Examining relational digital transformation through the unfolding of local practices of the Finnish taxi industry |
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Author: | Lanamäki, Arto1,2; Väyrynen, Karin3; Laari-Salmela, Sari4; |
Organizations: |
1School of Marketing and Communication, University of Vaasa, Finland 2School of Digital Technologies, Tallinn University, Estonia 3INTERACT Research Unit, University of Oulu, Finland
4University of Oulu Business School, Finland
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Format: | article |
Version: | published version |
Access: | open |
Online Access: | PDF Full Text (PDF, 3 MB) |
Persistent link: | http://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi-fe2020091669621 |
Language: | English |
Published: |
Elsevier,
2020
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Publish Date: | 2020-09-16 |
Description: |
AbstractDigital transformation has become a central construct in information systems (IS) research. Current conceptualizations largely attribute transformation to intentionality, focus on transformation within a single organization, or assign technology the role of a disruptive agent of change. Likewise, “digital” tends to be a general category of technology, rather than a specific technology enacted in a time and place. Inspired by Schatzkian practice theory and its site ontology, we suggest a contextual viewpoint on digital transformation and call it “relational digital transformation.” We analyzed the change dynamics in the context of taxi dispatch practice in Finland, studying the changing taxi dispatch platforms over years. We investigated five powerful industry actors: two incumbents, two entrants, and a federation of taxi entrepreneurs. We identified events of change in the material arrangements in sites and explain the changes through the process dynamics in the focal practice. We define relational digital transformation as a process through which practice-arrangement bundles of digital technologies evolve over time. This approach assumes the default nature of an industry is to be found in the changing relations between entities rather than in entities themselves. This provides a theoretical extension to the prevailing views of digital transformation in IS literature. It enables studying digital transformation in retrospect without attributing change agency to any entities or technologies a priori. We also contribute to practice-theoretical IS literature by demonstrating how the applicability of practice theoretical analysis extends beyond microphenomena to larger industry-level changes. see all
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Series: |
Journal of strategic information systems |
ISSN: | 0963-8687 |
ISSN-E: | 1873-1198 |
ISSN-L: | 0963-8687 |
Volume: | 29 |
Issue: | 3 |
Article number: | 101622 |
DOI: | 10.1016/j.jsis.2020.101622 |
OADOI: | https://oadoi.org/10.1016/j.jsis.2020.101622 |
Type of Publication: |
A1 Journal article – refereed |
Field of Science: |
512 Business and management 113 Computer and information sciences |
Subjects: | |
Funding: |
The first author (AL) and the second author (KV) have contributed equally. They collected all the data and contributed to all phases of the project. The third (SL-S) and the fourth author (MK) have contributed to the data analysis, theory, and writing. We thank the editor-in-chief Guy Gable and the three anonymous reviewers for facilitating a developmental review process. This manuscript was previously under review in the JSIS special issue on “Strategic Perspectives on Digital Work and Organizational Transformation.” We thank the editors of the special issue, especially Mary Beth Watson-Manheim and Joao Baptista, for helping us with paper development. We are grateful to all our informants who have participated in the interviews we conducted for this study. AL and KV would like to thank the Academy of Finland (PROFI4) GenZ short-term research action for providing financial support for the data collection. KV is grateful to the Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation who partly funded this research. |
Copyright information: |
© 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/BY/4.0/). |
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |