Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
previous concepts, green IT offerings address the
information technology function/industry, which
plays a role in reducing the environmental burdens
posed by IT and also serves to provide advanced
technology and solutions for the mitigation of en-
vironmental problems (O'Flynn, 2009). From this
perspective, the implementation of environmental
responsibility—which includes the generation of
practical and sustainable information systems--is
rapidly becoming a core element of organizations'
social and regulatory operating licensing stan-
dards. However, the concept of Green IT itself,
from the Information Systems perspective, still
needs to be empirically investigated (Hasan
et al
.,
2009). The majority of the literature regarding ICT
environmental sustainability comes from environ-
mental groups, practitioners, and governmental
bodies (Elliot and Binney, 2008). IS researchers
have yet to engage fully with this hot topic, while
business organizations are confronted by the
necessity of transforming their current business
activities into more environmentally sustainable
ones, but remain uncertain as to how to effect
that transformation (Elliot and Binney, 2008).
Progress in the Green IT research field requires
theorization, model construction, and measure-
ment development (Hair
et al
., 2006). Therefore,
in order to flesh out more thoroughly the concept
of green IT practices, we focused our current study
on the various dimensions of theories concerning
green IT practices, and recommended different
institutional levels of Green IT strategies from a
resource-based view perspective.
This paper is organized as follows. In the next
section, we present the theory of the resource-
based view of the firm, followed by natural
resource-based view theory, environmental strat-
egies, and institutional theory, as elucidated in
previous studies. Relying on these existing theo-
ries, we posited a new set of Green IT strategic
recommendations, including some theoretical
propositions to enhance the concept. In the final
section, we discuss some implications for future
research, in addition to some of the limitations of
the present study.
RESOURCE-BASED
VIEW OF THE FIRM
Resource-based view theory holds that, because
resources are heterogeneous among firms and
imperfectly mobile across firms, differences in
resource endowments may arise and persist over
time (Barney, 1991). This theory is primarily
employed in the literature concerning strategic
management, and has also been adopted in man-
agement information system research (Priem
and Butler, 2001). For example, it has been used
to measure discrepancies in IS resource perfor-
mance (Teng
et al
., 1995), link IT capability
with firm performance (Bharadwaj, 2000), and
evaluate the importance of senior leadership and
infrastructures to IT assimilation (Kearns and
Lederer, 2003). Some previous researchers have
asserted that the resource-based theory (Barney,
1991) and its extensions (e.g. Hart, 1995; Teece
et
al
., 1999), with their focus on firm resources and
capabilities (Grant, 1991), provide an appropriate
theoretical lens by which it can be determined
how factors internal to the firm can serve as a
source of competitive advantage (Ravichandran
and Lertwongsatien, 2005).
Resources can be defined as those assets that are
linked semi-permanently to the firm (Wernerfelt,
1984), whereas capabilities refer to skills predi-
cated in human competencies (Markides and Wil-
liamson, 1996). Resources can affect a variety of
the actions taken by top management and improve
financial performance (Wernerfelt, 1984). If these
resources culminate in a marketplace advantage
that cannot be readily duplicated, then they must be
considered potential sources of competitive advan-
tage (Kearns and Lederer, 2003). In other words,
to function as a source of persistent above-average
performance, resources must meet the following
three criteria: they must be (1) valuable, mean-
