The major objective of this thesis is to conceptualize top management role in MIS implementation and analysis the relationship between top management role and MIS performance.
Reviewing the related literatures this thesis categorized top managements' role into two parts-top management understanding/support and top management involvement in MIS implementation. With such conceptualizations, this thesis proposed hypothetical model of top management role. Under the premise that top management role does not always lead to successful MIS implementation and does not affect MIS performance directly, the model has the characteristics of contingency approach and contains intermediate variables which link top management role and MIS performance. The Contigency factors include "Degree of system complexity" and "Types of change", and the intermediate variables consist of "User's acceptance to change", "User involvement", "Degree of adherence to MIS implementation process" based on planned change model. As for the MIS performance, it contains 3 performance variables-User satisfaction, Voluntary usage of system and Technical success-to reflect multi-dimentionality of MIS performance.
The model hypothesized that top management active role (high level of understanding/support and involvement) increase the MIS performance directly and indirectly by enhancing user's acceptance to change, user involvement and adherence to MIS implementation process. It also hypothesized that the above relationships may differ across the contingency factors.
Data were collected from 64 Korean business organizations by stratified sampling method. Hypothesis were tested mainly by Pearson Correlation and additionly 2-way ANOVA(Analysis of Variance) and MDA(Multiple Descriminant Analysis) were used.
The major findings of this thesis are as follows.
1. The relationships between top management role and MIS performance differ by the performance variable(s) the study has taken. In this study, top management affect technical success but not user satisfaction.
2. The relationships between top management role and MIS performance are stronger when implementing more complex system than less complex system.
3. The benefits of top management role in MIS implementation are greater when the types of changes are "Coerced" than "Hands on Change". Considering the culture of Korean firms, This Implies that general strategies of MIS implementation in Korean firms are more like authorative or top-down.
In conclusion, top management role has close relationships with MIS performance. But top management role must be lied more on supporter or change-agent than suppressor in the fact of technologic innovation like MIS implementation. The findings, however, should be interpreted with caution, since this study has several limitations in measurement and sampling method. Further research is suggested and encouraged with more elaborated methodology and more suitable MIS performance variables.
