The last 20 years have witnessed a revolution in information technology. The emergence of low-cost information storage, retrieval, sharing, and transmission systems has begun to change the organization of firms in numerous ways.
a. What effect might the IT revolution have on the large-scale firm's choice between undertaking an activity in-house or outsourcing it?
b. Top managers have ever increasing amounts of information ("knowledge capital") at their disposal, but a common lament is that this knowledge is not always available at the "right place" in the organization. An ideal IT system would promote efficient information sharing. In what respects would low-cost information sharing favor a centralized organization? A decentralized one?
c. In what ways might improved IT facilitate the management-worker relationship within the firm? How might IT be labor saving?