The nexus between information technology and competitive strategy: a conceptual framework and its hypotheses

Abstract

This research is to empirically examine the strategic alignment between IT management strategy and business strategy (i.e., competitive strategy) in Taiwan organizations for achieving sustained competitive advantage. Three streams of theory: contingency theory, resource-based theory, and general strategic management theory are used to construct the research model to examine the causal relationships between variables affecting such alignment, using a structural equation modeling approach. The objective is to establish the organizational impact of strategic alignment, given the environmental uncertainty and the importance of IT to the organization. This research would contribute by indicating some of the implications, for both decision makers and scholars, of an extended IT capabilities perspective on alignment mechanisms. This paper mainly presents conceptual part, the development of research constructs, research hypotheses, and data collection status since empirical work is in progress