Impact of information technology management practices on customer service

Recently, despite huge incentives and subsequent increases in investment in customer relationship management technology, many firms have not been able to increase their customer satisfaction index ratings. The purpose of this paper is to gauge whether IT management practices differ among firms where IT has a major role in transforming marketing, operations, or both, which give the firms advantage by affecting their customer service. Several resea rch hypotheses are tested using data obtained from a survey of 213 IT-leade rs in the financial services industry. The results clearly indicate that th e IT-leader firms have a higher level of IT management sophistication and a higher role for their IT-leaders compared to IT-enabled customer focus, IT -enabled operations focus, and IT-laggard firms. This paper concludes with the implications for both researchers and practitioners.