DIGITALIZATION AND ITS CONTRIBUTION TO SUSTAINABILITY IN TERMS OF THE SOCIAL DIMENSION

Purpose: Sustainability and digitalization will determine economy in the future. But the crucial question is to what extent are both concepts related, are the CEOs of companies aware of this and where are obstacles concerning reaching sustainable social objectives by digitalization? In contrast to most approaches, digitalization will be rather understood as a social phenomenon than a technological issue in the first line. Thus, the study will investigate the social aspect of both topics. Design/methodology/approach: The paper is based on own qualitative depth interviews with managers of companies just as e.g. Lufthansa, Deloitte and Bosch. The empirical study deals with the specific question if top managers see digitalization as chance for sustainable aims and if so where they see problems for transformation on the operative level. Findings: This paper connects digitalization and sustainability on the social level. Interesting findings are that top managers are aware of the social dimension of digitalization. Moreover, they recognise the benefits arising out of digitalization especially for their employees and social objectives of sustainability. But they also mention that there is a gap between what they want and what stuff is willing to contribute due to several reasons. They assess that as the real big challenge concerning the digital organisational turn. Research/practical implications: By connecting sustainability and digitalization this paper provides important implications in order to understand digitalization as a social phenomenon as well as a chance for reaching social aims. Moreover, it decovers obstacles occurring in practice what is important for top managers. Only if they are aware of this they can implement measurements in order to minimize or to prevent those obstacles in their own company Originality/value: The added value of this work is that in contrast to previous work, digitalization and sustainability are linked at the social level. Moreover obstacles concerning the digitalorganizational turn are approached.