Empirically testing the outcomes of user involvement in DSS development

The widespread use of decision support systems (DSS) for decisions critical to company survival and growth, and the sizeable investments most companies are increasingly making in the related technologies, motivate a better understanding of the factors contributing to DSS success. User involvement in the DSS development process has been proposed by many as an important determinant of success. This paper reports an empirical test of existing theory and the results from previous studies regarding the relationships between user involvement and three of the more widely used measures of system success: user overall satisfaction with the DSS, user perceived system benefits, and DSS usage. Two previously proposed intervening variables, systems friendliness and user satisfaction with DSS specific characteristics, are also included in the proposed path analytic model. A sample of 185 business managers and professionals provided the basis for statistical analysis using the partial least squares (PLS) method which tests both the measurement model and the structural model simultaneously. The results strongly confirm the importance of user involvement and DSS friendliness as determinants to the different measures of DSS success.