Understanding Socio-Technical Impacts Arising from Software-asa-Service Usage in Companies A Mixed Method Analysis on Individual Level Data

Given the advantages of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), such as cost efficiency and flexibility gains, decision-makers increasingly deploy this technology for supporting business processes as well as core business processes. But the impact of SaaS integration on a company’s IT organization often does not become apparent until the implementation is completed. Therefore, this paper examines the perceptions of IT professionals in internal IT departments regarding the effects of SaaS. In order to analyze the changes in the daily work processes of internal IT professionals in companies using SaaS, we start with the design and test of a suitable quantitative research model. In a second step, we conduct triangulation by investigating four SaaS cases from the perspectives of internal IT professionals and end users. This step constitutes the qualitative part of the study. From the empirical results we can deduce that with an increasing SaaS usage level a socio-technical instability emerges in the perceived individual job outcome (e.g., job satisfaction, job acceptance, job significance). This is especially true for IT professionals. Our valuable findings help management to understand the need for balancing both their willingness for SaaS adoption and the socio-technical consequences.

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