Knowledge is used as a focal factor for competitive advantage, through effective and efficient performances by employees in many organisations. As a result, knowledgeable employees are expected to share their knowledge with others to increase innovation within the organisation. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Generally, employees behave differently within an organisation. The main challenge is that no organisation has total control of its employees behaviour and actions. The behaviour and action has impact on how information systems are deployed for innovation, in creating competitive advantage. As a result, many systems have been deployed by different organisations in attempt to address this challenge for the interest. Others have deployed competitive intelligence products and services. This is primarily intended to provide decision ‑ makers with information that can contribute to the innovative process in order to meet customer needs. For an organisation to survive, it must be able to innovate and market its innovations. Also, innovation creates uncertainty about its consequences in the mind of potential adopters. There exists a discrepancy between what customers perceive as their problems or needs and what organisations understand these problems to be. This study was conducted with the primary aim to understand the impact of Competitive Intelligence (CI) on Information systems (IS) innovation products and services in organisations. The case study research method was employed, using a financial organisation. The Innovation‑decision process, from the perspective of Diffusion of Innovation theory (DOI) was applied in the data analysis.

Over the years, there have been many foci in the search for IT value. However impending developments in information and other technologies may be about to change the nature of the quest entirely. For example, the prospect of technologically enhanced biological function raises new, difficult and disturbing questions about value that need to be explored. Longer term, developments areas such as cyborg technology, artificial intelligence and robotics could have profound, and potentially disruptive, implications for societies and even humanity as a whole. As of now, there is a rapidly diminishing window of opportunity in which to get our values and value systems clear before a combination of technological advance and market forces overwhelms our ability to make important value choices. This paper explores some of the possibilities that may be coming our way and asks some difficult questions about IT value in what may be a brave new world.

IS managers are being put under increasing pressure to justify the value of corporate ITIS expenditure. Their constant quest for the 'holy grail' continues, as existing methods and approaches of justifying ITIS expenditure are still failing to deliver. The decision making process is not as objective and transparent as it is claimed or intended to be. This paper discusses seven commonly used tactics used by business managers to influence IT appraisals. The paper takes a 'devil's advocate' position and adopts some irony when looking at the area of power and politics in IT evaluation. Rather than promoting the use of these techniques, this article aims to raise awareness that IT evaluation is not as rational as most IT evaluation researcherspractitioners would want it to be or indeed claim it to be. It is argued that rationalisation or counter tactics may counteract influence techniques in an attempt to get behind the cloak and dagger side of organisational power and politics, but politics and power in decision‑making cannot and should not be filtered out. Due to dissimilarities of objectives, limitations of time and information, influence techniques will always be used. However, rather than being counterproductive, these techniques are essential in the process of decision making of IT projects. They help organisations reach better decisions, which receive more commitment than decisions that were forced to comply with strictly rational approaches. Awareness of the influence and manipulation techniques used in practice will help to deal with power and politics in IT evaluation and thereby come to better IT investment decisions.

The Internet and related technologies have made a substantial impact on the way organisations conduct business in Australia and around the world. Australian organisations like their international counterparts have invested heavily to leverage the Internet and transform their traditional businesses into e‑businesses in the last seven years. E‑business investments are claiming a sizeable share of overall IT budgets in most organisations whether they are small, medium or large. However, managers are under constant pressure to justify e‑business costs and to ensure that these investments keep paying off. Earlier research on e‑business in Australia addressed issues of the rate of e‑business uptake and the application of the Internet to certain business processes. Research discussed in this paper is one of the first attempts to evaluate the value of e‑business. It is based on data collected, collated and analysed from the responses received from IT and e‑business managers throughout Australia. Research presented in this paper is based on a model developed in the USA (Barua et al, 2001) to identify the impact of e‑business drivers on operational excellence of firms which influence financial improvements. It was initiated to quantify the success of e‑business in Australia after huge losses from e‑business projects were reported by a few large organisations. The paper includes a review of literature on e‑business evaluation, research methodology, analysis techniques, a discussion of e‑business performance in Australia and presents the impact of e‑business on operational excellence and financial performance of the organisation.

Enterprise systems have been widely sold on the basis that they reduce costs through process efficiency and enhance decision making by providing accurate and timely enterprise wide information. Although research shows that operational efficiencies can be achieved, ERP systems are notoriously poor at delivering management information in a form that would support effective decision‑making. Research suggests managers are not helped in their decision‑making abilities simply by increasing the flow of information. This paper calls for a new approach to researching the impact of ERP implementations on global organizations by examining decision making processes at 3 levels in the organisation (corporate, core implementation team and local site).

For nonprofit organizations (NPO's), ICT is crucial to fulfil their social objectives. However, it is rare that ICT investments have monetary returns; ICT also has indirect impact on the social activity of NPO's. So it is very difficult for them both to decide about ICT investments and to evaluate their contribution to performance. NPO's should therefore define an appropriate evaluation framework, to understand if, where, what and how much to invest in ICT, to better achieve their mission. The evaluation framework described in this paper is based on the peculiar characteristics of nonprofit organizations, on the multidimensional evaluation criteria and on the balanced scorecard, adapted to the specific nature of nonprofit activities.

IS evaluation exercises continued to engender scepticism. The evaluation of IS investment is considered a 'wicked problem' and there are good reasons for this judgement. The topic has attracted many researchers. There is a substantial body of literature on the problems of measurement and the inadequacies of traditional investment appraisal methods. A wide range of alternative tools has been proposed to replace these approaches. But many surveys of actual practice have established little evidence of their use. Reported IS evaluation practice appears to be relatively unsophisti‑ cated or absent in many organisations. This paper draws on existing literature and case material to analyse the problem facing organisations when planning an IS evaluation exercise. It argues that the factors that can undermine the effectiveness of IS evaluation projects pose ma‑ jor problems. Management apathy may be a rational response to a complex and difficult exercise that often yields little benefit to the organisation.

Citizen‑Centric Approach and Healthcare Management Based on the XML Web Services Mayumi Hori1, Masakazu Ohashi2 and Shotaro Suzuki3 1Hakuoh University, Tochigi, Japan 2Chuo University, Tokyo, Japan 3Microsoft Co Ltd. Tokyo, Japan m.hori@hakuoh.ac.jp ohashi@fps.chuo‑u.ac.jp shosuz@microsoft.com Abstract: We propose recommendations on how to improve healthcare management by utilizing the XML Web services, which enhance the quality and promote the efficiency of healthcare and medical services with a citizen‑centric, patient‑oriented approach.