Abstract
This paper investigates how companies value efficiency gains against indirect costs that emerge during the implementation of digitization projects. We look at indirect costs (i.e., organizational, human, and relational costs), since they are typically overlooked or treated as ‘black box’ by researchers, although they have significant impacts for the implementation of a digitization project (e.g., employees’ resistance against the project). Using a discrete choice experiment (DCE), participants of our study had to trade off different digitization projects, characterized by various combinations of indirect costs and levels of efficiency gains. Our insights shed light to the relative importance of different indirect costs, hence provide significant implications for practitioners: Understanding how participants value efficiency gains against indirect costs, companies can reduce the internal resistance of employees against digitization projects by avoiding or minimizing those costs that are perceived unacceptable.
Recommended Citation
Bogodistov, Yevgen and Ostern, Nadine Kathrin, "Digitization at Any Cost? Willingness to Trade Efficiency for Organizational, Human, and Relational Costs" (2019). AMCIS 2019 Proceedings. 9.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/amcis2019/org_transformation_is/org_transformation_is/9
Digitization at Any Cost? Willingness to Trade Efficiency for Organizational, Human, and Relational Costs
This paper investigates how companies value efficiency gains against indirect costs that emerge during the implementation of digitization projects. We look at indirect costs (i.e., organizational, human, and relational costs), since they are typically overlooked or treated as ‘black box’ by researchers, although they have significant impacts for the implementation of a digitization project (e.g., employees’ resistance against the project). Using a discrete choice experiment (DCE), participants of our study had to trade off different digitization projects, characterized by various combinations of indirect costs and levels of efficiency gains. Our insights shed light to the relative importance of different indirect costs, hence provide significant implications for practitioners: Understanding how participants value efficiency gains against indirect costs, companies can reduce the internal resistance of employees against digitization projects by avoiding or minimizing those costs that are perceived unacceptable.