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Information technology, the organizational capability of proactive corporate environmental strategy and firm performance: a resource-based analysis

  • Research Article
  • Published:
European Journal of Information Systems

Abstract

The study of the relationships between information technology (IT), environmental organizational issues and firm performance is a cutting-edge research topic for the information systems (IS) community. However, at present we know very little about these relationships. Drawing on the perspective of IT-enabled organizational capabilities and the literature on organizations and the natural environment, our study introduces conceptually the construct organizational capability of proactive corporate environmental strategy to the IS field. We propose that IT capability may enable the implementation of a proactive environmental strategy and that this strategy could play a significant role in determining the business value of IT. Using structural equations modeling with data collected from 63 firms, we find that IT capability is an enabler of proactive environmental strategy and that this strategy plays a significant role in mediating the effects of IT on firm performance. Our study provides initial evidence on the role of IT in the implementation of proactive environmental practices. Our results suggest to IT executives that their decisions matter in shaping environmental sustainability, which in turn will generate business value from IT.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the Editors and three anonymous reviewers for their extensive and valuable comments that helped develop this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Management Science, Operations Management and Information Systems Group, School of Economics and Business, University of Granada, Granada, Spain

    Jose Benitez-Amado

  2. Department of Accounting and Information Management, School of Business and Economics, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands

    Rita M Walczuch

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  1. Jose Benitez-Amado
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  2. Rita M Walczuch
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Correspondence to Jose Benitez-Amado.

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Benitez-Amado, J., Walczuch, R. Information technology, the organizational capability of proactive corporate environmental strategy and firm performance: a resource-based analysis. Eur J Inf Syst 21, 664–679 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1057/ejis.2012.14

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/ejis.2012.14

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