Realising Synergy in Business Analytics Enabled Systems

The synergy of IT resources with other organisational resources is important in achieving operational and strategic benefits. The synergistic interaction between IT resources and other organisational resources leads to the emergence of new IT-enabled organisational resources, which are capable of generating significant organisational value. The aim of this paper is to understand how this synergy is realised between IT resources and other organisational resources. Based on a synthesis of relevant literature, we propose six enablers and mechanisms which lead to synergy. To assess the content validity of these enablers and mechanisms, we conducted ten one-hour interviews with Business Analytics (BA) experts. The results assisted us in refining and contextualising the enablers and mechanisms for BA systems and led to a clear and comprehensive definition of synergy. The paper concludes with suggestions for empirical research to further refine our definition of synergy.

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