Information technology and the autonomy—control duality: toward a theory

Authors:
Ali Tafti;Sunil Mithas;M. S. Krishnan
Affiliations:
Business Information Technology, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA 48109-1234;Decision and Information Technologies, R. H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland, College Park, USA 20742;Business Information Technology, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA 48109-1234
Venue:
Information Technology and Management
Year:
2007

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Abstract

We examine the relationship between firms' human resources (HR) practices and their information technology (IT) practices, focusing on the dichotomy between autonomy and control. We define facilitating HR practices as those that exhibit the following characteristics: worker autonomy, connectedness, learning, valuing individuals, trust, and flexibility in business processes. We then characterize facilitating IT practices, which are practices that facilitate employee collaboration, autonomy, and wider access to information. We contrast these categories of practice to traditional HR and monitoring IT, respectively. Drawing from theories of complementarities and configuration, we propose that alignment between HR and IT strategies originates at the level of individual practices. We consider the effects of this alignment on worker performance. We then ground our discussion in exploratory empirical and qualitative results.