloud computing (CC) with in their company. We conducted a longitudinal case study on the evolving CC strategy and its implementation at the multinational company Continental, based on a previous case study by Loebbecke et al. (2012). We narrate Continental's pathway towards CC adoption, which comprised the experimentation, professionalization, and utilization of CC, and discuss current and previous barriers encountered during the implementation. We derive five lessons learned that can serve as practical guidance for executives aiming to accelerate CC adoption within their own organization: (1) differentiate the CC strategy by delivery model; (2)drive proof of concepts to generate reusable blueprints; (3) preinvest in the integration of IaaS and PaaS providers; (4) implement CC gradually, transforming applications during the transition to the cloud; and (5) disseminate knowledge within the organization to enable change.}, subject = {Cloud Computing}, language = {en} } @article{WestnerStrahringer, author = {Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Determinants of success in IS offshoring projects}, series = {Information \& Management}, volume = {47}, journal = {Information \& Management}, number = {5-6}, pages = {291 -- 299}, abstract = {High labor cost in western countries allows cost savings by companies engaging in IS offshoring. However, studies worldwide indicate that a large number of companies that engaged in IS offshoring are not satisfied with the outcome. Our study examined the determinants of IS offshore project success: We developed a model and empirically tested it with data collected from 304 experts who reported on projects offshored from Germany to a wide range of near and distant countries. The model posited a direct effect of offshoring expertise and trust in offshore service provider (OSP) on success, as well as an indirect effect mediated by project suitability, knowledge transfer, and liaison quality. An analysis using partial least squares (PLSs) provided significant support for almost all these relationships. However, it showed that offshoring expertise played a minor role in explaining success and the mediating constructs. Trust in OSP had a small direct effect on success and a medium to large effect on the mediating constructs. Project suitability, knowledge transfer, and liaison quality all had small direct effects on success.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssystem}, language = {en} } @article{WestnerStrahringer, author = {Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {The current state of IS offshoring in Germany}, series = {Journal of Information Technology Management}, volume = {21}, journal = {Journal of Information Technology Management}, number = {1}, pages = {49 -- 70}, abstract = {This paper empirically examines the current state of the IS offshoring phenomenon in Germany regarding project characteristics and success patterns. Relying on a sample of 304 projects conducted at various industry sectors and companies, results show that IS offshoring primarily occurs in sectors Telecommunications and IT at large corporations. Cost reduction is the main reason for going offshore and offshore projects are executed as part of a larger program at companies. Noticeably, most projects are delivered from India. Additionally, neither captive offshoring nor offshore outsourcing dominates as a de-livery option. Comparing different project subgroups regarding project success, the results reveal that projects delivered by an internal or partially owned service provider are more successful. Other project characteristics such as a project's embedded-ness in a larger offshoring program, a project's size, or a project's offshoring degree in terms of relatively offshored labor hours show few significant differences. The paper addresses the paucity of empirical research on the current state of the IS offshoring phenomenon in Germany.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssystem}, language = {en} } @article{WestnerStrahringer, author = {Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Evaluation criteria for selecting offshoring candidates}, series = {Journal of Information Technology Management}, volume = {19}, journal = {Journal of Information Technology Management}, number = {4}, pages = {16 -- 34}, abstract = {The identification of suitable applications or projects is a main initial step in any software development or maintenance related IS offshoring arrangement. This paper examines evaluation criteria and their importance for selecting application or project candidates for offshoring. Based on a literature analysis and interviews with 47 experts from 36 different German companies describing 64 case examples, we find that in contrast to the literature, "size", "codification", and "language" are perceived as important selection criteria by experts. Case examples additionally show that "business specificity" seems to be a main reason for application or project failures, that "business criticality" appears to be less important than suggested by the literature, and that adequate "size" might be a necessary prerequisite, but seems not to be a sufficient criterion for an application's or project's suitability for offshoring. These differences in comparison to findings from the literature may be explained by cultural and language differences.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssystem}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{WulfStrahringerWestner, author = {Wulf, Frederik and Strahringer, Susanne and Westner, Markus}, title = {Information security risks, benefits, and mitigation measures in cloud sourcing}, series = {Proceedings of the IEEE 21th Conference on Business Informatics (CBI): 2019, Moscow, Russia}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the IEEE 21th Conference on Business Informatics (CBI): 2019, Moscow, Russia}, pages = {258 -- 267}, abstract = {This paper develops a categorization of cloud security risks, elaborates how they impact information security, and discusses potential security benefits from cloud sourcing. This review integrates the literature on information systems and computer science to summarize managerial and technological mitigation measures that enhance cloud security. The analysis uncovers gaps regarding the empirical investigation of security considerations in the corporate decision-making process. Specifically, the micro level of how security comes into play in the decision-making process and whether mitigation measures proposed by scholars are practically feasible requires further investigation. Furthermore, the macro level, how stakeholders perceive cloud sourcing, is not yet well understood.}, subject = {Cloud Computing}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{BaryWestnerStrahringer, author = {Bary, Benedikt von and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Do researchers investigate what practitioners deem relevant?}, series = {Proceedings of the 20th IEEE International Conference on Business Informatics (IEEE CBI 2018): Vienna, Austria, 11-14 July}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 20th IEEE International Conference on Business Informatics (IEEE CBI 2018): Vienna, Austria, 11-14 July}, doi = {10.1109/CBI.2018.00014}, pages = {40 -- 49}, abstract = {There is a common understanding amongst academics that information systems (IS) research sometimes has limited relevance for practitioners. This can be explained by the fact that research lags behind the fast moving IS environment, has limited practical applicability and is hard to access. We have focused on the research area of IS backsourcing, and analyzed practitioner literature to increase our understanding of topics of interest for practitioners, to determine a potential gap between academic and practitioner literature, and to identify future research directions in this field. We observed that most publications are either news or background articles, focusing on describing backsourcing cases. Additionally, we identified four recurring themes, namely reasons for backsourcing, presentation of survey results, discussion of industry trends, and backsourcing success stories. The main reasons identified to trigger backsourcing decisions are cost savings, quality improvements, and increasing control and flexibility. By comparing our findings with academic literature on IS backsourcing, we conclude that generally both literature types cover similar topics. However, researchers have a more formulative or interpretive focus than the often descriptive practitioner literature. Academic literature also examines a broader range of topics, while practitioner literature has a narrower focus. Additionally, we observe one difference regarding applied terminology: while researchers employ the term backsourcing, practitioners mostly use back in-house or insourcing. Our paper contributes to facilitating the exchange between academics and practitioners, presents topics to consider when aiming to increase practical relevance and provides researchers with concrete directions for future research within the field of IS backsourcing.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssystem}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{KoenningWestnerStrahringer, author = {K{\"o}nning, Michael and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Multisourcing on the Rise: Results from an Analysis of more than 1,000 IT Outsourcing Deals in the ASG Region}, series = {Tagungsband Multikonferenz Wirtschaftsinformatik 2018 (MKWI 2018): data driven X - turning data into value, Leuphana Unversit{\"a}t L{\"u}neburg, 6.-9. M{\"a}rz 2018}, booktitle = {Tagungsband Multikonferenz Wirtschaftsinformatik 2018 (MKWI 2018): data driven X - turning data into value, Leuphana Unversit{\"a}t L{\"u}neburg, 6.-9. M{\"a}rz 2018}, number = {Band V}, publisher = {Leuphana, Universit{\"a}t L{\"u}neburg}, address = {L{\"u}neburg}, pages = {1813 -- 1824}, abstract = {Information technology outsourcing (ITO) has long been recognized for its numerous potential advantages such as lowering costs, accessing external skills, and improving efficiency, flexibility, and quality. However, it also exposes client companies to various risks, including vendor lock-in, poor agility, or insufficient vendor expertisein individual domains, especially inincreasingly dynamic market environments. Consequently, companies increasingly implement multisourcing by composing a "best of breed" set of vendors for their various IT services. In this paper,we use a dataset of 1,016 ITO deals closed with Austrian, Swiss, and German client companies between 2006 and 2017 to analyze the development of the ITO market in general and multisourcing in particular. Our results show decreasing services run rates, shorter contract lengths, an increasing number of concurrent service providers per client,and a distribution of the total number of contracts to a larger set of vendors, all pointing towards an increasing popularity of multisourcing.}, subject = {Outsourcing}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{KobusWestnerStrahringer, author = {Kobus, J{\"o}rn and Westner, Markus and Strahringer, Susanne}, title = {Lean Management of IT Organizations}, series = {Proceedings of the 37th International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS 2016), Dublin,}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 37th International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS 2016), Dublin,}, pages = {1 -- 12}, abstract = {Lean Management has been successfully implemented in production organizations since several decades. The study at hand investigates the implementation of Lean Management to IT organizations (Lean IT). The study offers three contributions: First, it explains on a conceptual level how Lean Management can be transferred from production to IT organizations (philosophy, principles, tools). Second, it provides a theoretical perspective on why Lean IT can be beneficial for IT organizations (IT Slack theory). Third, it provides insights to the stated research questions (three benefits and three propositions) from an initial case study of an internal IT service provider for a large international insurance company (> US\$25 Billion revenue; >20,000 employees; active in >120 countries) and lays out the research methodology and potential focus areas for further studies.}, subject = {Lean Management}, language = {en} } @article{StrahringerWestnerBary, author = {Strahringer, Susanne and Westner, Markus and Bary, Benedikt von}, title = {IT-Backsourcing}, series = {Das Wirtschaftsstudium : wisu}, journal = {Das Wirtschaftsstudium : wisu}, number = {6}, publisher = {Lange ; Mohr}, address = {D{\"u}sseldorf ; T{\"u}bingen}, pages = {702 -- 706}, abstract = {The importance of information systems (IS) for companies has grown rapidly over the recent years. For example, companies from various industries are focusing their efforts to digitize business models, to adopt agile forms of collaboration, and to leverage automation of routine tasks. This forces companies to review their IS sourcing strategies and to potentially consider alternatives for current outsourcing contracts. One potential option could be to backsource IS services currently performed by external vendors. Based on empirical observations, previous academics defined it as the repatriation of all assets, activities, and skills needed to perform IS services back in-house, which had been outsourced previously to one or multiple vendors. The distinctive characteristic of backsourcing is the change in ownership back to the mother organization. This distinguishes the term backsourcing from similar terms, e.g., backshoring, reshoring, or relocating, which rather focus on the change in location of the service delivery. At the initial sourcing decision, the strategy to outsource an IS service was considered most promising. However, certain developments both inside the company, but also on a broader industry level may lead to a re-evaluation of the situation and thus to an adjustment of the original sourcing strategy. Over the last years, there has been a strong increase in cloud-based services and a shift towards the deployment of standardized, almost "industrialized" applications as services. Before, large companies leveraged their size in realizing economies of scale within their sourcing volumes. The raise of cloud computing as well as standardization of service delivery decreased those benefits and led towards a decline in large outsourcing contracts across a variety of services and a growth of multi-sourcing of individual IS services from the respective "best-in-breed" vendors for shorter time periods. Besides sourcing the best vendor for each service, companies that implement multi-sourcing strategies additionally aim for cost benefits due to an increased competition between vendors, and an increase in agility and adaptability. At the same time, a move towards multi-sourcing strategies with shorter contract durations leads to an increase in so-called "second generation sourcing decisions", namely whether to continue outsourcing a respective service or to bring the service back in-house. Given the developments within the IS environment, this research projects aims at understanding why IS services are backsourced and which factors influence a company's decision to backsource an IS service.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssystem}, language = {de} } @article{StrahringerWestnerKobus, author = {Strahringer, Susanne and Westner, Markus and Kobus, J{\"o}rn}, title = {Lean IT}, series = {WISU - Das Wirtschaftsstudium}, journal = {WISU - Das Wirtschaftsstudium}, number = {1}, pages = {87 -- 92}, subject = {Informationstechnik}, language = {de} }