Can – and should – enterprise-level IS governance be democratized?

Prof. Robert Winter

Full Professor of Business Informatics at the
University of St.Gallen Switzerland & Director of the Institute for Business Informatics

Abstract
While having effectively contributed to increase coherency and reduce complexity in the past, the value of enterprise-level coordination (such as data governance or EAM) is sometimes questioned in the face of increasingly agile, cloud-based and decentral approaches to IS management. This skepticism is fueled by the traditional form of ‘coordination delivery’ by means of central institutions and centrally imposed restrictions to local design freedom. If so many things now become ‘democratized’, what’s about data management and EAM? Can traditional forms of interventions just be delivered and framed differently? Are novel interventions needed – and can we finally address the imbalance between investing and benefiting from enterprise-level coordination?

Biography
Robert Winter is a full professor of business & information systems engineering at the University of St. Gallen (HSG) and director of HSG’s Institute of Information Management. He is also founding academic director of HSG’s Executive Master’s of Business Engineering program and was academic director of HSG’s PhD in Management program. He received master’s degrees in business administration and business education as well as a doctorate in social sciences from Goethe University, Frankfurt, Germany. After having served as vice editor-in-chief of Business & Information Systems Engineering and as senior editor of the European Journal of Information Systems, he currently serves on several editorial boards including MIS Quarterly Executive. His research interests include design science research methodology and all aspects of enterprise-level IS research, such as enterprise architecture management, design and governance of digital platforms, corporate data management, and design and governance of enterprise transformation. His research has been published in leading information systems conferences and journals, such as MIS Quarterly, European Journal of Information Systems, Journal of the AIS, Journal of Information Technology, and Business & Information Systems Engineering. One of his publications received the AIS Senior Scholars’ Best Paper award for 2017. In 2023, he received the Design Science Lifetime Achievement Award.