Highly successful organizations today are typically those that apply information technology most effectively.
This chapter examines the evolution of IT. The chapter begins by looking at IT
systems applied to organizational operations and then examines how IT is used for decision making and control of the organization. The next sections consider how IT can add strategic value through the use of internal coordination applications
such as intranets, enterprise resource planning, knowledge management systems, and social networking, as well as applications for external coordination and collaboration, such as extranets, customer-relationship systems, e-business, and the integrated enterprise. The final section of the chapter presents an overview of how IT affects organization design and interorganizational relationships.