Title: Individual capacity for culture acquisition: a business asset to be enhanced

Authors: Anna Marzona, Maurizio Pighin

Addresses: Dipartimento di Scienze Statistiche, Universita degli Studi di Udine, via Treppo, 18, Udine 33100, Italy. ' Laboratorio IS&SI – Ingegneria del Software e Sistemi Informativi, Dipartimento di Matematica e Informatica, Universita degli Studi di Udine, via delle Scienze, 208, Udine 33100, Italy

Abstract: The constant expansion of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in the business world results in constant pressure on individual employees, who must continuously respond to demands that they learn how to use new tools, that they change working modalities and that they understand for ever more complex business processes. Changes introduced by the expansion of ICT seem to require people to change their personal and professional culture, not just their behaviour. Is this always true? Or does the success of new technologies in organisations depend on the ability of its individual employees to adapt? The present case study analyses how various individual responses to change can influence an organisation, and also explores how ICT expansion may raise a new kind of digital divide between people with high adaptability to ICT evolution and people with a lower capacity for professional development.

Keywords: high-level digital divide; HLDD; ICT complexity; information technology; communications; individual professional development; culture acquisition.

DOI: 10.1504/IJITM.2008.018658

International Journal of Information Technology and Management, 2008 Vol.7 No.4, pp.421 - 439

Published online: 04 Jun 2008 *

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