The effect of organizational communication of information and communication technology: The case of Turkish Orienteering Federation

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of information and communication technology on the process of organizational communication of Turkish Orienteering Federation.This study was an experimental research in which practice-based action research was preferred as model within qualitative research methods. Face-to-face interviews with 12 persons, selected with criterion sampling method from various boards and city councils of the federation, were conducted in order to determine the communication problems in Turkish Orienteering Federation. Four themes were used to analyses the data obtained with qualitative research methods. A network-based software module was developed to solve the communication problems, which were determinated as a result of interviews, with ICT and was made available to the personnel, boards and city councils in Orienteering Federation for 3 months. Since the federation comprises a whole with all departments and personnel are the integral parts of it, this network-based software module was made available to all personnel of the institution including the central and provincial organizations, not just for the sample group. The system, consisting of short message service, video talk, email, online forum, online competition planning, information archiving, referee, club and school modules, was used by 2256 persons. Second interviews were conducted with the same persons after the practice, and it was established that the effect of the implementation module can be evaluated on the themes of information sharing, administrative dimension, fastness, motivation and archiving, as a result of the qualitative analysis. The analyses of qualitative interviews were made by four academicians who are experts in the field. Simple adaptation and kappa coefficient were calculated to ensure the research reliability. High reliability at the level of 0.79 for pre-practice interviews and very high rate of conformity at the level of 0.82 for post-practice interviews were detected. At the end of the research, it was detected that ICTs have an important effect in the process of organizational communication of personnel, in the direction of the codes obtained from interviews related to the process of organizational communication of the federation. It was seen that Information and Communication Technologies are positive effective in interactions of personnel, committee members and city councils, and in information sharing, archiving, simplicity of information transfer, information storage and motivational needs, in consequence of implementation in sport federations. Key Words: Sport Management, Sport Federations, Orienteering, Communication, Information and Communication Technologies