Organizational Reasons For Decision Aid Implementation

Abstract

Although substantial research efforts have been devoted to determining the reasons for the success and failure of decision aids in organizations, little has been done to examine the reasons why an organization chooses to implement the technology. We propose that understanding the relationship between decision aids and organizational reasons for implementation can assist in achieving a higher level of congruence between the organizations’ goals and the technology. This paper proposes and empirically tests a framework that categorizes four primary reasons – improved decision-making, improved financial outcomes, improved communication processes, and improved learning/training processes. The results support the four proposed dimensions and provide a structure to the multitude of potential reasons for developing and implementing decision aid technology.  The framework can be used by organizational managers in the initial stages of implementing a decision aid technology as well as during the functional stages of the decision aid to assess the initial and ongoing contribution the decision aid is making toward meeting organizational goals.