O Valor de Negócio das Práticas de Tecnologia da Informação

The real contribution of the business value of Information Technology (IT) is still much discussed and the results of several studies are divergent. Some authors argue the reason for the differences may lie in the excessive aggregation of the IT construct (BRYNJOLFSSON; HITT, 2003) and organizational performance construct (RAY; BARNEY; MUHANNA, 2004). This research employed a model which seeks to assess the business value of IT through the relationship between the internal resources of IT performance and business processes in the value chain (MOONEY; GURBAXANI; KRAEMER, 1996). After pre-test to check the language of the questionnaire, data were colected from 96 service firms of Belo Horizonte/Brazil through a cross-sectional survey. We validate and analyze the data with univariate and multivariate statistics and Partial Least Squares Path Model technique was the main one utilized. We found that IT practices (use of the Internet architecture, digital transactions intensity and internal IT communication intensity) had a significant relationship with the performance of all business processes chain value and reasonable predictive effect. The evaluated model showed a high goodness of fit, indicating that IT contributes to value creation. For management purposes, the study demonstrates the importance of the development of the IT practices. From the academic point of view, the work explores a theoretical model multidimensional process oriented business and thus it contributes introducing new perspectives for assessing the business value of IT