Title: A tale of two trajectories: bottom-up social software adoption in differing organisational contexts

Authors: Andreas Soyland; Jo Herstad

Addresses: Department of Sociology and Political Science, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, NTNU Samfunnsforskning AS, N-7491 Trondheim, Norway. ' Department of Informatics, University of Oslo, Gaustadalleen 23, N-0371 Oslo, Norway

Abstract: The inherent bottom-up nature of social software diffusion differs markedly from the adoption trajectories to which most organisational IT strategies are accustomed. Through case studies in two organisations, this paper presents insights into how adoption of emergent social software platforms may take form, and discusses the implications of two radically different approaches to manage these processes. Our findings suggest that organisations may need to cede control over parts of the IT innovation adoption process to benefit from grassroots initiatives, and rather standardise successful innovations on an ongoing basis to avoid detrimental fragmentation of media usage across organisational boundaries.

Keywords: social media; social networking; networks; information technology; communications technology; Enterprise 2.0; ICT innovation; technology adoption; social software; bottom-up processes; distributed organisations; organisational contexts; adoption trajectories; ICT strategies; emergent platforms; software platforms; adoption processes; grassroots initiatives; standardisation; detrimental fragmentation; media usage; organisational boundaries; Norway; energy industry; software development; internet; world wide web; enterprise management.

DOI: 10.1504/IJIEM.2011.044207

International Journal of Internet and Enterprise Management, 2011 Vol.7 No.3, pp.305 - 321

Published online: 25 Apr 2015 *

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