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Cloud computing adoption decision-making process: a sensemaking analysis

Ariana Polyviou (University of Nicosia, Nicosia, Cyprus)
Nancy Pouloudi (Department of Management Science and Technology, Athens University of Economics and Business, Athens, Greece)
Will Venters (Department of Management, London School of Economics, London, UK)

Information Technology & People

ISSN: 0959-3845

Article publication date: 7 September 2023

Issue publication date: 3 September 2024

408

Abstract

Purpose

The authors study how cloud adoption decision making unfolds in organizations and present the dynamic process leading to a decision to adopt or reject cloud computing. The authors thus complement earlier literature on factors that influence cloud adoption.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors adopt an interpretive epistemology to understand the process of cloud adoption decision making. Following an empirical investigation drawing on interviews with senior managers who led the cloud adoption decision making in organizations from across Europe. The authors outline a framework that shows how cloud adoptions follow multiple cycles in three broad phases.

Findings

The study findings demonstrate that cloud adoption decision making is a recursive process of learning about cloud through three broad phases: building perception about cloud possibilities, contextualizing cloud possibilities in terms of current computing resources and exposing the cloud proposition to others involved in making the decision. Building on these findings, the authors construct a framework of this process which can inform practitioners in making decisions on cloud adoption.

Originality/value

This work contributes to authors understanding of how cloud adoption decisions unfold and provides a framework for cloud adoption decisions that has theoretical and practical value. The study further demonstrates the role of the decision-leader, typically the CIO, in this process and identifies how other internal and external stakeholders are involved. It sheds light on the relevance of the phases of the cloud adoption decision-making process to different cloud adoption factors identified in the extant literature.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (Grant EP/R006865/1).

For the purpose of open access, the authors has applied a creative commons attribution (CC BY) licence to any author accepted manuscript version arising.

Citation

Polyviou, A., Pouloudi, N. and Venters, W. (2024), "Cloud computing adoption decision-making process: a sensemaking analysis", Information Technology & People, Vol. 37 No. 6, pp. 2153-2182. https://doi.org/10.1108/ITP-02-2022-0139

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited

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