IT Governance from Theory to Practice: The importance of accountability

It is widely acknowledged that Information Technology (IT) Governance is extremely complex and at the same time equally critical when organisations endeavour to maximize their IT investments. IT Governance provides the means for decision making required to ensure that IT enables the organization to excel in its mission. IT systems are often viewed as monetary drains rather than seen as fundamental bases underpinning the strategic direction of organizations. IT implementations often do not meet requirements, fail, are over budget and the media is littered with headlines that corroborate these perceptions. IT projects are now so big, and they touch so many aspects of an organization, that they pose a singular new risk as according to Harvard Business Review Magazine that a $5 million project leads to an almost $200 million loss (Flyvbjerg and Budzier, 2011). Every organisation will have experienced complications of an IT implementation and this is why IT Governance is becoming a crucial factor to business survival no matter how large or small an organisation is. This interpretive study of IT Governance provides an opportunity to from both theoretical and practice-based perspectives using multiple case studies from public sector organisations based in the Kingdom of Bahrain.