Examining the effects of IT capabilities and knowledge processes on agility in a healthcare setting

: The effects of IT and knowledge processes on patient agility

Abstract

Information technology is often considered to be a key enabler of capabilities such as knowledge-enabled processes and an organization’s agility. IT infrastructure integration is known to support digital capabilities as well as support customer-centric response. Other studies show that knowledge processes and capabilities support customer response capabilities and indirectly, customer performance. This study, however, will focus on a healthcare setting rather than business organizations in general, as these organizations rely on the tacit knowledge of healthcare practitioners, which makes (IT-enabled) knowledge processes all the more important to serve a patient’s needs adequately. A premise is developed that IT capabilities not only directly influence the degree to which a hospital can properly sense and respond to a patient’s needs, but that patient knowledge processes also mediate this effect. A survey is carried out to perform an empirical examination of these relations. The results of this examination show that the direct effect of IT capabilities on a hospital’s patient agility is rather weak, but that there is a strong mediated effect through patient knowledge processes. These findings are in contrast with the extant literature and provide new insight into the relationship between IT capabilities, knowledge processes and organizational agility.

Date of Award	22 Jan 2020
Original language	English
Supervisor	Rogier van de Wetering (Examiner) & Montse Prats López (Co-assessor)