| Universities and colleges annually expend millions of dollars to maintain their information technology (IT) resources. A major concern to post-secondary educational administrators considering new IT projects should be whether their respective institutions receive a return on investment (ROI) from such initiatives. Having a prognosticative tool to gauge if there will be any ROI prior to embarking on such projects would be of immense value.; This investigation offers a possible methodology to solve such dilemmas by examining primary and secondary computer workgroup software application usage by University of Delaware (UD) administrative personnel. The descriptive study scrutinizes end users' self-described skill levels—novice, intermediate, advanced or expert—in relation to their perceptions of the ease of use, usefulness, and effectiveness of generic software: electronic mail, wordprocessing, database management, accounting/spreadsheeting, and graphics applications.; A five part, 46-item, forced choice, assessment instrument, the Computer Workgroup Usage Survey, based on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) of Fred D. Davis with the addition of the third variable, perceived effectiveness suggested by a 1993 study by Segars, and Grover, was developed. The instrument consisted of front-end demographic questions in addition to descriptor items for the respective the variables which were ranked on a seven-point Likert scale, ranging from extremely unlikely (1) to extremely likely (7). It was administered to 185 persons; 132 responses (71.2 percent) were received.; Results indicate wordprocessing to be the most widely used application, and electronic mail to be the most widely used computer workgroup application. Perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, and perceived effectiveness for the respective applications are quite likely (6). Additionally, a trend indicates that the greater the skill level an end user reports with an application, the greater is the perception of its ease of use, usefulness, and effectiveness.; Recommendations resulting from the use of the Computer Workgroup Usage Survey are offered for consideration, and adoption within the institution. Future study is suggested for an inferential investigation to determine reliability, and validity measures for the instrument for adoption. |
