Whywe (do not) share data in German real estate – a reasoned action approach

Abstract

PurposeGerman (corporate-) real estate management departments have been facing the challenge of poor data quality for years. This holds them back from generating efficiency potentials via the use of new methods from the field of digitalisation and from coping with the increasing requirements from the ESG context. The purpose of this paper is to explore why German (corporate-) real estate managements (do not) share data with their real estate service providers to address the data quality challenge and identify possible solutions.Design/methodology/approachTo answer the research question, the reasoned action approach, an established theory from psychology for predicting human behaviour, is used. The relationships between the constructs are determined using linear regression. The study participants are almost exclusively from Germany.FindingsThe organisational milieu (perceived behavioural control) has a significant impact on the behaviour of sharing data with real estate service providers. Especially the change of contractual arrangements (data-driven contracts) seems to be crucial for the improvement of information logistics.Originality/valueTo the best of the author’s knowledge, for the first time, the reasoned action approach is used within the German real estate industry to predict organisational behaviour in the context of digitalisation.