50th Year Survey of IS Research in Management Science

MISRC Director Rob Kauffman's Survey of the Field Published in March 2004 Issue

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In March 2004, the INFORMS published a survey in Management Scienceof the Information Systems literature that has appeared in journal since 1954. The article, by MISRC Director Rob Kauffman, is entitled "The Evolution of Research on Information Systems: A Fiftieth Year Survey of the Literature in Management Science," and is coauthored with Rajiv Banker, currently business school Dean at the University of California , Riverside . The year 2004 marks the 50th anniversary of Management Science, the flagship journal of the Institute for Management Science (INFORMS).

Rob Kauffman comments: "This was a unique writing opportunity for me. It brought together two different threads in my career in academic research. First, my training from my masters and doctoral study at Cornell and Carnegie taught me to appreciate the innovations that come from interdisciplinary research and the blend of different theoretical and methodogical perspectives that are possible. Second, the time I have spent over the past few years teaching in the IDSc 8511 Conceptual Foundations of Information and Decision Sciences Research course with Professor Gordon Davis has had a profound effect on my thinking, and has helped me to develop a breadth of knowledge of the literature in Information Systems and its multiple theoretical perspectives that my experience at Carnegie did not provide."

Kauffman offers some additional insights into the research streams that he explored in his efforts to write the literature survey: "My 50th year survey of the IS literature in Management Science recognizes five distinct streams of research in the field, some of which appear to predate some of the IS research that was conducted at Minnesota and elsewhere in the mid-to-late 1970s, and which is popularly viewed as forming the foundations of the academic discipline. I now believe that there are even earlier roots though, especially involving the Management Science, Economics and Decision Support perspectives in this research discipline."

"I noted five separate streams:

• The Decision Support and Design Science Stream studies the application of computers in decision support, control, and managerial decision making. It forms the conceptual and theoretical basis for current developments in the IS field that are associated with Design Science and the Workshop on IT and Systems (WITS). It also recognizes some of the work done by past IDSc faculty, Gerardine DeSanctis on group decision making. This stream seemed to begin back in the mid-1950s—much earlier than originally thought.


• The Value of Information Stream reflects the early relationships that were established based on economic analysis of information as a commodity in the management of the firm. Although its development did not continue primarily in the IS field, there are nevertheless seminal papers published in this stream whose ideas are closely associated with current thinking about information value in decision making and IT investment analysis. Some of this work was also done in the 1960s and 1970s, ahead of the time that many IS researchers typically think.


• The Human-Computer Systems Design Research Stream emphasizes the cognitive basis for effective systems design. Among the articles in this stream are the well-known 1970s "Minnesota Experiments" of IDSc Professor Norm Chervany, and his past IDSc faculty colleague, Gary Dickson, and their graduate students. My knowledge of this work comes from my first-hand interactions with Norm, and my experience teaching doctoral students here with Gordon Davis.


• The IS Organization and Strategy Research Stream shifts the level of analysis away from the system user to the locus of value of the system investment and the impacts on the strategic capabilities of the firm. Traditionally, research in the Information and Decision Sciences Department at the Carlson School has been best known for some of this work, and is associated with past IDSc faculty members Cynthia Beath, Fred Davis, Gordon Davis, Dale Goodhue and Detmar Straub, and their doctoral graduates, who are now among the leaders in IS research. Much of this work occurred in the 1980s and 1990s, and is continuing within the field.


• The Economics of Information Systems and Technology Stream emphasizes the application of theoretical perspectives and methods from analytical and empirical economics to managerial problems involving IS and IT. This new tradition of research in the IDSc Department has been contributing to this stream at Management Science and in the leading IS journals (e.g., MIS Quarterly, Information Systems Research and the Journal of Management Information Systems). Some of that work is by ex-Carlson School Accounting professor, Rajiv Banker, and by Assistant Professor Fred Riggins and Associate Professor Alok Gupta. Some of my own research involving Economics and IS since I have been at Minnesota is included."

"My view of research in the IS field is an optimistic one, but also one that suggests some movement of the boundaries of our field and changes in how we define our research. In my Management Science article I wrote that:

[F]uture IS research will continue to be characterized by the study of problems in IS management, including systems analysis and design science, the management of software and IT investments within the firm, the configuration of business processes and the formation of business strategies that rely on IT, and the continued use of IT to create unique capabilities for users, decision makers, work groups, organizations and industry sectors. At its best, IS research has the potential to inform managers and academicians about how to understand, interpret, adapt to and effectively manage technologies that have been in use, as well as emerging technologies whose impacts are just being felt. If this capability can be brought to bear more strongly on the IS management function, there will be significant leverage to make one of the important business functions within the contemporary firm deliver on the promises that IT investments are supposed to offer. Clearly, however, much research is still to be done to accomplish this. IT infrastructure development, software project practices, setting up for the development of technology standards, optimizing networking capabilities for the firm, and structuring interorganizational IS investments all need to be treated as central problems that deserve increased attention. All of these issues require careful consideration of how IT impacts other management functions. Consequently, we also expect that the extent of interdisciplinary research in the IS field will increase, as other fields recognize the importance of developing knowledge related to specific problems that arise that are best assessed with an information systems view in mind.

Although other fields, including Economics, Operations Research, Organizational Theory and Strategic Management, will continue to play a key role in the development of managerial knowledge of IT, researchers in the IS field have an opportunity to leverage their in-depth knowledge of technology and the work group, organizational, market and economy settings in which it is deployed. This will require thoughtful problem selection, exploitation of knowledge of the role of information systems, and the capability to recognize situations where management science techniques make a difference.

Note: The citation for this article is as follows: Banker, R. D., and Kauffman, R. J. "The Evolution of Research on Information Systems: A Fiftieth Year Survey of the Literature in Management Science," Management Science , 50, 3, March 2004, 281-298. A second major survey article on Economic and Electronic Commerce by Rob Kauffman with past doctoral student, Eric Walden, provides another perspective on one stream of IS research that has made a major impact among e-commerce researchers. The citation is: Kauffman, R. J., and Walden, E. A. "Economics and Electronic Commerce: Survey and Directions for Research," International Journal of E-Commerce, 5, 4, Summer 2001, 5-116.