Resolving Indifferences in Multiple Attribute Business Information System Selection with Social Choice Methods

Abstract

The evaluation of Information Systems (IS) is a critical process for the successful development of any organizational IT capability. An important class of decision making techniques used in practice is based on conflicting criteria applied to the available alternatives, and the results are consolidated into a single ranking. In this process it is often the case that investment alternatives receive equal evaluations for some of the criteria. In this work various methods of social choice voting rules are considered that accept criteria rankings with indifferences for rank aggregation in two case studies. The properties of the results they deliver are compared with the outcomes of traditional multiple attribute decision making, taking special note of the resolving of indifferences.