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Shaping agility through digital options: reconceptualizing the role of information technology in contemporary firms

Published: 01 June 2003 Publication History

Abstract

Agility is vital to the innovation and competitive performance of firms in contemporary business environments. Firms are increasingly relying on information technologies, including process, knowledge, and communication technologies, to enhance their agility. The purpose of this paper is to broaden understanding about the strategic role of IT by examining the nomological network of influences through which IT impacts firm performance. By drawing upon recent thinking in the strategy, entrepreneurship, and IT management literatures, this paper uses a multitheoretic lens to argue that information technology investments and capabilities influence firm performance through three significant organizational capabilities (agility, digital options, and entrepreneurial alertness) and strategic processes (capability-building, entrepreneurial action, and coevolutionary adaptation). We also propose that these dynamic capabilities and strategic processes impact the ability of firms to launch many and varied competitive actions and that, in turn, these competitive actions are a significant antecedent of firm performance. Through our theorizing, we draw attention to a significant and reframed role of IT as a digital options generator in contemporary firms.

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        cover image MIS Quarterly
        MIS Quarterly  Volume 27, Issue 2
        June 2003
        146 pages

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        Society for Information Management and The Management Information Systems Research Center

        United States

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        Published: 01 June 2003

        Author Tags

        1. IT competence
        2. digital options
        3. knowledge capital
        4. process capital
        5. strategic agility

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