The role of IT competencies in the development of agility dimensions and improvement of competitive activity in organizations

A turbulent environment severely requires development and improvement of flexibility and accountability of the organization. Therefore, agility of organization, i.e. the ability to feel environmental changes, immediate accountability toward changes and learning from existing experiences, is one of the critical indices of improvement of competitive activity in such environments. Regarding high importance of agility and its different dimensions in organizations, there are less studies conducted on forming agility dimensions in organizations. Based on dynamic point of view in competitive environments, dynamic capabilities are tools to achieve agility in organizations. One of dynamic competencies which are important and effective on agility, information technology, has been identified through studying existing literatures. Therefore, the present research surveys role of information technology competency (digital options) to form different dimensions of agility in organizations and improve competitive activity so that a model has designed and tested in industry of Iran Information Technology. Results show that knowledge-based competencies of information technology, i.e. digital knowledge reach and digital knowledge richness, reinforce sensing and learning dimensions of organizational agility and process-based competencies of information technology, i.e. digital process reach and digital process richness, support responding dimension of agility and at the end, improvement of dimensions of agility help to develop competitive activity.

Keywords:

Maximum IT competency , digital option , competitive activity , agility dimensions