Toward a Configurational Theory of IT Governance Process Capabilities

While extant research has highlighted that IT governance (ITG) process capability is a key success driver for organizational performance, the question remains as to which configurations of ITG process capabilities lead to organizational performance and under which conditions. In the present paper, we leverage Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) to develop a configurational theory on how ITG process capabilities (including a board-level process capability) work together. Inspired by a contingency view in ITG research, we aim to explore the configurations of ITG process capabilities that lead to high organizational performance. Preliminary results reveal two sufficient configurations of ITG capabilities enabling high performance, one with a board-level process capability and one without. The results also challenge a key premise in ITG research – the necessity of board-level ITG. Beyond this short paper, we aim to extend the configurational theory on ITG process capabilities that take into account relevant contingencies.