Why People and Processes Enable Sustainability and Not the Latest Technology: On Achieving Green IT/IS Capability Maturity

Authors

Sathiyaraam Puvaneswaran, Universität Duisburg-EssenFollow
Helge Alsdorf, Universität Duisburg-EssenFollow

Paper Type

FP

Paper Number

201

Abstract

Green IT and Green IS are innovation types that organizations adopt so as to digitally and sustainably transform themselves. Since it is not the innovation adoption itself that leads to the desired outcomes, organizations need to build the necessary Green IT/IS capabilities. To do so, they may adhere to the IT-Capability Maturity Framework, which incorporates an explicit Green IT capability. We improve this framework and provide a better understanding of the Green IT/IS concept as well as of how to achieve Green IT/IS maturity. We map and integrate the Green IT capability to well-known understandings of Green IT/IS and find that, despite the technology-related label, most Green IT capability building blocks relate to sociotechnological and management processes. Thus, organizations need not first invest in new Green IT before building Green IT/IS capabilities; altering processes and sensitizing employees may be equally effective.

Recommended Citation

Puvaneswaran, Sathiyaraam and Alsdorf, Helge, "Why People and Processes Enable Sustainability and Not the Latest Technology: On Achieving Green IT/IS Capability Maturity" (2021). PACIS 2021 Proceedings. 163.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/pacis2021/163