@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{KoenningHeinrichLeyhetal., author = {K{\"o}nning, Michael and Heinrich, Kai and Leyh, Christian and Westner, Markus}, title = {A quantitative analysis of culture-induced differences in pivotal IT outsourcing contract features}, series = {Proceedings of the 27th European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS 2019): Stockholm \& Uppsala, Sweden, June 8-14}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 27th European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS 2019): Stockholm \& Uppsala, Sweden, June 8-14}, pages = {1 -- 15}, abstract = {More than 30 years after its first implementation, IT outsourcing (ITO) is unanimously considered a critical component of corporate strategy for private and public institutions alike. While implementations of ITO around the world share some common characteristics like typical reasons for outsourcing, key success factors, or dimensions along which they can be classified, extant research also points to regional differences. However, research on this topic, specifically regarding pivotal contract features like contract value, contract length, or pricing methods, is still in its infancy, and quantitative analyses on the subject are particularly scarce. We address this research gap by analyzing data on 14,917 ITO contracts closed between 2007 and 2017 through the lens of cultural regions and three statistical methods. The contribution of our paper is threefold. First, our descriptive analysis points to globally decreasing contract lengths and contract values, confirming previous studies and practice reports. Second, an ANOVA with independent post-hoc testing provides quantitative supportfor the degree of dissimilarity among individual regions in pivotal ITO contract features. Finally, our quantitative replication of a previous study identifies culture-induced regional differences between USA and Japan regarding the effect of influence factors on ITO contract features.}, subject = {Betriebliches Informationssytem}, 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} } @inproceedings{GrundlerWestner, author = {Grundler, Andreas and Westner, Markus}, title = {Scaling Agile Frameworks vs. Traditional Project Portfolio Management}, series = {Proceedings of the International Conferences on Internet Technologies \& Society (ITS 2019), Hongkong}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the International Conferences on Internet Technologies \& Society (ITS 2019), Hongkong}, isbn = {978-989-8533-84-5}, pages = {51 -- 62}, abstract = {Practitioners have developed numerous frameworks around scaling agile and lean methods. These frameworks are more frequently being used in practice in large-scale system development activities. Therefore, they are in the scope of project portfolio management. The paper examines the conformity of selected scaling agile frameworks to the objectives of project portfolio management through qualitative analysis. Four prominent frameworks are investigated: Scrum of Scrums, Large cale Scrum, Disciplined Agile, and the Scaled Agile Framework. The study shows significant differences between the frameworks and their view on project portfolio management with the Scaled Agile Framework offering the most detailed portfolio management-relevant processes and roles. In contrast to that, Large Scale Scrum does not see the need for portfolio management but promotes self-managing teams. Two of the four frameworks share the perception shift from projects to the products, which has significant implications for practitioners because it challenges and redefines prevalent management roles and practices.}, subject = {Agile Softwareentwicklung}, 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} } @inproceedings{ZemlerWestner, author = {Zemler, Florian and Westner, Markus}, title = {Blockchain and GDPR}, series = {Proceedings of the 30th Portland International Conference for Management of Engineering an Technology (PICMET), 2019, Portland, Oregon}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 30th Portland International Conference for Management of Engineering an Technology (PICMET), 2019, Portland, Oregon}, pages = {8}, abstract = {Blockchain and the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) are two topics that are currently highly discussed in academia and amongst professionals. The Blockchain technology is claimed to revolutionize how business is being conducted by its way of storing data and sharing it with others. The recently introduced GDPR has a huge impact on processing personal data because it brought major changes to privacy regulation. This might also affect the processing of personal data in Blockchain-based application scenarios. Based on literature analysis, the paper at hand provides an overview of the Blockchain technology, presents a decision model, and introduces two possible Blockchain application scenarios. It analyses relevant requirements of the GDPR in view of processing personal data and compares these with the fundamental principles of the Blockchain technology. The paper concludes that processing personal data in the Blockchain is violating the GDPR because it conflicts with fundamental specification of this regulation. This finding reveals the need for further research to propose concepts and frameworks for a GDPR-compliant processing of personal data using Blockchain technology.}, subject = {Blockchain}, 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{WestnerFuhrmannWaasetal., author = {Westner, Markus and Fuhrmann, Thomas and Waas, Thomas and Skelton, David}, title = {Internationalization of a Computer Science Faculty}, series = {9th Annual International Conference on Computer Science Education: Innovation and Technology (CSEIT 2018), 2018, Singapore}, booktitle = {9th Annual International Conference on Computer Science Education: Innovation and Technology (CSEIT 2018), 2018, Singapore}, doi = {10.5176/2251-2195_CSEIT18.118}, pages = {33 -- 38}, abstract = {The paper at hand describes how a regional university of applied sciences tried to internationalize its learning and teaching environment. It describes the challenges encountered, the managerial approach taken, illustrates the implemented initiatives, and how effective they turned out. The results might be relevant to faculty staff in managerial positions at regional universities all over the world that face the challenge to internationalize their teaching and learning environment for the benefit of their domestic students.}, subject = {Internationalisierung}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{SkeltonWestner, author = {Skelton, David and Westner, Markus}, title = {International internships}, series = {Refereed Proceedings of the 3rd International Research Symposium on Cooperative and Work-Integrated Education, Stuttgart, Germany : 3rd - 27th of June, 2018, Stuttgart, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany}, booktitle = {Refereed Proceedings of the 3rd International Research Symposium on Cooperative and Work-Integrated Education, Stuttgart, Germany : 3rd - 27th of June, 2018, Stuttgart, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany}, editor = {Zegwaard, Karsten E. and Ford, Marty}, isbn = {978-0-473-46291-8}, pages = {193 -- 198}, abstract = {Students are increasingly considering expanding their cooperative experiences into the global environment. This paper investigates the experiences of students undertaking their internship capstone in other countries under the supervision of a partner institute and a participating industry sponsor. These experiences of German students interning in New Zealand (NZ), and NZ students interning in Germany offer an insight into the organisation required by the partner institutions and the comparative cultural and technical differences that these students have encountered. The international agreement between Ostbayerische Technische Hochschule (OTH) Regensburg, Germany, and the Eastern Institute of Technology (EIT), NZ, has already built a mutual framework of visiting lecturers teaching in each other's institutes, and a programme of hosting exchange students in each other's institutes. A natural progression of this partnership has now moved into the active recruitment and brokering of international internship opportunities for their respective final year Business and Information Technology (IT) students. The benefits are evident personally to the students, which are discussed in this paper, but there are also clear benefits for EIT and OTH in terms of marketing opportunities for prospective students and enriching the learning environments. This paper explores the challenges faced by the Schools of Business and Computing at EIT as it pioneers the first two years of establishing internship options for final year German exchange students within NZ, and matching final year EIT degree students to industry sponsors within Bavaria, a federal state of Germany. A qualitative approach was taken for this study with data acquired from internship students involved, the key organising lecturers from each institute, and industry sponsors from each country. A number of student, staff and industry representative interviews were conducted along with a cultural appraisal of relevant literature in the global education field. A further overview of the macro benefits for the partner institutes in terms of marketing, and programme enrichment is also part of the conclusion. The paper may be useful as a template for other institutes on developing international internship opportunities through global partners.}, subject = {Wirtschaftswissenschaftliches Studium}, 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{KobusWestner, author = {Kobus, J{\"o}rn and Westner, Markus}, title = {Ranking-type delphi studies in IS research}, series = {Proceedings of the 9th IADIS International Conference Information Systems, Vilamoura, Portugal, 9-11 April}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 9th IADIS International Conference Information Systems, Vilamoura, Portugal, 9-11 April}, pages = {28 -- 38}, abstract = {Ranking-type Delphi is a frequently used method in IS research. However, besides several studies investigating a rigorous application of ranking-type Delphi as a research method, a comprehensive and precise step-by-step guide on how to conduct a rigorous ranking-type Delphi study in IS research is currently missing. In addition, a common critic of Delphi studies in general is that it is unclear if there is indeed authentic consensus of the panelists, or if panelists only agree because of other reasons (e.g. acquiescence bias or tiredness to disagreement after several rounds). This also applies to ranking-type Delphi studies. Therefore, this study aims to (1) Provide a rigorous step-by-step guide to conduct ranking-type Delphi studies through synthesizing results of existing research and (2) Offer an analytical extension to the ranking-type Delphi method by introducing Best/Worst Scaling, which originated in Marketing and Consumer Behavior research. A guiding example is introduced to increase comprehensibility of the proposals. Future research needs to validate the step-by-step guide in an empirical setting as well as test the suitability of Best/Worst Scaling within described research contexts.}, subject = {Delphi-Technik}, language = {en} }