An examination of the effects of experience, expertise, and perceived flexibility on data warehouse use

Data warehousing has become ubiquitous at most larger organizations, but research on end-user acceptance of data warehousing has been limited. The scant research available reveals a troubling underlying pattern: end-users with a year or more of data warehouse experience still report that the data warehouse is difficult to use. This is counter-intuitive because data warehouses are expressly created for end-users, and end-user difficulty with any application after this much time is unusual.; In an attempt to better explain this phenomenon, the effects of user experience, expertise, and perceived flexibility on data warehouse usage are examined using the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). The TAM posits that system usage is a function of user perceptions of both how easy and useful a system is to use.; Data collected from data warehouse end-users was analyzed using Partial Least Squares. Results showed that experience has a significant positive effect on data warehouse ease-of-use perceptions, and that this effect is significantly mediated by perceived flexibility. However, the effect of experience dissipated when expertise was also included in the measurement model. Expertise was found to be much more salient than experience as a predictor of user perceptions of data warehouse ease-of-use, usefulness, and flexibility. In addition, perceived flexibility was shown to mediate the relationship between expertise and perceived ease-of-use.; These results have meaningful implications for both practice and research. First, a plausible explanation is presented about why many experienced end-users still have difficulty using their firms' data warehouses. Second, a new construct (perceived flexibility) is added to the TAM and shown to be the pathway through which experience and expertise affect ease-of-use perceptions.