Business and IT Alignment in a Large Organization: an Empirical View

Over the past two decades, the consensus was reached, that IT has emancipated itself from being perceived as having a mere supporting role to uphold the business strategy of the enterprise. IT is now a major and decisive factor of any large organization’s business strategy. To reach Business-IT Alignment, we need to understand the subject matter, as well as certain factors and antecedents, which have an important impact. This work aims at discussing the relation between Business-IT Alignment and how it is impacted by organizational culture and the organizational IT outsourcing strategy as well as capturing the background and dynamics of Business-IT Alignment, first on a theoretical basis in an initial literature review, and second on an empirical basis in the form of two case studies for two large organizations operating in the private sector. The empirical part will be structured in the form of two case studies. The underlying research work will be conducted by using qualitative and quantitative methods to describe the processes, factors, and antecedents within enterprises, which have an impact on Business-IT Alignment with focus on the organizational culture and the outsourcing strategy. The methods will be professional observations, interviews, and surveys. The case studies will outline how these enterprises operate, how Business-IT Alignment is viewed and approached, and how the two major factors of organizational culture and outsourcing impact these two organizations’ business goals, business strategy and their path to improving Business-IT Alignment in a fast growing and fast changing business field. The results of the case studies for both organizations confirm the hypothesis, that both factors organizational culture and outsourcing have a significant impact on Business-IT Alignment, though it is important to take size, structure, technical background, and IT know-how as well as the business field of the organization and the impact of these factors on Business-IT Alignment into account. The conclusion, the preceding discussion, and the subsequent part of outlook as well as the assumptions and limitations provide valuable findings and opportunities for further research.