Start Date
10-12-2017 12:00 AM
Description
Popular media suggests that the emerging millenial workforce makes business-to-business purchase decisions more rigorously, because of its increased reliance on digital information sources. This argument seemingly contradicts extant research, which indicates that organizational buyers rely on decision shortcuts (e.g., brand) to mitigate risks or simplify decisions. Furthermore, the use of digital sources has been shown to reinforce biases. In this study, we leverage the Accessibility-Diagnosticity information processing framework to introduce a Digital Embeddedness construct that conceptualizes the extent to which information from digital sources is integral to an individual’s decision-making. Using survey data from 196 purchasing managers, we find that while buyers who rely more on digital sources rely less on some decision shortcuts, namely loyalty, they also use these sources to reinforce reliance on other shortcuts, including brand and peer opinions. Implications are discussed for digital marketing, and for understanding the effect of digital sources on organizational decision-making.
Recommended Citation
Krijestorac, Haris; Garg, Rajiv; and Konana, Prabhudev, "Digital Embeddedness and its Effect on Organizational Decision-Making" (2017). ICIS 2017 Proceedings. 17.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2017/HumanBehavior/Presentations/17
Digital Embeddedness and its Effect on Organizational Decision-Making
Popular media suggests that the emerging millenial workforce makes business-to-business purchase decisions more rigorously, because of its increased reliance on digital information sources. This argument seemingly contradicts extant research, which indicates that organizational buyers rely on decision shortcuts (e.g., brand) to mitigate risks or simplify decisions. Furthermore, the use of digital sources has been shown to reinforce biases. In this study, we leverage the Accessibility-Diagnosticity information processing framework to introduce a Digital Embeddedness construct that conceptualizes the extent to which information from digital sources is integral to an individual’s decision-making. Using survey data from 196 purchasing managers, we find that while buyers who rely more on digital sources rely less on some decision shortcuts, namely loyalty, they also use these sources to reinforce reliance on other shortcuts, including brand and peer opinions. Implications are discussed for digital marketing, and for understanding the effect of digital sources on organizational decision-making.