An indicators-Based Approach to Measuring Information Technology Governance Effectiveness: a Study with Brazilian Professionals

Organisations have adopted information technology governance (ITG) practices to improve decisionmaking and accountability about decisions related to IT. Considering the resources and effort required for the adoption of these practices, it is important to measure ITG effectiveness, in particular by contributing to the increased transparency and IT accountability desired by stakeholders. The goal of this study is to identify a set of indicators to measure ITG effectiveness. Interviews and focus groups are the main techniques of data collection, which involved professionals linked to 45 companies: 11 Chief Information Officers (CIOs), 4 IT managers, 13 IT coordinators, 15 governance analysts and 2 IT researchers. Nine criteria for ITG effectiveness were obtained from semi-structured interviews, and 213 measurement indicators were identified using structured interviews. Content analysis was used to create a set of 48 indicators, based on similarities among the descriptions. This set of indicators was discussed in a focus group, and 27 of these indicators were considered to be especially important for measuring ITG effectiveness and the most applicable in different organisations. The main result of this study was the set of indicators to measure ITG effectiveness, which can be used independently within organisations’ ITG frameworks.