The Effect Of Collaboration Quality And Social Technology Use On Decision-making Performance

Abstract

The use of social technology is expected to rise in the future, with more digital natives constituting the workforce. The attitudes and behaviors of digital natives relative to digital immigrants are understandably different since the former were born into a world that was almost exclusively reliant on digital technology. With this in mind, organizations would be wise to prepare the integration of social technologies in its business practices, especially in the process of decision-making. A better understanding of the relationships between social technology and collaboration on decision-making are vital for an organization, since the intensive use social technology would require several changes in an organization’s culture and business process. The organization also needs to ensure that the decisionmaking process is not hindered, and if possible, is improved by the use of social technology. Unfortunately, there has not been sufficient research studying the relationships between on decision-making, collaboration, and social technology. In addition, most of the research on these subjects have been conducted in corporation, while higher educational governance research on these subjects has not gained enough traction. In this context, the importance of this study is to gain a better understanding of 1) how decision-making performance is affected by the use of social technology; 2) the factors needed to be taken into account to increase the use of social technology; 3) how decision-making performance is affected by collaboration quality, and 4) the capabilities that are needed to improve collaboration quality. This study was conducted in the context of Higher Education Institution governance, and received responses from 218 study programs of 16 Muhammadiyah and ‘Aisyiyah universities in the Special Region of Yogyakarta and the Province of Central Java. From this dataset, 200 responses were further analyzed using Structural Equation Modelling with AMOS software, and supported by descriptive analysis. The findings provided contributions to both theory and practice.