eThesis - School of Business electronic theses

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OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

The purpose of this thesis is to assess the Critical Success Factors (CSF) in internet and communications field. There have been a variety of CSF studies on ICT area, but very little in standardization area. The earlier literature has focused on providing tools and definitions for the matter. Furthermore, no literature exists on how CSFs are perceived in the standardization area. This thesis is set to fill that research gap. The goal is to find out critical success factors occurring in the ICT standardization area, and to find out how the factors are perceived when no pre-determined context is given.

METHODOLOGY

The empirical part of this thesis is formed on expert interviews conducted to ten specialists from telecommunication, maritime, and banking industries. Their background in the standardization scene varies from observers to contributors and to managers in the field. All participants have worked in several standardization efforts over time. The viewpoints of the interviewees are spread between private and public organizations, as well as the standardization organizations in which they work have both formal and informal organizations represented. The nature of the study is qualitative. The empirical data was transcribed and analyzed against the earlier literature. Finally, a CSF model is derived that is applicable in the standardization context.

MAIN FINDINGS

Earlier literature has addressed the issue on many levels, but on rather excluding tone as well. The results of the study indicate CSFs on many dimensions. Few on a practical level, but the most important factors were found on a more abstract level. Study indicates that the world is not black and white in a sense how the Critical Success Factors are perceived. The perception of a critical factor is extremely broad. The success factors proposed by interviewees vary from a concept of a need and ecosystem, into the determination of how narrow scope should the effort have. Therefore the study indicates that the perception of a critical success factor is very subjective and depends on the experiences of people who are providing the answers.