Empirical study of the relationship between operations strategy and information systems strategic orientation in an e-commerce environment

Many corporate executives are convinced that today's e-commerce operations require a fundamental review of business strategy. Operations management researchers also call for substantiating operations strategy research to an e-commerce environment. However, no empirical research has explored information systems strategic issues using operations strategy theory. Drawing on both operations strategy and the information systems strategy literature, this exploratory research proposes a conceptual framework integrating both operations strategy and information systems strategy models, and then applies this new proposed framework to an e-commerce setting. This research not only provides a conceptual framework systematically to explore e-commerce strategic issues, but also provides empirical evidence on the relationships between its various constructs. Results of this exploratory study indicate that the business environment appears to have a tangible impact on strategic choices in operations. It also appears that links between the business environment and operations strategy in e-commerce, as well as the alignment between the information systems strategic orientation and operations strategy, determines e-commerce business performance success. Results show that high-performing e-commerce companies and low-performing e-commerce companies use different information systems strategies to support their operations strategy. The types of strategies these companies use are identified in this study.