Information technology--Management

System modeling has the potential to enhance system design productivity by providing a
platform for system performance evaluations. This model must be designed at an abstract
level, hiding system details. However, it must represent any subsystem or its components
at any level of specification details. In order to model such a system, we will need to
combine various models-of-computation (MOC). MOC provide a framework to model
various algorithms and activities, while accounting for and exploiting concurrency and
synchronization aspects. Along with supporting various MOC, a modeling environment
should also support a well developed library. In this thesis, we have explored various
modeling environments. MLDesigner (MLD) is one such modeling environment that
supports a well developed library and integrates various MOC. We present an overview
and discuss the process of system modeling with MLD. We further present an abstract
model of a Network-on-Chip in MLD and show latency results for various customizable
parameters for this model.

In this thesis, a practical solution for drive test data evaluation and a real
application are studied. We propose a system framework to project high dimensional
Drive Test Data (DTD) to well-organized web pages, such that users can visually review
phone performance with respect to different factors.
The proposed application, iVESTA (interactive Visualization and Evaluation
System for driven Test dAta), employs a web-based architecture which enables users to
upload DTD and immediately visualize the test results and observe phone and network
performances with respect to different factors such as dropped call rate, signal quality,
vehicle speed, handover and network delays. iVESTA provides practical solutions for
mobile phone manufacturers and network service providers to perform comprehensive
study on their products from the real-world DTD.

Aligning information technology (lT) strategy with business strategy has been one
of the top concerns of practitioners and scholars. Despite the documented positive effects
of strategic alignment on organizational success, only few organizations consider
themselves in alignment. Although numerous studies exist about IT-business alignment,
the empirical studies based on strong theories have been rare in the alignment literature.
This dissertation attempts to fulfill this gap by proposing and empirically validating a
comprehensive strategic alignment model. Drawing on prior literature, we identified five
antecedents of alignment; centralization, formalization , shared domain knowledge,
successful IT history and relationship management. We further hypothesized that the
effects of these antecedents are mediated by the drivers of alignment, which are conceptualized as the level of connection of lT and business planning and the level of
communication between IT and business managers. Furthermore, the proposed research
model investigated the moderating effects of goal commitment of business executives to
achieving and sustaining strategic alignment and environmental uncertainty. The results
showed that both drivers had significant effects on alignment, and the effect of
connection is about twice that of communications. Our findings also support for the
effects of all antecedents except centralization. Finally, we found partial support for the
effects of moderating variables. Overall, the main contribution of this dissertation is the
development and empirical validation of a comprehensive strategic alignment model with
considerations for antecedents and potential moderating effects, thus extending the
alignment literature by differentiating the effects of dimensions of environmental
uncertainty as well as introducing the goal commitment and IT unit structure constructs,
and providing prescriptive insight for managing IT-business strategic alignment.

This dissertation examines the stock market reaction to 474 announcements of hiring chief information officers (CIOs) in the 1987--2002 period, and firm performance for periods up to two years following the CIO appointment. The study reports that the announcements are associated with significantly positive abnormal returns (0.48 percent). The returns are more pronounced when the new CIO is hired from an IT leader firm (1.94 percent). Abnormal returns are significantly positive related with the CIO's level of education and high-technology firms, and negatively related with firm size. In addition, there is no significant difference in market reaction between the announcements that publicize the creation of a new position and those that imply the filling of an existing position with new hires. Further, the study finds an association between the appointment of the new CIO and subsequent improvement in the accounting measures of profitability. Findings reveal that CIO firms outperform their matched firms and their industry counterparts for the two years following the announcements relative to the year prior to the CIO appointment.