The Nature of Digital Transformation

This paper discusses the nature of digital transformation from a conceptual perspective. We consider digital transformation as the changes associated with the application of digital technology in all aspects of human life. The emphasis is that digital technology is now part of human life, and that human beings increasingly experience the world with, through and by information technology. A human – technology interactions perspective is presented which underpin the process of digital transformation as based on embodied, hermeneutic and alterity relationships. Thus, the process of digital transformation is argued to impact on three major domains of human activity: governance, commerce and individual/knowledge society. These domains are impacted by the process of digitalization at three levels. Based on the argumentation developed, we then conceptualize digital transformation as change enabled by and intertwined with IT, which impacts on product and process innovations as well as innovative ways of organizing human affairs (governance, business models, and individual/society life-worlds).