Business-information technology alignment between chief nurse executives and informatics nurse specialist: An instrument development

Abstract

Background. The Informatics Nurse Specialist (INS) makes significant contributions to the health information management function. The ability to function effectively can be affected by the degree to which the INS and the Chief Nurse Executive (CNE) are aligned on business and information technology (IT) objectives, processes, priorities, and outcomes. The failure of this dyad to achieve alignment can seriously retard the information-handling needs of a nursing department. No reliable or valid measure existed to measure business-IT alignment among the CNE/INS dyad. Purpose. This study aimed to produce a reliable and valid instrument (Index of Business-Information Technology Alignment in Nursing (IBITA-N) for assessing business-IT alignment between CNEs and INSs in acute healthcare facilities and estimate its psychometric properties. Subquestions included: (a) What are the individual and organizational demographic and practice characteristics of the sample?, (b) What relationships exist between IBITA-N subscale and total scores and selected individual and organizational characteristics?, and (3) What set of individual and organizational characteristics best predicts a high degree of alignment between the CNEs and INSs? Design/methods. A cross-sectional survey design was used. Data were obtained through mailed surveys from a sample of 102 CNEs and INSs. Results. Principal components analysis (PCA) provided initial evidence of a parsimonious four-factor structure that was consistent with the proposed theoretical dimensions of alignment. Seven items loaded high on Factor I, titled "strategic communication." Six items loaded high on Factor II, titled "enabling processes". Seven items loaded high on Factor III, titled "prioritization." Nine items loaded high on Factor IV, titled "measures of success/outcomes." Significant differences between CNEs and INSs were found for the Strategic Communication and Prioritization subscales and the total scale score as well as between subscale and total scores and individual and organizational characteristics.;Conclusion. This study provided initial evidence to support the theoretical dimensions of the business-IT alignment construct among CNEs and INSs. The initial 81-item measure was reviewed by a panel of experts and subsequently reduced to 70-items; PCA suggested that a fewer number of items (29) may be sufficient to measure business-IT alignment in the CNE/INS dyad. Further development of the measure is needed.