User-Driven Change enabled by Malleable Information Technology

Malleable technologies promise almost infinite applications for organizations. Users can utilize the generic functionalities of such technologies to support personal tasks or combine and adapt them to create custom artefacts and, hence, shape organizational routines. Although users have a crucial part in the transition from generic potentials to effective use of malleable technologies, we know little about processes and factors that facilitate users in this endeavor and how created artefacts evolve over time. This dissertation presents three studies, which target these research gaps. The studies draw on affordance theory, cognitive load theory, routine theory and momentum of change and apply qualitative and quantitative methods to the case of a malleable technology implementation project in an organization. The results suggest that users perceive and actualize afforded potentials of malleable technologies through different processes, which depend on user characteristics and local environmental factors. Moreover, the longitudinal observations show that users often perform a series of changes, when they form custom artefacts from malleable technologies. The intensity of these changes can be described as momentum that depends on factors like the existing artefact or the embeddedness of the related routine. Overall, the dissertation findings open the black box of user-driven change under malleable technology and help to explain variations in the created momentum of change

Change of Organizational Routines under Malleable Information Technology: Explaining Variations in Momentum

Malleable technology bears the promise of allowing users to flexibly change organizational routines. Although the benefits from malleable technology depend on the extent to which users make use of such technology to change organizational routines, we know little about the factors that shape the intensity of routine change. We report the results of a case study in which we analyzed changes of 24 routines under malleable technology over a period of three years. Our results show that actors often perform a series of consecutive changes rather than one discrete change. We build on the concept of momentum to describe the intensity of these changes. Our emergent theory suggests that momentum is affected by the embeddedness of routines, by existing artefacts, by lead actor traits, and by external knowledge. Our study contributes to theory of routine change by developing explanations for variations in momentum of routine change under malleable technology

Affordance Perceptions under Malleable Information Technology: A Social Cognitive Theory Perspective

Organizations benefit from malleable IT only if users perceive the affordances that malleable IT provides for their work. However, theoretical explanations and empirical evidence related to affordance perception are scarce. In this paper, we develop a theoretical framework based on Social Cognitive Theory to explain two different types of affordance perceptions: vicarious and autonomous. Data from a survey of 154 users supports the framework. We find that vicarious affordance perceptions depend on social information and on basic knowledge about the malleable IT. In contrast, autonomous affordance perceptions, which rely on uncertain and cognitively complex search activities, depend on self-efficacy gained through prolonged use and on the knowledge acquired through a learning process that starts with system use and observation of other people’s use, followed by vicarious affordance perceptions. The key contribution of our paper lies in developing and testing explanations for affordance perceptions under malleable IT

The Evolution of Routines under Flexible Information Technology

Many technological developments of the past two decades come with the promise of greater IT flexi-bility, i.e. greater capacity to adapt IT. These technologies are increasingly used to improve organiza-tional routines that are not affected by large, hard-to-change IT such as ERP. Yet, most findings on the interaction of routines and IT stem from contexts where IT is hard to change. Our research ex-plores how routines and IT co-evolve when IT is flexible. We review the literatures on routines to sug-gest that IT may act as a boundary object that mediates the learning process unfolding between the ostensive and the performative aspect of the routine. Although prior work has concluded from such conceptualizations that IT stabilizes routines, we qualify that flexible IT can also stimulate change because it enables learning in short feedback cycles. We suggest that, however, such change might not always materialize because it is contingent on governance choices and technical knowledge. We de-scribe the case-study method to explore how routines and flexible IT co-evolve and how governance and technical knowledge influence this process. We expect to contribute towards stronger theory of routines and to develop recommendations for the effective implementation of flexible IT in loosely coupled routines

How Users Perceive and Actualize Affordances: An Exploratory Case Study of Collaboration Platforms

The success of collaboration platforms depends on the degree to which users incorporate generic platform features into their particular collaborative actions. Yet, little is known about the processes through which users perceive and actualize the potentials for action, or affordances, offered by collaboration platforms. We report the results of an exploratory case study in which we accompanied collaboration platform users over a period of over two years. We find that users perceive affordances through three alternative processes: imitating, exploring, and transferring. After perceiving affordances, users often need to arrange for configuration to enable the perceived action potential. Configuration can be found in three forms: delegated, guided, or autonomous configuration. Our emerging theory suggests that these perception and actualization processes depend in complex ways on individual-level (knowledge, self-efficacy, perceived complexity) and on higher-level factors (advice networks, collective knowledge). Our study helps open the black box of affordance perception and actualization processes

Behind the scenes of digital servitization: Actualising IoT-enabled affordances

Manufacturers are increasingly transforming through servitization, and the Internet of Things (IoT) is a crucial enabler of this transformation. Current literature describes the diverse outcomes from IoT that enable servitization but fails to explain the reasons behind the diversity and the processes manufacturers go through to create these outcomes. This study aims to identify these processes by drawing on affordance theory and its core principles of affordance perception (understanding an opportunity provided by technology) and affordance actualisation (taking advantage of an opportunity provided by technology). By using affordance theory to analyse the case scenarios of six manufacturing firms, the study develops a framework to explain the realisation of the opportunities the IoT provides to manufacturers' servitization efforts. The analysis identifies three types of affordances and actualisation processes that help manufacturers realise the opportunities of the IoT. This framework enables manufacturers to systematically manage the contributions from the IoT and the associated actualisation efforts required to advance servitization. The study adds to the understanding of the IoT's role in a manufacturing servitization context