Evaluating Information System Effectiveness — Part II: Comparing Evaluator Viewpoints

Evaluations of Management Information System (MIS) tend to be subjective and are influenced by the perceptions of system objectives, as well as the experiences with system performance in accomplishing organizational objectives. Consequently, the assessments of MIS effectiveness are often controversial and can be sources of disagreement and conflict between different functional groups involved in MIS implementation — users, MIS development, internal audit, and top management personnel. This article, the second of two parts, describes and compares the evaluator viewpoints on system effectiveness for these various functional groups. The first part, which appeared in the previous issue of the MIS Quarterly (Volume 5, Number 3) presented a conceptual hierarchy of system objectives and compared various approaches for evaluating accomplishment of objectives.