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ALIGNING INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY WITH INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS PRACTICES OF SMALL FIRMS: EXPLORING THEORY AND PRACTICE

ACADEMIC ABSTRACT Recently there has been an increasingly vocal call for alignment between an organization's information technology (IT) and its strategy. In addition, there is a " disconnect " between theory professed in academia and the practical experience of managers in the trenches. We bridge this gap by addressing two primary issues in this workshop: (1) The identification of key alignment challenges, and (2) The identification of suitable ways to provide " knowledge diffusion " in academic and training settings. We focus on one type of IT (i.e., Enterprise Resource Planning) to highlight the alignment process. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The call to align IT with an organization's strategy has not yet been adequately addressed in the literature. Moreover, the lag between theory and practice has been acutely felt in academia as well as industry. In this workshop we address two key issues: (1) The identification of key IT alignment challenges, and (2) The identification of suitable ways to provide " knowledge diffusion " in academic and training settings. The findings of this workshop would be useful to researchers, publishers/authors of text books, instructors, firms specializing in IT training, and executives in smaller organizations that are increasingly involved in international business operations. We focus on one type of IT (i.e., Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP) to highlight the alignment process. The ERP-International Strategy alignment challenge is a relatively new phenomenon. In addition, combining fine-grained ERP characteristics with course-grained international strategy characteristics allows us to bridge a critical gap in the theory. The workshop synergistically leverages the multidisciplinary skill-sets of the principal organizers of the workshop. One of the organizers brings to the table a wide range of research and industry experience, including expertise in engineering, operations management, flexibility, international business, corporate planning and strategic business integration. The other organizer has extensive cross-functional consulting experience across various industries such as bio-sciences, banking, and IT. He has worked in a variety of functional roles as well as on IT-business integration projects in various capacities for well over a decade. Both individuals have several years of international work experience.