Strategic Business-IT Alignment: A Multi-Agent Systems Approach

Abstract

This paper discusses one of the most critical concerns in all organizations, which is business-IT alignment, and it needs coherent organizational and technological strategies. Over time, the definition has changed to show that alignment is a strategy that can be used to be more competitive and gain value for stakeholders. Aligning to drive corporate goals is crucial for competitive strategy and business success. Achieving this across multiple firms poses a challenge due to budgetary limitations, the complexity of the IT systems, and the rapid advances of technology can be barriers to overcome. Strategic alignment relies on understanding stakeholder requirements, strategic statements, communication levels, a highly skilled workforce, and rapid feedback mechanisms. We propose a new multi-agent system to address these difficulties by emphasizing the roles of managers, external influences, clients, communication tools, employees, stakeholders, and suppliers. This framework improves existing models by enabling real-time adaptation and cooperation through advanced algorithms and communications protocols. To ensure the practicality and efficiency of our framework, we conducted an empirical study using different Moroccan organizations. This is followed by a call for more case studies to prove that the proposed model works, underscoring the importance of practical validation in business-IT alignment.