The influence of digital standardization on administrative efficiency in e-government: A view of standards development organizations

This is an empirical study aimed to explore the impact of IT in efficiency in government and the intersection between administrative efficiency and the institutional design of IT standardization for civil servants. In this research, the top three digital standardization systems in the administrative process in the sampling governments are (1) the documentary management system aims to mange internal or external official documents via digitalized and standardized information systems; (2) the digitalized timecard system focuses on handling the individual working hours of officials and (3) the personnel management systems deals with officials' personal data, including recruitment, resignation and so on. This research is based on the perspective of standards development organizations (SDOs). The study examines the critical link between the institutional design of SDOs and working efficiency after digitalized standardization in e-government. When applying the survey data from bureaucrats in Tainan City Council and Tainan municipal government, Taiwan to the ordered Logit model, the results showed that the time of tenure and working types significantly affect bureaucrats' perceived efficiency increase level. Also, for civil servants, IT standardization in administration increases their communication and cooperation.