New Faculty Spotlight:

Magno De Souza Queiroz, Ph.D., has built a scholarly career on better understanding how some organizations have the ability to excel in using information technology (IT) resources, while others fail.

“Answering questions about why and how organizations benefit from their investments in information technology is what motivates my current research efforts,” said Queiroz, an assistant professor in the department of information technology and operations management from the College of Business. Queiroz holds a doctorate degree in management information systems from the University of Wollongong in Australia, where he also worked as a research fellow. He also has a bachelor’s degree in computer science and a master’s degree in computer science with an emphasis in IT management. His most recent paper, “Aligning the IT portfolio with business strategy: Evidence for complementarity of corporate and business unit alignment,” was published in the Journal of Strategic Information Systems.

Prior to becoming a new faculty member of FAU this semester, Queiroz taught courses on data analytics and IT strategies as an assistant professor at Utah State University and at the University of Technology Sydney in Australia. Queiroz’s research interests involve IT/business alignment and digital infrastructure. His expertise also includes resource sharing in multi-business firms and organizational agility.

Here’s a look at what Queiroz said about his journey to FAU:

What is your research focus?

The overarching theme of my research program is the strategic role of IT in organizations. I investigate how organizations leverage IT assets, resources and capabilities to generate business benefits. Within this research program, I study topics such as the sharing of IT assets within multi-business organizations, IT/business alignment, dynamic capabilities for managing IT application portfolios and IT-enabled organizational agility.

Why do you have an interest in this research?

I was always fascinated by the ability of some organizations to excel in using IT resources while other organizations with access to similar financial resources were unable to reap similar benefits. Answering questions about why and how organizations benefit from their investments in IT is what motivates my current research efforts.

What do you want people to know about your research or what do you hope to accomplish?

I am working to establish myself as one of the voices in the continuous conversation in the literature about the strategic benefits of IT. This requires the relentless pursuit of new knowledge, understanding of how your research fits within the broader literature and the ability to tell a story that builds upon and extends prior research. As part of these efforts, I’m working with colleagues in the U.S., Australia and New Zealand to raise new research questions and identify avenues for moving the field forward. For example, I’m currently serving as guest editor for the special issue of the European Journal of Information Systems on IT-enabled strategic agility. The theme of the special issue is “The Next Frontier,” where we raise new questions and seek to move the IT-enabled agility literature into promising, and as yet, unexplored research directions.

Do you have any advice for becoming a researcher in your field?

Read, read and read. Becoming a good researcher involves understanding the point of view of others before formulating a new point of view that contributes to the conversation of interest. Focus on why a point of view or research question is relevant and important to the literature. Simply identifying a gap in the literature is not enough. Maybe there is a gap for a reason: no one cares about that particular issue or addressing that issue is unlikely to move the literature forward. Consider research questions that excite you and at the same time can shed new light on an important research stream. Think about the literature as a set of research streams; for example, there are different streams of research within the IT/business alignment literature. To which stream are you contributing to? Are you clearly articulating what we do know and do not know within that research stream? Is your research question likely to move that research stream forward? These are some of the questions one should consider.

Where do you see your research continuing in the future?

The lines between the business and information technology domains are becoming more and more blurred in this digital economy. With the rise of digital business strategies and growing emphasis on digitization, I see my research evolving to address new questions related to digital transformation and the nature of innovation when information technology is the business.

What is an interesting fact that people at FAU may not know about you?

I like music, and guitars, a lot. Although I love Brazilian popular music, I can’t get enough of rock music from the late 60s, the whole of the 70s and early 80s. Led Zeppelin, Queen, Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Metallica, I could go on and on. Listening to Queen right now. Pink Floyd will be next. I was asked once about my favorite song and am still trying to find an answer. I go back and forth between Echoes by Pink Floyd, The Show Must Go On by Queen, and Janis Joplin’s performance of Work Me Lord at Woodstock. One funny fact related to music: during my undergraduate studies I was writing code at 3 a.m. trying to fix a software problem. I could not figure out what the problem was, and after so many hours working on it, I was very tired. At some point I started to hear dogs barking. From the first floor of my home in Brazil I opened my window and started to look for dogs on the street. I could not believe that dogs were barking at 3 a.m. I then realized that the song Dogs by Pink Floyd was playing, and the barking was coming from the speakers. Moral of the story do not code until 3 a.m. and beware of those surround sound systems when listening to Pink Floyd.