Information System Development (ISD) projects fail at an alarming rate; many of these failures result fromrnmanagerial rather than technical difficulties. One of the principal management issues that affect ISD successrnis stakeholder commitment to the ISD process. To date, the majority of the ISD literature has not examinedrnchanges in commitment over time and how these changes may affect the success of an ISD project. In thisrnpaper, we examine the rate of change of commitment over time and offer five propositions: 1) Each individualrnwill experience a different rate of change in commitment across the project life cycle, 2) the change inrncommitment is influenced by key stakeholders involved in the project, 3) the amount of commitment felt by eachrnstakeholder must be above a critical threshold through certain key stages of the project in order to ensure ISDrnsuccess, 4) the rate of change may differ for different stages in the life cycle, and 5) any sudden change in arnkey stakeholder’s commitment (positive or negative) at any stage has a negative effect on ISD success. Thesernpropositions are examined using a case study of an ISD project. The paper builds on the existing body ofrnknowledge on ISD commitment and contributes to an understanding of how ISD efforts can be better monitoredrnand controlled to optimize stakeholder commitment.
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