Citizen Relationship Management Implementation in Local Government – Towards a Theoretical Research Framework

Many governments today have made significant investment on Citizen Relationship Management (CiRM) implementation. The employment of CiRM systems has increased the operational day-to-day and strategic long-term effectiveness of governments, particularly in relation to the intimacy of their relationship with the public. However, many of the initiatives have failed to deliver the benefits expected at the local government setting. As a consequence, it is now important to look from the literature in order to understand the process of implementation and if there are common determinants that may influence the success of CiRM implementation. Based on the reviewed of literature, this paper investigates the development of CiRM implementation studies that had significant effects upon the CiRM system implementation. A conceptual framework is proposed which contributes to the theoretical understanding of CiRM implementation process, and may inform practitioner success with new CiRM system implementation. The paper concludes with four crucial issues that need to be clarified before the proposed theoretical framework of the study can be further explored and developed: 1) the meaning of CiRM implementation process; 2) the determinants that may influence the process of CiRM implementation; 3) the appropriate approach to investigate CiRM implementation process; and 4) the perspective of CiRM implementation projects.