This document was prepared by the National Center for State Courts, supported by grant number 91--DD--CX--0013(S--1) awarded by the Bureau of Justice Assistance, Office of Justice Programs,U.S.Department of Justice. The opinions,findings,and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice or the National Center for State Courts.

This document was prepared by the National Center for State Courts, supported by grant numbers 87--DD--CX--0002 and 91--DD--CX--0013(S--1), awarded by the Bureau of Justice Assistance, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. The opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice.

The notion that effective relationships between groups improve coordination, cooperation and consequently performance has considerable appeal in a broad range of contexts. In particular, partnerships are viewed as critical organizational mechanisms enabling information systems groups and their clients within organizations to utilize existing information technology investments already in place and to tap the potential offered by information technologies. This paper proposes a theoretical model drawing from socio-cognitive theory, highlighting a convergence in perspectives on key issues between the groups as the mechanism underlying partnerships. Data from a survey of 671 managers on both sides of IS-User relationships in multiple firms provides support for the model and the hypothesized relationship between convergence in perspectives and the performance of IS groups. In particular, the results suggest that a convergent assessment of the perspectives of IS groups by Users significantly enhances the performance of IS groups. This paper is among the first efforts in the IS literature to use dyadic data provided by both IS and User groups to understand IS-User relationships. Keywords: IS-User Partnerships, Social Cognition Theory, Perspective Taking, IS Performance

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research and the organizations participating in the research effort that chose to remain anonymous for their assistance in collecting the data. The first author also wishes to thank Gordon Davis, N. Venkatraman, Stephanie Watts and Weidong Xia for their helpful comments and Mark Bergen for his encouraging persistence that helped bring closure to the final draft! Linking IS-User Partnerships … 2Linking IS-User Partnerships to IS Performance: A Socio-Cognitive Perspective The notion that effective relationships between groups improve coordination, cooperation and consequently performance has considerable appeal in a broad range of contexts. In particular, partnerships are suggested as critical organizational mechanisms enabling information systems groups and their clients within organizations to utilize existing information technology investments already in place and to tap the potential offered by information technologies. This paper proposes a theoretical model drawing from socio-cognitive theory, highlighting a convergence in perspectives on key issues between the groups as the central mechanism underlying partnerships. Data from a survey of managers on both sides of 95 IS-User relationships in multiple firms provides support for the model and the hypothesized relationship between convergence in perspectives and the