Digitalization of Work Systems—An Organizational Routines’ Perspective

Abstract

Digitalization is a hypernym that denotes the ground-shifting impact IT artifacts have on organizations. The term implicitly refers to core topics in Information Systems research, which now enfolds at increasing magnitude, speed, and reach. However, digitalization often lacks explicit references to domestic theories, concepts, and constructs in the Information Systems literature. Fundamental mechanisms that constitute digitalization as an interplay of organizations and information systems remain unexplored. The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, based on extending extant theory on organizational routines, we propose four patterns that conceptualize digitalization mechanisms as an interplay of organizational routines and IT artifacts. Second, we demonstrate how more complex transformation trajectories of routines unfold, by concatenating our patterns to form transformation stories. On either level of abstraction, further research can build on the proposed patterns to theorize on how the interplay of IT artifacts and organizational routines constitutes the digitalization of work systems.