A multistep research plan was utilised. The plan comprised of the following: Preparation of an interview script that was informed by prior research (Grabski et al., 2001) to be used for preliminary interviews with management accountants, information system professionals and supervisory personnel. These interviews informed the development of a questionnaire to be sent out to CIMA members. Sending out the questionnaires and analysing the responses. Creation of a structured interview script, based upon the responses obtained in the mail-out survey. This script was used in a series of in-depth interviews conducted across a variety of organizations that had experienced differing degrees of success in the implementation and use of ERP systems (described in Chapter 4 of this report). The preliminary interviews were conducted with three different companies in 2003 and involved six individuals (four individuals from one company and one each from the other companies). All interviews were recorded with the interviewees’ consent, and the interviewees were informed that they could end the interview at any time. The postal questionnaire was then developed based upon prior research and the interviews. The questionnaire (Appendix 4) and associated information sheet (Appendix 3) were mailed out in early January 2004 to CIMA members along with a covering letter from CIMA informing the participants of the objective of the research and the importance of responding (Appendix 2). All respondents were provided with postage paid envelopes so that they could complete and submit their questionnaire independent of any other respondent. By the end of February 2004, 16 replies to the first mailing had been received from 14 different companies. As per normal postal survey research practice, a second (and final) mailing of the questionnaires was sent on 3 March 2004. After the two mailings, 22 responses were received. These responses informed the development of the interview script used in the subsequent case studies. The intensive case studies involved visiting seven organizations during a 2-week period in September 2004. Structured interviews (using an interview script developed following analyzing of the responses to the postal questionnaire – see Appendix 6) were conducted and 12 individuals were interviewed. The organizations were all located in various cities across England. As in the preliminary interviews, these interviews were recorded with the consent of the interviewees and all participants were informed that they could end the interview at any time.
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