Building Legitimacy for IT Innovations: The Case of Computerized Physician Order Entry Systems

Research on IT innovations has largely relied on economic-rationalistic models and focused on individuals or organizations as the unit of analysis. The intent of this paper is to advance an alternative research agenda that explores the institutional underpinnings of IT innovation diffusion at the inter-organizational level. Through a multi-stage research study, we examine the legitimation function of organizing visions for IT innovations and develop a taxonomy of legitimation strategies employed by the proponents of an IT innovation. We first built a preliminary theoretical framework that synthesizes key arguments on legitimacy drawn from the organization theory and IS literatures. Next, we conducted an exploratory case study of institutional entrepreneurship surrounding computerized physician order entry (CPOE) systems. We examined the discursive actions of CPOE vendors by content analyzing 165 press releases issued between 1998 and 2006. We then combined the findings of the literature analysis and the case study to create a taxonomy of discursive strategies for building IT innovation legitimacy. A post-hoc analysis of the case study data reveals a number of interesting patterns in the CPOE vendors’ use of the legitimation strategies and helps us formulate a set of research questions to guide future investigations. The work reported in this paper lays a foundation for a deeper understanding of the role of legitimacy and legitimation in shaping diffusion of IT innovations. It also contributes to the conceptual and methodological elaboration of the organizing vision framework

Impacts of GSS on Moral Discourse: An Argumentation Analysis

Although ethical decision making is a key concern of organizations, the impacts of IT on ethical discourse is an underexplored topic. The laboratory experiment reported in this paper examines the impacts of the use of group support systems (GSSs) on moral discourse. Drawing upon Toulmin’s (1958) model of argumentation and Kohlberg’s (1976) framework of stages of moral reasoning, we used the technique of argumentation mapping (Fletcher and Huff 1990) to analyze group discussions of scenarios involving music piracy and hacktivism (computer hacking for a social cause) by GSS-supported and face-to-face groups. The results indicate that use of GSS can have a significant impact on the extent and diversity of the argumentation contributed during group discussion involving ethical dilemmas, including the number of grounds and rebuttals and the number of unique stages of moral reasoning underpinning the argumentation

A Process for Managing Digital Transformation: An Organizational Inertia Perspective

Digital transformation is often described as organizational change that is simultaneously triggered and enabled by digital technologies. As with other types of organizational transformation, overcoming organizational inertia lies at the heart of digital transformation. However, our understanding of the specific processes employed by incumbent firms to overcome organizational inertia in digital transformation is currently limited. In this paper, we draw on the case study of AsiaBank, a large traditional bank in Asia, to explore the micro-foundations of how incumbent firms tackle different types of inertia as they embark on a digital transformation journey. We identify four key digital transformation processes—i.e., embracing consumerization of digital technologies, diffusing and appropriating digital business practices, enabling distributed organizing, and revamping IT architecture—that combine to reduce negative psychology, socio-cognitive, socio-technical, political, and economic inertia in digital transformation. Our findings expand the extant view on the role of agency in overcoming organizational inertia and contribute to the literature at the intersection of digital innovation and transformation

Media tablets for mobile learning

As consumers continue to shift everyday activities onto personal mobile devices, organizations seek to provide similar capabilities for their employees. Introduction of the iPad in April 2010 and ensuing explosion of the worldwide media tablet market was yet another impetus to the rising importance of mobility in the enterprise. Tablets offer a sweet spot for mobile workers looking for media, collaboration, and basic personal productivity capabilities on the go. Forrester Research expects almost one-third of tablets to be sold directly to businesses by 2016

IT Consumerization and the Transformation of IT Governance

IT governance describes the decision rights and accountability framework used to ensure the alignment of IT-related activities with the organization’s strategy and objectives. Conversely, IT consumerization refers to the process whereby the changing practices and expectations of consumers influence the IT-related activities of workers and managers in organizations. We propose that IT consumerization not only challenges the foundations of IT governance but ultimately also transforms it. To explore this research problem, we utilize the punctuated equilibrium theory and a case study of IT consumerization and the transformation of IT governance in a large global bank. Our findings suggest that the widespread adoption of digital technology in everyday life leads to “everyone’s IT,” which is a new set of shared beliefs among consumers that highlights democratized access and individualized use of IT. As everyone’s IT beliefs begin to alter the IT-related activities of workers, the result is IT governance misalignments that ultimately lead to a punctuated transformation of IT governance that dismantles functional IT governance. The establishment of platform-based governance marks a new equilibrium period. Our mid-range theory contributes to the IS domain with the novel concept of everyone’s IT and a grounded explanation of IT governance transformation in the context of IT consumerization. Our theory offers a set of significant research and practical implications