“We are going digital”: Leveraging organizational identity pluralism for proactive adaptation

Abstract

We investigate how incumbents adapt to a major technological change through an inductive study of three large and established firms. Our core contribution is a framework of how proactive incumbents turn their established identities into means of adapting to the technological change, here the digital revolution, through reflecting on and flexing, pluralizing, leveraging, and adapting organizational identity. We conceptualize meta-identity and sub-identity bricolage to explain organizational identity work while coping with the digital revolution proactively. We also distinguish between additive and transformative meta-identities, based on their effect on how adaptation projects are structured. Moreover, we find that managers across hierarchical levels complement each other’s adaptation efforts; top managers promote meta-identity, and intrapreneurs construct sub-identity bricolage. Such identity works help managers avoid potential tensions between identity and innovation. We develop a multilevel identity-informed theoretical model of the firm’s adaptation to major technological change. We discuss our findings and identify avenues for future research.