Evaluating British Petroleum (BP)'s Enterprise Information Assets for business goals attainment using Information Systems Strategy triangle

1. Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information
CI6228 – Managing Information Systems
“Evaluating British Petroleum (BP)’s Enterprise Information Assets for
business goals attainment using Information System Strategy triangle”
Submitted By
ThangaveluMuthuKumaar (G1101765E)
AjaiLoganathan Singh (G1101834E)

2. Table of Contents
Introduction: ........................................................................................................................................... 3
British Petroleum - Overview .................................................................................................................. 3
2.2 Reason for Choosing BP ................................................................................................................ 4
Theoretical frameworks and reasons for choice .................................................................................... 5
3.1 Information System Strategy Triangle framework........................................................................ 6
3.2 Hypercompetition Framework...................................................................................................... 7
3.3 IT Value Chain model .................................................................................................................... 7
Related Frameworks available in aligning strategies .............................................................................. 8
Applying frameworks in BP ..................................................................................................................... 8
5.1 Hypercompetition framework ...................................................................................................... 9
5.1.1 Strategic soothsaying ............................................................................................................. 9
Buy, not build .................................................................................................................................. 9
Selective outsourcing ...................................................................................................................... 9
Strategy to manage outsourcing ................................................................................................... 10
Technology implementation in BP - Evolution of a dedicated IT stack......................................... 10
5.1.2 Positioning for speed ........................................................................................................... 14
Failure to leverage Social Media during Crisis Management........................................................ 14
Research findings .................................................................................................................................. 17
Lessons Learnt....................................................................................................................................... 18
Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................. 19
Appendix ............................................................................................................................................... 21

3. Abstract:
The study analyses the information systems and technology implemented in British
Petroleum (BP) from a business perspective. The key success in technology transformation
for any organization lies in the proper alignment between Information Systems and Business
Strategies. The objective of this study is to analyse BP‟s business strategy using Hyper
Competition model;using internal Value Chain model created by BP to understand IT
outsourcing strategy and tracing enterprise technology implementations evolvedin British
Petroleum over the years.
1. Introduction:
The essence of survival for an organization is to gain competitive and strategic advantage
with every move to differentiate and serve the customers better. With technology
advancements in the recent past includes increase in processing power of computers, data
storage capacity of servers and robust network connectivity; enterprises have realized IT to
be an important business component and integrated in their organizational processes.
Understanding IT to be a key driver in organization growth and enabler of business
processes, there has been an increased thrust in organizations to leveragevalue intheir
investment in technology. The success is usually determined by the alignment between the
Information System (IS) and organizational planning, that is attained when general managers
and technical personnel are able to work in collaboration.
2. British Petroleum - Overview
BP was an Anglo-Persian company involved in exploiting the discovery of oil for
commercial purpose in Iran in 1909. It was then changed to Anglo-Iranian Co and later to
British Petroleum in 1954. BP expanded its business towards petrochemical industries in

4. 1947, followed by major discovery of oil wells in Alaska and North Sea. Around 1970, BP
diversified its functions into new areas including computer software, coal and other minerals
(Hollier, 1992).
2.1Understanding BP’s Business and Organizational structure
British Petroleum (BP) is the fourth largest oil and gas company in the world. They are
involved in both B2B (Business to Business) and B2C (Business to Consumer) markets with
customer base in around 70 countries. Their major end products are petrol, diesel, lubricants,
maritime and aviation fuel, gas for industrial consumers and bottled gas. BP‟s major retail
brands are BP Connect, BP Express, BP Shop, Castrol, Air BP and BP Shipping. Shell,
Chevron, Exxon are BP‟s top competitors.
Upstream & Downstream model:BP core operations involve exploration, production and
processing in its upstream model and refining, marketing and distributing energy in the
downstream model. A vertical-integration management style is adopted in BP. Apart from
these distinct divisions, a fourth division namely Strategy and Integration which hosts
business functions Human Resource (HR), Information Technology (IT), Finance and
Technology and ensures integration among the core three divisions and functions. In 2010,
organizational strategic realignment in BP was done by the Chief Executive, Bob Dudley in
Exploration and Production division after considering the competitive market.
2.2 Reason for Choosing BP
Over the years, many organizations had changed their existing information systems due to
advancement in technology, overspending of IT budget and overhead in maintenance. The
increase in thrust in leveraging IS assets towards their growth has led to Strategic Information
Systems Planning (SISP) (Pollack, 2010). As stated during mid-90's, BP's mission is to
become the best upstream company in the world.The foremost change in BP was done to IT

5. division. This report analyses the BP's strategic plans in achieving their business mission
using the ISS triangle. The main objective of BP transformation is to change the existing
organization to a more dynamic, scalable and adapting to changing environment and
economic demands. Since IT was used extensively throughout the organization in the
business processes, changing IT will have a direct impact on their business strategy. An
organization to realise this fact and re-architecture the information systems to achieve their
business strategy is British Petroleum (BP).
Early 90's, CEO John Browne realised the potential change needed for the IT functions in the
exploration division of BP. There have been three broad generations of changes in IT
functions, First generation focussing on the cost-savings and efficiency; Second generation
started during late 80's with the objective to maintain IT as a strategic resource, the primary
aim of this era is to have IT aligned with or supporting business strategy.Unfortunately
strategic benefits yield from second generation is less sustainable hence third generation
principles focus changed to outsourcing and decentralising IT functions.
The principle change from third generation in IT function is discussed in this paper to
understand the alignment between IS and business strategy. Also the recent technology
implementations and integration of new information strategies after lessons learnt in the
recent oil spill crisis is understood to analyse how BP leverages IT to create business value.
3. Theoretical frameworks and reasons for choice
To better understand the importance of organization's information system which is not an
island within a firm, rather it is the core functioning part in enabling the business engine. We
have used Information System Strategy (ISS) triangle, a simple framework for understanding
the impact of Information System (IS) in organization as depicted by (Pearlson& Saunders,
2009).

6. Alignment: The definition for alignment provided in the paper "Winning 3 legged
race"(Hoque, Sambamurthy, Zmud, Trainer, & Wilson, 2005) is used for this study; "the
situation in which a company's current and emerging business strategy is enabled, supported
and unconstrained by technology". When an organization is able to achieve proper fit
between the IT functions and organization's business strategy, it is said be in strategic
alignment. Hence, alignment has become a prime concern for senior executives.
Over the years, BP has undergone technology transformation to accomplish their business
goal and to sustain the inevitable economic market. The most recent critical events in BP‟s
calendar found to have a massive impact on business, operations and revenue is the 2010‟s oil
spill by BP in the Gulf of Mexico followed by 1980 oil glut (Refer Appendix Figure 4).
3.1 Information System Strategy Triangle framework
A framework that helps to understand the importance of information systems in current
organization trend is the Information System Strategy triangle (Pollack, 2010).
Figure 1: Information System (IS) Strategy Triangle
The three elements of the triangle are as follows (Pearlson& Saunders, 2009);
 Business strategy is the mission of the organization; what the business seeks to
accomplish; a clear boundary that shows the steps taken by an organization to achieve
the goal and objectives.
 Organization strategy is focussed on the people, process, and purpose to achieve the
business goal.

7.  Information systems strategy is the service provided by the organisation to
complement the business goal.
For a successful organisation, these three vertices of the triangle should be aligned and
complement each other.
3.2 Hypercompetition Framework
The main focus is to understand the alignment between BP‟s information system strategy and
business strategy. This framework helps us to identify different aspects of BP's business
strategy and helps us to analyse the alignment of IS in the strategy triangle. With the
economic changes faced by BP over the years this framework is useful in understanding the
changes made in sustaining the business strategy during the tough times. The approaches
used in this study are Strategic soothsaying and Positioning for speed
3.3 IT Value Chain model
A framework created by BP is the IT value chain model or Jacob's ladder. This framework
has helped BP better distinguish between areas to be maintained in-house and outsourced.
The four main components of this framework are;
Figure 2: IT value chain model
Business process delivers business outcomes; it provides a level to measure the business
performance.Information is an important component in an organization, every decision

8. making process is made based on the information available and accessible. Application often
called as information systems, the medium in which information is transported.
Infrastructure provides the base for the information system, this allows organization to easily
measure the cost, value but it is difficult to measure the outcome of information, application
development.
Organizations sometimes fail to satisfy their business strategy due to lack of understanding
core business process rather focussing on nice applications which results in no return on
investment (Baets, 1992).
4. Related Frameworks available in aligning strategies
During the IT transformation era 1989 to 1995, BP's has framed new principles to manage IT
activities. Seven elements (Pearlson & Saunders, 2009) identified in their transformation
agenda which acted as a framework for other organizations in IT transformation(Refer
Appendix: 1.1).
Zachman framework is an enterprise architecture framework, it provides a structure to
analyse and define the architectural artefacts. It provides a two dimensional matrix logically
analysing an enterprise information systems along the lines of What, Where, When, Why,
How and Who.
5. Applying frameworks in BP
The frameworksare applied to analyse the role of information system in ISS triangle. BP's
approach in competitive environment using technology changes is discussed in this section;

9. 5.1 Hypercompetition framework
5.1.1 Strategic soothsaying
BP's approach towards seeking new knowledge that can predict or create a new window for
opportunities to achieve the business strategy is seen during the technology transformation.
The traditional models were useful only during the environmental stability era, these models
were not able to sustain the continuously changing market and were not flexible to adapt
during economic changes. BP was one of the pioneers in forming new management principles
such as seven component model for IT transformation (Refer Appendix Table 1) and IT value
chain modelfor outsourcing. Further over the years, BPhas implemented various enterprise
systems and use of social media during crisis management to align IS with their business
strategy. Following are the few strategic moves highlighted during the different phases;
Buy, not build:The key decision to destroy the current IT functions and strategically plan for
outsourcing is implemented. The core business of BP is basically exploring oil and not
application development or infrastructure management, hence value creation to the business
are held by in-house expertise. Activities like application and infrastructure management are
cost drivers rather than value creators hence in order to reduce cost and achieve business
strategy outsourcing is followed. BP's pursuit of realising their goal to "buy, not build" policy
was a unique initiative in creative external software market (Cross, Earl, & Sampler,
1997).Selective outsourcing: BP strategy to reduce the dependency on specific suppliers and
implemented the mixed sourcing strategy, increasingly moved to selective outsourcing
(hybrid model)(Lacity, Willcocks, & Feeny, 1996). Since 1986, it had outsourced selected
services in the form of renewable contracts with providers like SEMA group, Syncordia,
SAIC, I-NET and CTG (Cross, 1995).IT value chain or Jacob's ladder model was used to
draw guidelines to identify the IT functions to be outsourced.

10. Strategy to manage outsourcing:The foremost transition took place in the core working
strategy of IT division, traditional role of system analyst are changed to business consultant.
Realigning traditional job responsibilities of IT analyst from mere solution providers to
redesigning and optimising business operations were carried out. Managers were involved in
coordination roles like vendor management, change management, post project evaluations
rather than software development and management. This transformation in IT personnel
skillshas provided a best-of-class solution for the problems and also sets an equal balance
between business, people and technical skills (Cross, et al., 1997).
Centralised IT system “plug and play”
The decentralized IT systems have resulted in fragmented and duplicated information due to
which managing information had become increasingly cumbersome. The strategic move to
define a global architecture planning was designed, regional IT divisions are allowed to select
applications "plug and play" in the global architecture. This architecture led to the design of a
number of services shared among divisions. Since IT resources has short-life span,
redesigning and updating infrastructure was a constant process to meet changing business
solutions.
The main goal of IT implementation was to avoid the complexity involved in the existing
systems (application reduced from 175 to 75, with no complaints from business), and
outsourcing of the value realization IT functions. This strategic move has eventually allowed
IT division to pursue value creation, cost reduction and oversee infrastructure.
Technology implementation in BP - Evolution of a dedicated IT stack:Technology
evolved in BP over years. By now, they have stacked the IT in three different layers with four
different kinds of technologies.

11. Figure3: IT Stack at BP (Rao, 2007)
Foundation:BP achieved secure, seamlesscommunicationand basic processing capability
Enables business by providing the firm wide basic back end and system capabilities.
Enterprise data centres and servers are managed by HP since 2010. Cisco manages the
wireless LAN Communication links and network services with over 20 collaborative projects
since 2001 to access control, plant operational data and to connect their operating offices.
Commodity:BP increased productivity with improved process planning and materials
management triggered by a common user level electronic platform for collaboration and
collaboration available as a commodity.IBM Maximo Asset Management enables BP to
connect its business processes with over 1500 suppliers to co-ordinate the maintenance,
operation and repair of specialised exploration and production equipment.BP uses shared data
systems based on common data standards such as XML (Holland, Shaw &Kawalek,
2005).Plum Tree‟s Content Management Systems enables BP to manage its organizational
memory and help in dissemination and diffusion of processes and operations knowledge.
Table Stakes:BP maximized asset efficiency by outsourcing the functionalities to specialized
vendors or by purchasing the license of the software. BP improved business process

12. management with SAP and IT business applications with competing IT vendors since 2009
(IBM, Wipro, Tata, Infosys, and Accenture). Microsoft provides Business Intelligence
services for the BP management to gain insights on the business processes since 2006. Oracle
Siebel CRM systems provides downstream operations management. Seebeyond‟s ICAN and
Tibco are the Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) systems used to connect with different
platforms, architecture and technology.SoftwareAG‟sWebmethods enable enterprise work
flow modelling used to process transactions, avoid conflict at different layers of the
organization. (Vemmestad, 2008)Google Search Appliance enhances BP‟s enterprise search
engine capabilities with more intuitive searches with multi-lingual options for the employees
and website users and enhanced search speed five-fold, increasing internal and public
searches by 80%
Differentiating:IT guided BP in overcoming the upstream challenges in transforming the oil
rigs to digital oil platforms, oil recovery to optimized oil recovery. Process simulations with
advanced imaging and visualization in real time helped BP to ensure the best quality and
safety standards in their operations and delivery. Specialized and competing oil field service
providers helped BP to achieve operational efficiency in the fields of exploration.
BP outsources most of its operations at the previous levels in the stack and it relies on
specialized Supplier performance Management solutions providers like Biznet Solutions
tuned for energy companies with integrated energy metrics since 2000.3D Visualization and
simulation helps in risk analysis and to ensure operational capabilities like deployment,
change management. Extensive video monitoring ensures safety levels, fire and gas
detections. Real time web based information processing helps in solving issues confronted in
operations and to serve as a self-diagnostic platform. Augmented reality based simulations
help in intuitive and realistic core exploration and production process design. Transocean,
Halliburton, Cameroon, Schlumberger and Baker Hughes are the major oil field service and

13. simulation software providers employed by BP now. To exploit the ingrain talent of human
capital in BP, it has launched an „Idea Aggregator web tool‟ to propose, vote and promote
ideas to market after validation since 2006. It has also launched a crowdsourcing platform to
tap on collective intelligence from the external communities. BP has also invested on next
generation web search based on semantic web to be on the top of the competing ladder.
Field of the future (FOTF) portalis an in-house state-of-the-art system consisting of the use
control systems, sensors, real time data distribution and the use of advanced optimization and
control modelling. (Source: www.bp.com, Frontiers Publication, Dec 2006)
ACE (Advanced Collaboration Environment) is used for control rooms offering real time off
shore monitoring and “see and talk facilities with always-on video link”.One touch tool
works using a web browser pulls and combines information from 24 different databases about
reservoirs, geological maps to generate easily consumable mash ups, visualizations for
comparison and instant decision making.CMS (Crisis Management System) gathers and
visualizes the information from Geographical Information Systems (GIS) about the weather,
environment , ocean currents and also various other internal and external sources and
monitors the safety of environment and people.ISIS (Integrated Subsurface Information
Systems) gathers the down hole information from the wells using sensors in real time that
measures critical parameters such as temperature and pressure.
Starting from the third generation (transformation) stage wherein BP's focus is to align
Information System towards their business strategy. Pitching with outsourcing strategy to
reduce cost, downsizing IT resources and implementing various enterprise and innovative
technology has made BP attain a position of competitive advantage in gaining new
knowledge and creating a window for opportunities.

14. 5.1.2 Positioning for speed
Though BP had a winning streak in positioning its IT transformation and reacting to the
change in technology and process as fast as possible in its competing circle, it has clearly lost
the game in the Information Communication perspective during the Oil Spill Crisis in 2010.
This part critiques the negative aspects of BP‟s reactions to social media during the early
days of the spill and how BP progressively incorporated the social media strategies in their
Information Strategy soon after the lessons learnt.
On April 20th 9.46pm: The Deep-water Horizon, the sub sea oil drilling system exploded
off the Louisiana coast in the Gulf of Mexico.
Impact on environment and people: 11 dead, 16 injured and 115 workers rescued. BP had
released about 4.9 million barrels of crude oil causing the ecological imbalance in the
surrounding coastal areas and affected tourism and fisheries industry to a great extent.
Impact on corporate image and brand:BP had employed Ogilvy & Mather as their Public
Relations (PR) consultants. During the spill, the corporate communications was not
positioned for speed to reveal BP‟s realization of the mistake and commitment in the
reformation activities.
Failure to leverage Social Media during Crisis Management
Social Media by then added a new layer of communication. Environment activists, local
artists trying to popularize them with BP‟s context used YouTube video channel to criticize
BP‟s poor actions to resolve the crisis. “When BP spills coffee” 1produced by UCB comedy
reached 2.5 million views by June 2010.On 16th May, a parody twitter account for BP named
@BPGlobalPR opens with the tweet: “We regretfully admit that something has happened off
in the Gulf Coast. More to come”.By June 2010, @BPGlobalPR (parody) had 125,000
followers whereas @BP_America (official) had 10,000. „Boycott BP‟ facebook page had
1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AAa0gd7ClM&ob=av3e

15. 233,000 fans while the official BP page had 18,000 (Andersson & Macdonald, 2010).
Greenpeace, the global environmental non-governmental organization (NGO) initiated a
"Rebrand the BP Logo" contest in Internet and asked the contest entrants to submit their
entries on Flickr.com, the social photo sharing site. There were approximately 2,500 entries
and about 600,000 views of the logo rebrands entered, just in a few weeks by June 2010.
The stock price of BP fell by 15% in 43 days partially due to the disruption of its corporate
image in social media .2
BP started off communicating very late even for the first time. It came up with a tweet from
its official page only after 10 days from the start of the spill. BP also ignored the parody
twitter account @BPGlobalPR activities and the unofficial logo redesign competition
organized internally in the micro blog. @BPGlobalPRsold $10,000 of „BP cares‟ t-shirts and
donates all proceeds to the recovery mission (Refer Appendix Figure 5).These activities
should have been recognized and supported by BP officially, but it underestimated the value
of social media and social networks.From the start, BP was not sharing the feedback about
the reformation activities openly in social media and BP wasn‟t open to public criticisms and
comments about the disaster or recovery. It imposed extensive commenting policy that warns
any "ad hominem attacks" will be removed. This to some extent provoked the social media
users to start online campaigns against BP.
Its sole strategy of purchasing more “Google Ad words” , search key phrases and Youtube
overlaying ads related to the oil spill which redirected to the BP‟s video channel or website
about reformation activities was not able to save their corporate image.
2http://www.propublica.org/article/congressmen-raised-concerns-about-bp-safety-in-months-before-gulf-spill
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/conversation-twitters-satirical-bp-star-10849258Don't
http://mashable.com/2010/06/09/bpglobalpr-changes-bio
http://mashable.com/2010/06/02/social-media-gulf-oil-spill/
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/05/01/us/20100501-oil-spill-tracker.html
http://www.businessinsider.com/bps-crisis-pr-strategy-unprepared-inefficient-and-incomprehensive-2010-5
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/7804922/BP-chief-Tony-Hayward-sold-shares-weeks-before-oil-
spill.html
http://www.fastcompany.com/1644053/infographic-of-the-day-what-the-heck-is-a-relief-well-bp-explains

16. BP's strategy towards Social media monitoring and reputation maintenance
Followed by criticism, an aggressive social media strategy which formed a part of their
recovery strategy was devised. BP outsourced the social media monitoring to Social360, a
corporate specializing in monitoring social media content to selectively respond and engage
online discussions of users for seven months following the spill. It identified relevant
conversations on social web (blogs, Twitter, Facebook, forums, etc.) and results are filtered
and analysed by a team of human editors into concise reports for client consumption. More
than 10.5 million individual social media posts were processed. The marketing team at BP
directly coordinated with the social360 team in generating interactive content to the public.
New posts on social media and collaborative activities connected people withBP activities
like reformation, executivepublic speeches about the pace of relief activities and investigation
results for the cause of spill. (Source: Social360 BP case study3). BP partnered with Radian6,
a social sentiment analytics organization to constantly report on the social media sentiments
permanently after the oil spill.BP started engaging online reputation management consulting
to guide on their social media and online brand management strategies along with the PR
consulting firm Oglivy&Mathers.
The competitive advantage attained by BP in the strategic soothsaying approach with the
insight in analysing the current IT functions and using the IT value chain model for
outsourcing has tried to align IS towards their business strategy in ISS triangle.But the
delayed action from the corporate communications perspective during the massive
environmental disaster created by BPmadethem completely pull back from the competitive
market. The poor performance in responding to the crisis and poor planning has lost
credibility among customers and stakeholders. BP has a tough recovery mission for its
corporate image and it‟s still going on.
3
http://social360monitoring.com/case-studies-bp/

17. 6. Research findings
BP has rightly envisioned the IT transformation early in the competitor circle (1990) and
framed a customized strategic plan to align information system with business strategy.
Outsourcing is one of the key elements in the transformation phase which has provided BP
with a tremendous cost reduction results. The selective IT (hybrid) outsourcing for cost
reduction and business process improvement right from the start of IT transformation
provides least bargaining power for suppliers.Using the IT value chain model by making the
right choice of competing vendors and differentiating their core and non-core processes has
led to align their information system with business strategy. Starting with a complete strategic
information system planning to transform their business strategyto an architecture and then to
infrastructure implementation has set an example for other organizations in IT
implementation. BP chose the best-in-class enterprise systems for its operations and business
process facilitation.BP enabled best collaboration between virtual teams across geographies
to share knowledge and expertise by choosing and installing the best and secure
communication, collaboration and content management software and hardware.
Ignoring the social media sentiments during the greatest BP crisis, oil spill and
underestimating the power of network effects, user generated content and web 2.0 for
corporate communications led to the destruction of its corporate image in the market
comprising competitors, customers and stakeholders.
BP uses Knowledge Management (KM) and Business Intelligence (BI) to turn data and
information into contextual knowledge and generate insights to the top management about the
customer trends and business. BP also tuned its global information systems to provide both
autonomy as well as decentralization to facilitate context based decision making in the
operating locations across geographies.Advanced in-house Information processing systems in

18. real time providing simulations in multiple dimensions enabled BP to exploit their
operational capability and gain competitive advantage.
The use of balanced score card, an intellectual capital management framework helps vendor's
to focus not only on providing service but to contribute to BP's core business process.
7. Lessons Learnt
BP learnt from the mistake of underestimating the power of social media during a crisis. BP
then strengthened its social media strategy by partnering with consulting firms providing
specialized sentiment analytics and online reputation management solutions.
The official YouTube channel for BP was launched only on May 18, 2010, soon after the
disaster and it is very unfortunate to see such an industrial giant in oil and gas had no clues
about the emerging information and communication platform and social media. The in-house
IT team of BP need to have research collaboration with universities, offered to attend latest
technology conferences and subscribe to IT journals, consumer and market trend reports from
Nielsen, Ipsos and integrate research databases like Forrester inside BP‟s library.
The oil spill‟s investigation also proved that technology wasn‟t the sole reason behind the
disaster, but also due to the negligence of the employee at site, who ignored the early
warnings raised by the system about the defect. Knowledge Management can be a viable
solution in long term to avoid such risks by codifying the scenarios, discussing in
communities about the problem and exploiting collective knowledge to solve it.

19. 8. Conclusion
The strategic planningby British Petroleum‟s during IT transformation to carry selective
outsourcing, enterprise system implementationshows how BP leverages information systems
towards their business strategy. To specifically drill down and understand the business
strategies with Information systems, D‟Aveni‟s hyper competition model – Strategic
soothsaying and positioning for speed approaches were used. Value chain model helped us to
appreciate their selective outsourcing strategy retaining the core differentiating state-of-the-
art systems in-house. Improper initial response during oil spill through social media shows
their set back in handling new technology. Late recovery strategy post oil spill showed the
protest arose due to negligence of the mass in social media. Information systems and
technology has been and is a key value creator and business process enabler for BP. The
success lies in understanding and catering information systems to the needs of the business
strategy.

20. References
Hollier, A. (1992),“Computerised finding aids at the British petroleum archive”, Journal of
the Society of Archivists, 13(2), 124-131. doi: 10.1080/00379819209511677
Pollack, T. A. (2010), “Strategic information systems planning”, ASCUE Proceedings, 47-58.
Pearlson, K., & Saunders, C. S. (2009), “Strategic management of information systems”, Keri
E. Pearlson, Carol Silverman Saunders: Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons, c2009.
4th ed., International student version.
Hoque, F., Sambamurthy, V., Zmud, R., Trainer, T., & Wilson, C. (2005), “Winning the 3-
legged Race: when business and technology run together:” Prentice-Hall, Inc.
Baets, W. (1992), “Aligning information systems with business strategy”, The Journal of
Strategic Information Systems, 1(4), 205-213.
Cross, J., Earl, M. J., & Sampler, J. L. (1997),“Transformation of the IT function at British
Petroleum”,Mis Quarterly, 401-423.
Lacity, M. C., Willcocks, L. P., &Feeny, D. F. (1996), “The value of selective IT sourcing.
Sloan management review”, 37, 13-25.
Rao Vijay (2007), “Future Challenges Facing BP, How technology can help”, available at
http://www.bp.com
John Cross (1995), “HowBP Exploration achieved seamless service from multiple suppliers”,
Harvard Business Review
Frontiers (2006) ,“Virtually there”, Frontiers publication, available at http://www.bp.com
C.P. Holland, D.R. Shaw, and P. Kawalek (2005), “BP's Multienterprise Asset Management
System”, Information andSoftware Technology 47(15), pp. 999-1007.
Andersson Liri and MacdonaldJonathan (2010),“An overview of the BP crisis from a
communications perspective”, available at www.thisfluidworld.com
John Vemmestad ( 2008),“Mature fields technology”, available at http://www.bp.com
Tony Hayward, Andy Inglis, Byron Grote and Iain Conn (2010), “BP Strategy Presentation”,
London, available at http://www.bp.com

21. Appendix
Table 1: BP IT transformation agenda with 7 component model
From To
System Provider Infrastructure Planner
Monopoly Supplier Mixed sourcing
Business Standard Industry standards
Decentralized bias Centralized topsight
System analyst Business consultant
Craftsman Project Managers
Large Functions Lean Teams
Figure 4: Uncertain price environment,
Source: BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 20114
Figure 5: @BPGlobalPR(Twitter Parody Account) statement by its founder, Leroy
Stick (MacDonald & Andersson,2010)
4
http://bp.com/statisticalreview