Cultivating sustainable information systems projects in public sector institutions in least developed countries

Abstract

The aim of this thesis is to develop a theoretical understanding of how the information systems (IS) project implementation process affects system sustainability in the context of least developed countries (LDCs). Information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) initiatives suffer high failure rates, which includes sustainability failure where systems are abandoned after initial successful implementation (Heeks, 2002; Walsham & Sahay, 2006; Avgerou, 2008). The contributions of this study were developed based on three case studies of major IS project implementation in Timor-Leste. From the three case studies, 41 semi-structured formal interviews were conducted, 54 observations of meetings and trainings were also conducted, and 217 documents of secondary data were collected to facilitate data triangulation. From the interviews and observations, 432 pages of transcription were produced. Using grounded theory methodology (GTM), this study develops a cultivating sustainability process theory; this process theory contributes to the ICT4D theory and practice by formulating an integrated process model that may help the effort to achieve IS sustainability during the project implementation process. This complements existing studies on achieving sustainability, which have been conducted mainly with a focus on achieving individual aspects of sustainability namely political/institutional, financial/economic, technological, cultural/social and environmental (Kumar & Best, 2006). The process model shows that the sustainability of IS projects in less developed countries can be cultivated using three main phases: achieving strong sponsorship from the top management of the host institution, successfully delivering the technology based on the host institution's existing conditions, and the focus on system outcomes, which includes technical and political outcomes. The process theory was developed based on data collected from three major IS project implementations in Timor-Leste. Further research is needed to investigate more IS projects with distinct characteristics compared to the three IS projects used in this study; the results of future studies will be used to confirm, revise or enrich the process model developed in this study.