A Methodology for Evaluating Whether Web Sites Support Their Organizational Critical Activities

Organizational critical activities (OCAs) are activities which must receive constant management attention in order for that organization to be successful in its industry. Some empirical studies have shown that all of these activities may not be well supported by organizations’ websites. This research attempts to develop the evaluation methodology which can be used to assess how well an organization’s website supports the organization’s OCAs if the OCAs are identified. Based on a review of relevant literature, a prototype was proposed, and then evolved and tested through eight case studies in New Zealand universities. In total, more than two thousands web pages were evaluated and 37 semi-structured interviews were conducted. The final methodology includes five operational stages and seven forms. The results of final case were presented in order to show how the methodology can be utilized in the website evaluation. Some implications and future research are also provided.