Abstract

Information technology has become a critical factor for enterprises of all sizes. However, after years of increasing business process digitisation, companies face various challenges: On the one hand, the number of information systems and the intensity of their use have significantly increased, and the IT landscape’s inherent complexity requires a great deal of effort to change the existing information systems; on the other hand, companies are forced to continuously adapt to the fast-paced business environment and realise that their IT landscapes can no longer cope with the current and future business requirements. As IT is increasingly regarded as a hindering factor, companies launch IT transformation initiatives to overcome the dilemma of their overly complex IT landscapes. The purpose of this article is to investigate the nature and characteristics of IT transformation. Using the resource-based view as a theoretical lens, we suggest conceptualising IT transformation as a fundamental IT capability and resource change. On the basis of three case studies, we analyse the changes in IT capabilities and resources in the course of IT transformation and explore their interplay with business capabilities. Our empirical results confirm the nature of IT transformation as a secondorder change affecting technological and human IT resources’ ‘deep-structure’. From our cross-case analysis, we identify a set of technological IT capabilities induced by IT transformation as well as dynamic human IT capabilities required to manage this set’s reconfiguration.

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