Symposium on IT Governance at the board level: a call for research and action

Author(s)/Auteur(s): Josianne Marsan (Universite Laval Faculte des Sciences de l'Administration), Lyne Bouchard (Universite Laval Faculte des Sciences de l'Administration) & Anne-Marie Croteau (Concordia University)

IT governance is more important than ever, given the spread of technology across organizations and society. Cybersecurity, data protection and privacy, digitalization, artificial intelligence: all these topics find their way to board discussions and are top of mind for CEOs and their leadership teams. Academics have much more to offer to boards of directors than some may think. Contrary to IT consultants or practitioners, they rarely have potential conflict of interest that could impede their independence that is so necessary for proper governance mechanisms. They bring broader understanding of various realities of IT within organizations, thanks to their exposure to many organizations in the field of practice and to numerous research findings and trends. This panel is designed to encourage scholars to foresee this other way of contributing not only to the needs of organizations and societies but to research issues. By being exposed to current realities, IT scholars who serve on boards can also shed a more relevant and practical lens on what researchers need to address.