IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/tjisxx/v33y2024i3p383-402.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Business value of SME digitalisation: when does it pay off more?

Author

Listed:
  • Nicolai Etienne Fabian
  • John Qi Dong
  • Thijs Broekhuizen
  • Peter C. Verhoef

Abstract

Small and medium enterprise (SME) digitalisation involves the reinforcement, modification, and renewal of business models with the help of digital technologies. It is widely considered imperative for SMEs to stay relevant in the digital age. Yet, little is known about the conditions under which SME digitalisation improves the performance of SMEs in the IS literature. Guided by the SME literature, we postulate that the business value of SME digitalisation – based on its impact on improving financial firm performance – is dependent on two factors that are particularly relevant to SMEs due to their smallness and flexibility: radical orientation and organisational rigidity. Using data from multiple waves of surveys in 2019–2020 and archival financial data from Dutch SMEs, we demonstrate that the positive impact of SME digitalisation on performance improvement strongly depends on SME characteristics. SMEs who are oriented towards radical change and are more rigid are disadvantaged and attain lower returns on SME digitalisation.

Suggested Citation

  • Nicolai Etienne Fabian & John Qi Dong & Thijs Broekhuizen & Peter C. Verhoef, 2024. "Business value of SME digitalisation: when does it pay off more?," European Journal of Information Systems, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(3), pages 383-402, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:tjisxx:v:33:y:2024:i:3:p:383-402
    DOI: 10.1080/0960085X.2023.2167671
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/0960085X.2023.2167671
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/0960085X.2023.2167671?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:tjisxx:v:33:y:2024:i:3:p:383-402. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/tjis .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.