Browsing by Author "Rai, Arun"

Now showing 1 - 4 of 4
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    Combating Infant Mortality in Rural India: Evidence From a Field Study of eHealth Kiosk Implementations
    Venkatesh, Viswanath; Rai, Arun; Sykes, Tracy Ann; Aljafari, Ruba (Society for Information Management, 2016-06-01)
    The United Nations' Millennium Development Goals listed high infant mortality rates as a major problem in developing countries, especially in rural areas. Given the powerful information dissemination capabilities, information and communication technologies (ICTs) have been suggested as interventions to build infant care awareness and to modify healthcare behaviors. We examine how the use of one ICT intervention-specifically, eHealth kiosks disseminating authenticated and accessible medical information-can alleviate the problem of high infant mortality in rural India. We investigate how mothers' social networks affect their use of eHealth kiosks, seeking professional medical care for their infants and, ultimately, infant mortality. Drawing on the social epidemiology and social networks literatures, we focus on advice and hindrance from both strong and weak ties as the conduit of social influence on mothers' health-related behaviors for the care of their infants. Over a period of 7 years, we studied 4,620 infants across 10 villages where the eHealth kiosks were implemented along with support resources for proxy use. The results revealed that (1) eHealth kiosk use promotes seeking professional medical care and reduces infant mortality, (2) mothers are especially vulnerable to hindrance from both strong and weak ties as they choose to maintain the status quo of traditional infant healthcare practices (e.g., reliance on untrained personnel, superstitions, fatalism) in villages, and (3) advice from both strong and weak ties offers the potential to break down misplaced beliefs about infant healthcare practices and to develop literacy on seeking professional medical care. In contrast, in a comparative group of 10 neighboring villages, the reduction in infant mortality was not as pronounced and the effect of professional medical care in reducing infant mortality was lower. Our findings suggest that an ICT intervention can effectively address one of society's most important problems (i.e., infant mortality) even in parts of the world with limited resources and deep suspicion of technology and change. Overall, we believe such an ICT intervention will complement other investments being made, including the facilitation of use (proxy use) and provision of professional medical facilities to reduce infant mortality.
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    How does an enterprise system implementation change interpersonal relationships in organizations
    Bala, Hillol; Venkatesh, Viswanath; Ganster, Daniel C.; Rai, Arun (Emerald, 2021-06-28)
    Purpose: Although research has suggested that enterprise system (ES) implementations have major impacts on employee job characteristics and outcomes, there has been limited research that has examined the impacts of ES implementations on interpersonal relationships over time. Building on and extending recent studies that have examined changes in employee job characteristics and outcomes during an ES implementation, this research examined the nature, extent, determinants and outcomes of changes in an important interpersonal relationship construct—coworker exchange (CWX)—following an ES implementation. CWX is considered a critical aspect of employees' job and an important determinant of their success in the workplace. Drawing on social exchange theory (SET), the authors theorize that employees will perceive a change in CWX following an ES implementation. Design/methodology/approach: A longitudinal field study over a period of 6 months among 249 employees was conducted. Latent growth modeling was used to analyze the data. Findings: The authors found that employees' work process characteristics, namely perceived process complexity, perceived process rigidity and perceived process radicalness, significantly explained change, i.e. decline in our case, in CWX during the shakedown phase of an ES implementation. The decreasing trajectory of change in CWX led to declining job performance and job satisfaction. Originality/value: The role of CWX and its importance in the context of ES implementations is a key novel element of this work.
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    Information Systems Projects and Individual Developer Outcomes: Role of Project Managers and Process Control
    Venkatesh, Viswanath; Rai, Arun; Maruping, Likoebe M. (INFORMS, 2018-03-01)
    We integrate control theory and the information systems (IS) project management literature using a multilevel lens to theorize the cross-level effects of technical IS project risk on individual developer outcomes-performance and psychological stress- and the mechanisms by which IS project managers' project-related knowledge attenuates this relationship. We argue that IS project managers with project-related knowledge mitigate technical IS project risk by facilitating the enactment of internal and external process controls in their IS projects. Our empirical study involves data collected from 1,230 individual developers embedded in 130 IS project teams that are managed by 20 IS project managers. Our results provide strong support for the three-level model and its set of (a) cross-level main effects of technical IS project risk on individual developer outcomes; (b) cross-level main effects of IS project manager project-related knowledge on enacted internal and external process controls; and (c) cross-level moderation of the relationship between technical IS project risk and individual developer outcomes by IS project manager project-related knowledge through internal and external process controls. Our study provides insights on how IS project management, IS project process controls, and technical IS project risk must be managed as a system of multilevel dependencies to achieve the desired developer outcomes.
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    Overcoming cross-organizational barriers to success in offshore projects
    Maruping, Likoebe; Rai, Arun; Aljafari, Ruba; Venkatesh, Viswanath (Emerald, 2021-10-04)
    Purpose: Advances in information technology coupled with the need to build resilience against disruptions by pandemics like COVID-19 continue to emphasize offshoring services in the software industry. Service-level agreements (SLAs) have served as a key mechanism for safeguarding against risk in offshore service arrangements. Yet, variations in service cost and quality persist. This study aims to open up the blackbox linking SLAs to offshore project outcomes by examining (1) how the provisions in these contracts affect the ability of project teams – the work unit primarily in charge of producing the offshored service – to achieve their objectives and fulfill client requirements and (2) how differences in contextual factors shape the effects of these provisions. Design/methodology/approach: The authors incorporate the role of organizational work practice differences to understand the challenges that 270 offshore project teams faced in coordinating and integrating technical and business domain knowledge across organizational boundaries in offshore arrangements. The examined offshore IT projects were managed by a leading software vendor in India and several of its US-based clients over a three-year period. Findings: The authors demonstrate that organizational work practice differences represent a barrier to offshore project success, and that project team transition processes are an important mechanism for overcoming these barriers. Moreover, the authors find that transition processes represent key mediating mechanisms through which SLA provisions affect offshore project outcomes. Originality/value: The study findings shed light on how SLAs shape software project teams' balance between activities aimed at meeting client needs and those aimed at containing costs.