The workflow application as an unintended medium for organizational learning: A longitudinal field study

Research on information technology (IT) and organizational learning has treated IT as either a subject of or an intentionally designed platform for organizational learning. In contrast, this study investigates the unintentional effects of IT use on organizational learning processes. The findings of this longitudinal field study suggest that an IT platform can serve as both reification and propagation media for experimentation with new work practices. The use of an IT platform can produce online profiles of new work practices and spread them within a user community immediately and simultaneously in a decontextualized fashion. As a consequence, the intensity of collective learning in the process of institutionalizing new work practices can be reduced.