. International Review of Management and Marketing ISSN: 2146-4405 available at http: www.econjournals.com International Review of Management and Marketing, 2018, 8(3), 32-35. International Review of Management and Marketing | Vol 8 • Issue 3 • 201832 Factors Influencing the Use of E-Management from Manager’s Perspective: An Applied Study in Saudi Communication Sector Abdulah M. Aseri* Department of Management Information System, College of Business Administration, Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, Saudi Arabia. *Email: Amaseri@iau.edu.sa ABSTRACT Electronic management (E-management) is considered as an important organizational mechanism that is critical for the effectiveness of decision making and control in organizations. The main purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors influencing the use of e-management in Saudi communication sector from manager’s perspective. Data is collected through questionnaires from communication companies in Saudi Arabia. Smart Partial least squares was used to analyze the data and to test the study hypotheses. Findings proof that perceived usefulness, ease of use and trust have a significant impact on using e-management. Keywords: E-management, Electronic Management, E-management Factors, Communication Companies JEL Classifications: M10, M15 1. INTRODUCTION Information Technology revolution and the fast evolution in electronics, computers and communication have achieved quick and comprehensive exchange of information within the rapid flow of data policy, coupled with the widespread use of the Internet and its investment in the field of electronic business activity within the concepts of e-business and electronic commerce. Meanwhile, Communication institutions are essential to economic system, continued technological innovation and fierce competition between the communication company, has contributed in the accelerated developments in the industry, and new forms of e-management have emerged in various areas of these industry. E-management tools and strategy in developing countries should first target the improvement of their operations and processes and also the level of departments ability to cooperate. This system combines the methodologies, controls and accounting techniques to track financial transactions and to provide internal and external reporting data as well as helping the preparation of financial statements with capabilities to improve organizational performance (Pérez Estébanez et al., 2010). E-management improves the quality of organizations’ performance through the use of modern, efficient electronic methods that characterized by high quality and accuracy in solving traditional management problem (Al-Nimr and Khashoggi, 2006). This tool is multidimensional which can achieve a lot of goals and objectives. Responding to the increasing daily work and work pressure, which now expects more than manage of organization resources, is a widely adopted view in e-management services. As well as, the successful implementation and manage of an effective e-management is mainly related to organizational change and facilities. However, despite the observed remarkable progress in the managerial process and the great benefits of technological innovation, we still see deficient in the using of these services and the traditional way of management system is still applied. To sum up, this research mainly aimed to investigate the most important factors that limit the use of e-management in Saudi communication sector from manager’s perspective. This study seeks to address and explore this issue in a systematic research process that aims to answer the following main question. Aseri: Factors Influencing the Use of E-Management from Manager’s Perspective: An Applied Study in Saudi Communication Sector International Review of Management and Marketing | Vol 8 • Issue 3 • 2018 33 1.1. What are Factors Influencing the Use of E-management in Saudi Communication Sector from Manager’s Perspective? The main aim of this study is to investigate factors influencing the use of e-management in Saudi communication sector from manager’s perspective. The study also seeks to achieve the following objectives: • Providing an overview of the available literature relating to E-management. • Identify the most important factors that affecting the use of e-management in Saudi’s communication sector. • Providing recommendations for decision makers based on the findings of the study. 2. LITERATURE REVIEW Electronic management (E-Management) term is related to modern information technology and its various components. It can be defined as Integration of information and data to achieve the organization goals with flexibility in their internal operations and respond to the environment changes both internal and external (Radwan, 2007). Younis (2016) define e-management as administrative processes that rely on electronic tools and their application efficiently which lead to the development of the organization through improve technical capacity and enhance the effectiveness of information exchange to reach the desired objectives. It is also defined as a set of elements that interact with each other to collect, store, process and report data and information to enhance the processes of decision making processes (Al-adaileh, 2008. p. 17). E-management services are available to support different organizational levels including operational, tactical, and strategic level. These systems can provide a continuous flow of information from internal or external sources. E-management is considered as an important organizational mechanism that is critical for effectiveness of decision management and control in organizations (Sajady et al., 2008. p. 50). Furthermore, the application of e-management achieves a number of benefits for the organization including (Al-Salmi and Sulaiti, 2009): • Simplification of managerial procedures within organization. • Shorten the execution time of the various administrative transactions. • Facilitate communication between different departments of the organization. • Accuracy and objectivity in the completion of various processes within the organization. • Reduce the use of paper significantly and this positively affects the work of the organization. The essential of e-management is maximize, manage and maintain the performance which consider as a key role to play in improving the overall value of an organization (Armstrong and Baron, 1998). As well as, effectiveness of e-management also depends on the perception of decision makers on the usefulness of information generated by the system to satisfy informational needs for operation processes, managerial reports, budgeting and control within the organization (Nwinee et al., 2016). The quality of an e-management depends on many factors, critical among these are the organization’s information policy, the number of users and their educational level, and motivation. Thus, the relationship between e-management and organizational performance would be influenced by many factors. According to the pervious argument we analyze the contingency fit these factors and use of e-management. Therefore, we formulate the following hypotheses. 3. RESEARCH HYPOTHESIS AND MODEL • H1: Perceived usefulness has a significant statistical impact on the using of E-management. • H2: Ease of use has a significant statistical impact on the using of E-management. • H3: Trust has a significant statistical impact on the using of E-management. To test the above hypotheses, the following research model is proposed (Figure 1). 4. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 4.1. Data Collection Method and Sampling Framework Research methodology involves describing, explaining and predicting phenomena in addition to the research plan. It is necessary for the researcher to recognize the research and its contents to be able to identify the type of research. However, this research adopted a descriptive and analytical approach. A quantitative survey was used to collect the necessary data. The study population included all managers of the Saudi’s communication companies. A convenient sampling techniques was used to select the participants. 110 questionnaires were distributed. 100 questionnaires were analyzed. Table 1 outlines the sample characteristics. 4.2. Instrument Design The research is based on questionnaire that was developed for the purpose of this study. Face validity and contents validity of the Table 1: Sample characteristics Personal information Frequency (%) Diploma (college) degree 17 (17) Bachler’s degree 50 (50) Educational level Master degree 25 (25) PhD degree 8 (8) Experience <5 years 35 (35) 11–15 years 37 (37) More than 15 28 (28) Total 100 (100) Aseri: Factors Influencing the Use of E-Management from Manager’s Perspective: An Applied Study in Saudi Communication Sector International Review of Management and Marketing | Vol 8 • Issue 3 • 201834 questionnaire were made. The answers were classified according to five Likert scale. The questionnaire includes two parts; the first part contains 2 items that related to personal information; the second part contains 15 items related to the research variables. 5. DATA ANALYSIS Partial least squares (PLS) was chosen for the current study using SmartPLS software. It was used in a two-stage approach, measurement and structural model testing. 5.1. Measurement Model The measurement model can be assessed by examining the reliability, convergent validity and discriminant validity. Specifically, reliability which refers to the internal consistency of measurement, can be assessed by checking if the value of composite reliability (CR) is more than 0.7, the average variance extracted (AVE) is >0.5 and Cronbach’s α is >0.6 (Hair et al., 2006). Table 2 shows that the CR values ranged from 0.85 to 0.91 and the AVE values ranged from 0.62 to 0.84. These values are higher than the acceptance value 0.70 and 0.50 which indicate a good construct reliability. Furthermore, in order to check the convergent validity, loading factor for each item was calculated. All item loadings are larger than 0.6 and t values indicate that all loadings are significant at 0.05 which indicates that the scale has a good convergent validity. Bootstrapping method in SmartPLS software was used to test the statistical significance of path coefficients. Figure 2 shows the P value for all research variables and the PLS model of the study. 5.2. Structural Model The analysis result reveals that the factor (perceived usefulness) has a significant impact on using E-management (t = 23.46, P ≤ 0.001) which supported H1. In addition, perceived usefulness explained 0.65% of using E-management variance. Moreover, ease of use has a significant positive influence on using E-management with values (t = 28.64, P ≤ 0.001) and can explain 0.44% of using E-management variance. Thus, H2 was supported. Furthermore, trust has a significant positive influence on using E-management with t values (14.98) and (P ≤ 0.001) Figure 1: Research model Figure 2: Result of partial least squares Table 2: Result of construct assessment Constructs Items Factor loading Mean±SD CR Cronbach’s α AVE Using of E-management UM1 0.773 0.673±4.467 0.828 0.615 UM2 0.781 0.82±3.46 UM3 0.822 0.685±4.204 0.851 UM4 0.811 0.681±4.248 P1 0.788 0.87±3.956 Perceived usefulness P2 0.862 0.733±4.058 0.863 0.824 0.695 P3 0.813 0.778±3.964 P4 0.72 0.755±3.954 E1 0.81 0.686±4.182 Ease of use E2 0.884 0.784±3.883 0.915 0.891 0.771 E3 0.834 0.758±4.036 Trust T1 0.892 0.853±3.847 T2 0.788 0.731±3.832 0.903 0.874 0.811 T3 0.899 0.749±3.788 SD: Standard deviation Table 3: Hypothesis testing results No. Path (hypothesis) t p R2 Results 1 Perceived usefulness→using E-management H1 23.46 *** 0.65 Supported 2 Ease of use→using E-management H2 28.64 *** 0.44 Supported 3 Trust→using E-management H3 14.98 *** 0.53 Supported Aseri: Factors Influencing the Use of E-Management from Manager’s Perspective: An Applied Study in Saudi Communication Sector International Review of Management and Marketing | Vol 8 • Issue 3 • 2018 35 and can explain 0.53% of using E-management variance. Thus, H3 was supported. Summary of hypothesis testing results are presented in Table 3. 6. CONCLUSION The primary insights from this research are as follows. Perceived usefulness might be seen as a strong predictor of the using of e-management, coinciding with previous findings in the literature. Regarding the ease of use, the results show that ease of use has a positive and significant influence on using of e-management with previous findings in the literature (Charag and Ahmad, 2013). Finally, the research revealed that trust can enhance the using of e-management which agrees with the study of (De Oliveira et.al, 2012). The study concludes that more concern should be directed towards using of e-management as an enhancement tool for better organizational performance. Management willingness and awareness seem important and their continuous support is needed to push up using of e-management. REFERENCES Al-adaileh, R. (2008), Essentials of Management Information Systems. 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