Central Queensland University's Course Management Systems: Accelerator or brake in engaging change?

Central Queensland University (CQU) is a highly complex institution, combining campuses in Central Queensland and distance education programs for Australian domestic students with Australian metropolitan sites for international students and a number of overseas centres, also for international students. In common with many other universities, CQU has recently reviewed its course management systems (CMSs). In doing so, CQU has signalled its desired strategic position in managing its online learning provision for the foreseeable future. This paper analyzes that strategic position from the perspective of the effectiveness of CQU's engagement with current drivers of change. Drawing on online survey results, the authors deploy Introna's (1996) distinction between teleological and ateleological systems to interrogate CQU's current position on CMSs - one of its most significant enterprises - for what it reveals about whether and how CQU's CMSs should be considered an accelerator of, or a brake on, its effective engagement with those drivers of change. The authors contend that a more thorough adoption of an ateological systems approach is likely to enhance the CMS's status as an accelerator in engaging with such drivers.

[1]  Adrienne De Schutter,et al.  Vendor-Assisted Evaluation of a Learning Management System. , 2004 .

[2]  Fons Nouwens,et al.  Evaluation of Online Learning Management Systems. , 2004 .

[3]  John Yen,et al.  Introduction , 2004, CACM.

[4]  C. Prahalad,et al.  Competing for the Future , 1994 .

[5]  Paul O Gaddis,et al.  Strategy under attack , 1997 .

[6]  Richard Baskerville,et al.  Systems Without Method: The Impact of New Technologies on Information Systems Development Projects , 1992, The Impact of Computer Supported Technologies in Information Systems Development.

[7]  Charles I. Stubbart,et al.  Why we need a revolution in strategic planning , 1985 .

[8]  Angela Lin,et al.  Mission Critical: Realizing the Promise of Enterprise Systems , 2001 .

[9]  A. Giddens,et al.  Reflexive Modernization: Politics, Tradition and Aesthetics in the Modern Social Order , 1994 .

[10]  Henry Mintzberg.  The rise and fall of strategic planning , 1993 .

[11]  Richard N. Katz,et al.  Balancing Technology and Tradition: The Example of Course Management Systems. , 2003 .

[12]  Shirley Gregor,et al.  An Information Systems Design Theory for e-Learning , 2004, ACIS.

[13]  Kalle Lyytinen,et al.  Different perspectives on information systems: problems and solutions , 1987, CSUR.

[14]  David R. Brodwin,et al.  Strategic implementation: Five approaches to an elusive phenomenon , 1984 .

[15]  M. Markus,et al.  Information technology and organizational change: causal structure in theory and research , 1988 .

[16]  Patrick Alan Danaher,et al.  Challenging enterprises and subcultures: interrogating 'best practice' in Central Queensland University's course management systems , 2004 .

[17]  Kent L. Beck,et al.  Embracing Change with Extreme Programming , 1999, Computer.

[18]  D. Dunphy,et al.  Transformational and Coercive Strategies for Planned Organizational Change: Beyond the O.D. Model , 1988 .

[19]  James A. Highsmith,et al.  Adaptive Software Development: A Collaborative Approach to Managing Complex Systems , 1999 .

[20]  V. J. Connors,et al.  Strategic plan. , 1999, Journal of the American Optometric Association.

[21]  Alistair Cockburn,et al.  Agile Software Development , 2001 .

[22]  EDUCAUSE CENTER FOR APPLIED RESEARCH 73 Faculty Use of Course Management Systems , 2003 .

[23]  M. Porter,et al.  How Information Gives You Competitive Advantage , 1985 .

[24]  William H. Dutton,et al.  The Social Shaping of a Virtual Learning Environment: The Case of a University-Wide Course Management System. , 2004 .

[25]  R. MacAvoy,et al.  Frictionless Commerce? A Comparison of Internet and Conventional Retailers , 1999 .

[26]  Richard Baskerville,et al.  Amethodical systems development: the deferred meaning of systems development methods , 2000 .

[27]  Lucas D. Introna.  Notes on ateleological information systems development , 1996, Inf. Technol. People.

[28]  Ram A. Cnaan,et al.  The Impact of Information Technology on Social Work Practice , 1989 .

[29]  William H. Dutton,et al.  Digital academe : the new media and institutions of higher education and learning , 2005 .

[30]  Y. Doz,et al.  Strategy process research: Focusing on corporate self‐renewal , 1992 .

[31]  Morten Flate Paulsen,et al.  Online Education Systems in Scandinavian and Australian Universities: A Comparative Study , 2002 .

[32]  P. Self.  Is Comprehensive Planning Possible and Rational , 1974 .

[33]  E. Schein.  Organisational culture and leadership , 1991 .

[34]  T. Davenport.  Putting the enterprise into the enterprise system. , 1998, Harvard business review.

[35]  F. Thayer.  An end to hierarchy and competition : administration in the post-affluent world , 1981 .

[36]  Don Tapscott,et al.  The Digital Economy: Promise and Peril in the Age of Networked Intelligence , 2003 .

[37]  E. Brynjolfsson,et al.  Paradox Lost? Firm-Level Evidence on the Returns to Information Systems Spending , 1996 .

[38]  Mary C. Dyson,et al.  Evaluating Virtual Learning Environments: What Are We Measuring?. , 2003 .

[39]  Harry Doxsee,et al.  Integrated Learning Management Systems , 2004 .

[40]  William A. Kraus,et al.  Collaboration in organizations: Alternatives to hierarchy , 1980 .

[41]  Alistair Cockburn,et al.  Agile Software Development: The Business of Innovation , 2001, Computer.

[42]  R. Harreveld,et al.  Evaluation Perspectives: Interrogating Open and Distance Education Provision at an Australian Regional University. , 2004 .

[43]  Aaron Wildavsky,et al.  If planning is everything, maybe it's nothing , 1973 .

[44]  Blake Ives,et al.  The information system as a competitive weapon , 1984, CACM.