[AISWorld] CFP: AMCIS 2010 Minitrack on Understanding and Managing Shared Services in Public-Sector Organizations

[Frank_Ulbrich]

CALL FOR PAPERS

16th Americas Conference on Information Systems
August 12-15, 2010, Lima, Peru

E-Government Track

Minitrack: 
Understanding and Managing Shared Services in Public-Sector Organizations


DESCRIPTION
 
In an era of declining budgets and increasing demand for service
delivery/quality, public-sector organizations are seeking for more effective
and cost-efficient means of delivering services. One way to target these
OECD-wide preconditions in the public-sector is through adopting shared
services in these organizations.

Shared services is often referred to as independent organizational entities
that provide well-defined services for more than one unit within an
organization. However, a common accepted definition in literature and
practice is not given. Shared services comes in a broad variety: it copes
with service delivery from IT to HR or accounting to legal. The operation of
shared services varies from country to country. Local initiatives prevail
in, for example, Swedish government agencies or German municipalities
whereas enterprise-wide initiatives are wider spread in Canada through the
Canadian Shared Services Bureau or in the UK where shared services
initiatives have been launched by the Cabinet Office.

Common for shared services is that they make use of advanced information and
communication technology. Many services are information-intensive and
delivered digitally to the customers. The use of advanced information and
communication technology enables changes in business practices, processes,
and the organizational form, which makes the shared services idea an
excellent opportunity for studying IT-enabled organizational change on an
applicable level.

In this minitrack we seek to enhance the understanding of shared services in
public-sector organizations and how they are managed. We invite researchers
to contribute with formal definitions or observations of common adoption
patterns/configurations. We seek to better understand the dynamics behind
the adoption of the shared services idea and its institutionalization in
public-sector organizations. We are particularly interested in empirical
findings with regard to the day-to-day business of shared services centers,
how they are controlled and governed at operational, tactical, and strategic
levels to ensure the accomplishment of the initial goals of cost reduction
and quality enhancement.


SUGGESTED TOPICS 

Contributed papers may deal with, but are not limited to:

-  Adoption of shared services
-  Comparative studies between private and public-sector shared services
-  Configuration of shared services
-  Definitions and classifications
-  Descriptive studies on implementation
-  Driving forces for implementing shared services
-  Governance
-  Institutionalizing shared services
-  IT shared services in public-sector organizations
-  Organizational aspects of shared services
-  Organizational maturity of shared services
-  Performance management/measurement
-  Research implications on policy development
-  Technological barriers and enablers for shared services


IMPORTANT DATES

February 26, 2010 Deadline for paper submissions.
April 12, 2010 Notification of acceptance of papers.
April 26, 2010 Final copy due.


SUBMISSION SITE

http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/amcis2010


MINITRACK CO-CHAIRS

Dr. Frank Ulbrich (corresponding co-chair)
Center for Information Management, Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden
Sprott School of Business, Carleton University, Canada
Email: frank_ulbrich at carleton.ca

Dr. Mark Borman
University of Sydney, Australia
Email: m.borman at econ.usyd.edu.au

Veit Schulz
University of St. Gallen, Switzerland
Email: veit.schulz at unisg.ch