The funeral industry and the Internet: on the historical emergence and destabilization of strategic paths

Abstract

Although IS research acknowledges the importance of path dependence with the generalized response that ''history matters,'' this broad understanding does not substitute for a more systematic historical analysis of how paths emerge and how technological change breaks them. In this context, we draw on the theory of strategic path dependence from organization and management research to develop a more nuanced understanding of path dependence and then explore how technological change breaks these strategic paths. Based on a narrative analysis of the strategic development of incumbents in the funeral industry, we reconstruct the core components of strategic paths-strategic patterns and selfreinforcing mechanisms-and scrutinize the Internet's role in breaking these paths. We suggest that technological change helps break strategic paths by destabilizing the very self-reinforcing mechanisms that led to their emergence and reproduction in the first place. Furthermore, by showing that breaking strategic paths involves a subsequent critical event that destabilizes the strategic pattern, we advance a process understanding of how strategic paths are broken. This paper thus provides much-needed historical analyses of IS-related phenomena, offers a more precise and systematic understanding of path dependence in IS research, and yields insights into the process of how strategic paths are broken.

From entity to process: toward more process-based theorizing in the field of organizational change

“…Thus, it does not force organizational change into linear cause-effect relationships between entities. Instead, From entity to process process-based theorizing enables researchers to unfold patterns of action that constitute and produce organizational change in time and space and gain a better understanding of the underlying mechanisms that explicate how and why that change occurs (Langley et al, 2013;Wenzel et al, 2017). Thus, scholars can observe and theorize the constitution and production of organizational change that linear cause-effect relationships cannot capture (Langley, 1999).…”

“…Second, process-based theorizing enables scholars to gain a more complex understanding of organizational change. By avoiding forcing organizational change into linear cause-effect relationships between entities, it opens the view for dynamics that extend beyond linear cause-effect relationships, such paradoxes Smith and Lewis, 2011), dualities (Farjoun, 2010;Priem et al, 2018), plurivocality (Boje, 1995), polyphony (Hazen, 1993) and self-reinforcing dynamics (Sydow et al, 2009;Wenzel et al, 2017). Thus, by relying on process-based theorizing, scholars can theorize the complex processes through which organizational change comes into being.…”

“…To direct organizational change scholars toward more process-based theorizing, we propose an analytical procedure that enables them to theorize organizational change systematically from a process perspective. In line with the need for a "narrative-based style" of theorizing processes (Cornelissen, 2017a; see also Wenzel et al, 2017), this procedure is inspired by discourse-analytical considerations (see Balogun et al, 2014, andPhillips andHardy, 2002, for a comprehensive overview). Discourse analyses allude to the written and oral use of language in social practices through which actors construct meaning and, therefore, social reality over time.…”

Current Interest in the Theory of Organizational Path Dependence. A Short Update on the Occasion of the 2019 AMR Decade Award

“…Valorinta, Schildt, & Lamberg, 2011) and other service industries (e.g Wenzel, Wagner, & Koch, 2017)…”