Valuing Information Technology (IT) and Operational Risk Management

The focus of this study was to investigate the relationship between: (1) information communication technology (ICT) operational risk management (ORM) and (2) performance of small to medium enterprise (SME). To achieve the focus, the research investigated five specific research objectives that included the principal causes of ICT ORM failure in SME: change management requirements; characteristic(s) of business information, new solutions and finally evaluating models for understanding the value of ICT ORM in SMEs. From the review of literature, an electronic survey of closed ended questions was developed for a total of 107 responses. Factor Analysis was used as a data reduction technique. It was used to reduce a large number of related variables to a more manageable number. All five operational risk variables of the current study had evidence to support the notion that there was a relationship between IT operational risk management (ITRM) and SMEs performance. The empirical evidence presented indicated that a significant proportion of aforementioned variables impacted on the performance of a SME. Therefore, the premise of the model in the current study is that there is a strategic impact in terms of the ICT operation and SME performance. The evidence was supportive of the strategic recognition or development by the respondents towards the wider implications of ICT operation.