A Strategic Approach to Information Quality and Its Implications for the Performance of Military Organizations

The extant Information Systems (IS) literature has focused on developing methods for assessing the level of Information Quality (IQ), paying scant attention to the introduction of strategic initiatives for improving the level IQ and operational performance. We address that lacuna and explore how organizations can improve the level of subjective IQ and positively influence their operational performance. Through a Canonical Action Research approach and interviews with 43 individuals from a multinational military organization, we demonstrate that the implementation of an IQ strategy can significantly improve operational performance through its impact on knowledge, employee satisfaction, efficiency, and productivity. Our findings demonstrate that employee tenure, and background, as well as organizational culture and hierarchy significantly influence the level of subjective IQ. Our work contributes to IS theory by further elucidating the relationship between IQ and operational performance, and to practice by enabling organizations to improve their level of subjective IQ and operational performance.