Information technologies for the 1990s: the executives' view

Reviewer: Hilary D. Burton

The authors extend Straub and Wetherbe's study of the impact of information technologies as expressed by 11 international experts [1] and compare it to a survey of major US corporation information systems managers. Using Straub and Wetherbe's taxonomy, they developed additional survey tools and elicited the answer to the question “Which information technologies will have the greatest organizational impact during the 1990s__?__” They present their findings in several <__?__Pub Fmt nolinebreak>tables.<__?__Pub Fmt /nolinebreak><__?__Pub Caret> The first is a ranked list of technologies, followed by an evaluated list of Straub and Wetherbe's information technology groups. These are followed by tables evaluating the importance of each technology group: human interface technologies, communications technologies, system support technologies, limited impact technologies, and technologies that are not yet mature. Not surprisingly, they found a lack of consensus among the people surveyed. The authors' conclusion that “each technology will have differential impacts on individual organizations” seems somewhat obvious. A question that might be considered is whether the differential impact is a cause or an effect of the variation in opinions.