View IS project management as an art as well as a science. . . .
There are a number of books out there on project management. What is different and specific about this book?
- There is a balance between socio-cultural and technical aspects and there is a balance between qualitative and quantitative aspects – project management is seen as both an art and a science.
- It provides an information systems orientation for project management: neither information technology oriented on the one side nor production and operations oriented on the other, but of application to both within an organizational-wide view.
- It stresses information systems as a whole, not just software development – no project is successful if only software aspects are considered.
- It gives a truly international view of the domain – examples and experiences from different parts of the world add richness as well as context to the material. Globalization has ensured that most projects take on an international dimension.
- The book provides a coherent explanation of the concerns of the project manager as the project develops through the project life cycle – it does not follow a 'kitchen sink approach'.
- Each chapter has the following consistent structure: introduction and outline, an exhibit, the main text with examples, chapter summary, exercises, discussion questions, interview with project manager and appendix – this structure provides coherence and consistency.
- The exhibit, interview and appendix contain real-world examples, experiences, case studies, discussion material, software descriptions and professional codes – these provide material for class discussion and group work.
- The material has been used on our courses in the United States, Europe and Australia, given to practitioners as well as students (both undergraduate and postgraduate) – it has been well tested as part of our own project managemenThe material in this text has been proven successful through repeated use in courses in the United States, Europe, and Australia, by practitioners as well as undergraduate and postgraduate students.
Intended Audience
This core text is designed for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses such as Management Information Systems, Computer Information Systems, Information Systems, and Decision and Information Systems in the departments of information systems, information technology, and business.
Professor David Avison is Distinguished Professor of Information Systems at ESSEC Business School, Paris, France (since 2000) after being Professor at the School of Management at Southampton University for nine years. He is also full professor at the School of Information Systems, Computing and Mathematics at Brunel University in England. So far, twenty-five books are to his credit as author or editor including the fourth edition of the well-used text on Information Systems Development; Methodologies, Techniques and Tools (203, McGraw-Hill) which is jointly authored with Guy Fitzgerald. Over the years, this has sold over 100,000 copies (mainly in UK, Europe, Asia and Australia/New Zealand). David was Chair of the International Federation of Information Processing (IFIP) 8.2 group on the impact of IS/IT on organizations and society and is now acting chair of IFIP technical committee 8. He was past President of the UK Academy for Information Systems and also chair of the UK Heads and Professors of IS. He was joint program chair of the International Conference in Information Systems in Las Vegas (previously also research program stream chair at ICIS Atlanta), joint program chair of IFIP TC8 conference at Santiago Chile on IS past, present and future, program chair of the IFIPWG8.2 conference in Amsterdam on IS development, panels chair for the European Conference in Information Systems at Copenhagen and publicity chair for the entity-relationship conference in Paris and chair of several other UK and European conferences. He also acts as consultant and has most recently worked with a leading manufacturer developing their IT/IS strategy, although much of his consulting experience has been gained in SMEs. He is joint editor of Blackwell Science′s Information Systems Journal. He has published a large number of research papers in learned journals, and researches in the area of information systems development and more generally on information systems in their natural organizational setting.
Reza Torkzadeh is professor and chair of Management Information Systems in the College of Business at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He is an educator with broad experience working with graduate and undergraduate students on information system research projects. He has been recognized in several studies as a leading MIS researcher and has received many national and international honors and awards. He was General Chair of the International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS′05) and is the current chair of the Executive Committee of ICIS. He serves on the editorial board of Information Systems Journal and Information & Management and is Division Editor of IS for Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences. He was an Associate Editor of Journal of Applied Mathematics & Decision Sciences from 1999 to 2006. His articles have appeared in academic and professional journals including Management Science, MIS Quarterly, Information Systems Research, Journal of MIS, Decision Sciences, Communications of the ACM, Omega, Decision Support Systems, Information & Management, Journal of Operational Research, Journal of Knowledge Engineering, Structural Equation Modeling, Long Range Planning, and others. He has developed widely used research instruments for computer user satisfaction, impact of information technology on work, user involvement in systems development activities, computer usage pattern, computer user skills, and e-commerce value to the customer. His current research interests include the impact of information technology, measures of e-commerce success, computer self-efficacy, and information systems security. He is a member of The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Science, Association for Information Systems, and Decision Sciences Institute.
