The New Kid on the Block: Chief Digital Officers and Three Ways of Political Job Crafting

Abstract

Chief Digital Officers (CDO) are expected to fulfill a strategic role in the digital transformation strategy and its implementation. Although research on digital transformation is growing steadily, we lack a coherent understanding of the extent and the nature of the CDO role as the scope of the CDOs’ responsibilities remains unclear and there are potential redundancies with reference to other IT executives. Based on 53 interviews with CDOs, we examine how they as strategic leaders engage in defining their jobs. In our analysis we draw on job crafting theory as a theoretical lens. We identify that CDOs face pressures to define a role narrative and engage in political job crafting practices. Specifically, we reveal change of existing power dynamics, shift of perception as well as enhancement of job credibility as political job crafting practices. These practices help strategic leaders, CDOs in particular, to maneuver strategically and politically in the beginning but also throughout their tenure to gain sufficient authority to execute their mission. In so doing, we extend the present understanding of job crafting as a political activity at the level of strategic leadership, specifically in the context of digital transformation.