Technology flexibility: conceptualization, validation, and measurement

Abstract

This research investigates technology flexibility, which is the technology characteristic that allows or enables adjustments and other changes to the business process. Technology flexibility has two dimensions, structural and process flexibility, encompassing both the actual technology application and the people and processes that support it. The flexibility of technology that supports business processes can greatly influence the organization's capacity for change. Existing technology can present opportunities for or barriers to business process flexibility through structural characteristics such as language, platform and design. Technology can also indirectly affect flexibility through the relationship between the technology maintenance organization and the business process owners, change request processing, and other response characteristics. These indirect effects reflect a more organizational perspective of flexibility. This paper asks the question, "what makes technology flexible?" This question is addressed by developing and validating a measurement model of technology flexibility. Constructs and definitions of technology flexibility are developed by examining the concept of flexibility in other disciplines, and the demands imposed on technology by business processes. The purpose of building a measurement model is to show validity for the constructs of technology flexibility. This paper discusses the theory of technology flexibility, develops constructs and determinants of this phenomenon, and proposes a methodology for the validation and study of the flexibility of emerging technologies.

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