{"title":"How finance shared services affect profitability: an IT business value perspective.","authors":"Xin Chen, Qizhi Dai, Chaohong Na","doi":"10.1007/s10799-023-00391-1","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Shared services have become an important IT-enabled organizational form for providing support business functions to internal users. The information systems that implement and deliver shared services are part of the organizational IT infrastructure that has a twofold effect on firm financial performance. On the one hand, with the shared services model, the IT infrastructure consolidates so that the costs are lowered for providing the common functions firm-wide. On the other hand, the systems delivering the shared services embody the workflow and business functions so that the value of shared services can be gained from improvements in the function performance at the process level. We perceive finance shared services as IT-enabled services for corporate finance and accounting functions, and propose that finance shared services improve firm profitability via cost savings at firm level and via increased working capital efficiency at the process level. We test our hypotheses with data on Chinese public firms from 2008 to 2019. Data analysis results show both direct effect of finance shared services on profitability and mediating effect of working capital efficiency. This study expands our understandings about impacts of shared services, and contributes to empirical research in IT business value.</p>","PeriodicalId":46884,"journal":{"name":"Information Technology & Management","volume":" ","pages":"1-16"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3000,"publicationDate":"2023-02-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9934509/pdf/","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Information Technology & Management","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10799-023-00391-1","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"INFORMATION SCIENCE & LIBRARY SCIENCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Shared services have become an important IT-enabled organizational form for providing support business functions to internal users. The information systems that implement and deliver shared services are part of the organizational IT infrastructure that has a twofold effect on firm financial performance. On the one hand, with the shared services model, the IT infrastructure consolidates so that the costs are lowered for providing the common functions firm-wide. On the other hand, the systems delivering the shared services embody the workflow and business functions so that the value of shared services can be gained from improvements in the function performance at the process level. We perceive finance shared services as IT-enabled services for corporate finance and accounting functions, and propose that finance shared services improve firm profitability via cost savings at firm level and via increased working capital efficiency at the process level. We test our hypotheses with data on Chinese public firms from 2008 to 2019. Data analysis results show both direct effect of finance shared services on profitability and mediating effect of working capital efficiency. This study expands our understandings about impacts of shared services, and contributes to empirical research in IT business value.
期刊介绍:
Changes in the hardware, software and telecommunication technologies play a major role in the way our society is evolving. During the last decade, the rate of change in information technology has increased. Indeed it is clear that we are now entering an era where explosive change in telecommunication technology combined with ever increasing computing power will lead to profound changes in information systems that support our organizations. These changes will affect the way our organizations function, will lead to new business opportunities and will create a need for new non-profit organizations. Governments and international organizations do and will have to scramble to create policies and laws for control of public goods and services such as airwaves and public networks. Educational institutions will continue to change the content of educational materials they deliver to include new knowledge and skills. In addition these institutions will change the delivery mechanisms for disseminating these materials. By definition, information technology is very wide. There are a number of journals that address different technologies such as databases, knowledge bases, multimedia, group-ware, telecommunications, etc. This current trend is understandable because these technologies are indeed complex and often have a multitude of technical issues requiring in-depth study. On the other hand, business solutions almost always require integration of a number of these technologies. Therefore it is important to have a journal where the readers will be exposed not only to different technologies but also to their impact on information system design, functionality, operations and management. It should be emphasized that information systems include not only machines but also humans; therefore, the journal will be an outlet for studies dealing with man/machine interface, human factors and organizational issues. Furthermore, managerial issues arising from and dealing with managem ent of information technology and systems including strategic issues are included in the domain of coverage. The topics of coverage will include but will not be limited to the following list: Managing with Information Technology;Management of Information Technology and Systems;Introduction and Diffusion of IT;Strategic Impact of IT;Economics of IS and IT;New Information Technologies and Their Impact on Organizations;Human Factors in Information Systems;Man/Machine Interface, GUI;IS and Organizational Research Issues;Graphical Problem Solving;Multimedia Applications;Knowledge Acquisition and Representation;Knowledge Bases;Data Modeling;Database Management Systems;Data Mining;Model Management Systems;Systems Analysis, Design and Development; Case Technologies;Object Oriented Design Methodologies;System Design Methodologies;System Development Environments;Performance Modeling and Analysis; Software Engineering;Artificial Intelligence Applications to Organizational/Business Problems;Expert Systems;Decision Support Systems;Machine Learning;Neural Network Applications;Meta-Heuristics and Business Problem Solving;Distributed Computer Systems, Legacy Systems, Client - Server Computing;End User Computing;Information Systems for Virtual Organizations;IS and IT for Business Process Re-engineering;IS for Total Quality Control;IS for Supporting Team Work;Negotiation Support Systems;Group Decision Support Systems;EDI;Internet/WWW Applications;Telecommunication Networks;IT and International Information Systems;Security in Networks and Systems;Public Policy Issues dealing with Telecommunica tion;Networks and Airways;IS and IT Training;GIS;IS and IT Applications, e.g., in logistics, marketing, accounting, finance and operations.
Officially cited as: Inf Technol Manag