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• Open access
• Published: 28 December 2018

Digital technology and practices for school improvement: innovative digital school model

• Liisa Ilomäki 1 &
• Minna Lakkala 1  

Research and Practice in Technology Enhanced Learning volume  13 , Article number:  25 ( 2018 ) Cite this article

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A Correction to this article was published on 18 March 2019

This article has been updated

The aim of this study was to create a model which describes the main elements for improving schools with digital technology and helps to reveal differences between schools and identify their best practices and challenges. The innovative digital school model (IDI school) offers a framework for research but also a research-based model for schools to examine their own practices with digital technologies. The model combines previous research on school improvement, creation of innovations, and digital technology in education as a special case of innovations and learning as knowledge creation to define six main elements describing an innovative, digital school: visions of the school, leadership, practices of the teaching community, pedagogical practices, school-level knowledge practices and digital resources. The model was applied to investigate three basic education schools. The results indicate that the model worked: we found essential differences between the schools and their best practices and challenges for improvement. It worked particularly well for those elements, which are mainly the responsibility for leadership inside a school. The differences of various elements between schools were not based on socioeconomic background but on the school-level practices. As a conclusion, we suggest that to improve schools with digital technology, all elements of the model should be included in the evaluation and development process.

Introduction

In today’s world, education is facing major challenges: it is expected to provide children and teenagers with competencies they will need in the future, to consider informal ways of learning, and to apply digital technologies and modern pedagogical methods to answer these challenges (EU, 2010 ). However, schools have not managed to meet all these challenges: e.g. digital technology has not yet been applied much in education, although it is widely in use elsewhere in the society and in work life (EU 2013 ; Livingstone 2012 ); students do not acquire sufficient competence at school to undertake university studies (such as collaboration, planning, independent learning, digital competence or working with knowledge) (Hautamäki et al. 2012 ; Kiili 2012 ; Lundahl et al. 2010 ); and there are major differences between countries and schools in reaching these skill levels (such as problem-solving skills, OECD 2014 , 2017 ). There have been promising results that some pedagogical practices related to student centredness, real-life activities and group work have increased at schools between 2001 and 2011. Such pedagogical practices are often linked to the use of digital technology (OECD 2014 ).

There is a large body of research about using digital technology in schools, in classrooms and among teachers and students, but often these studies concentrate on only one or two phenomena of education and technology (e.g. classroom cases, or technical competence of teachers and students), thus isolating the object of study from the broader context of a school. Unless a more comprehensive view is adopted in the efforts of developing a school, there is little chance of innovation programmes having any lasting effect (Wikeley et al. 2005 ). Wong and Li ( 2011 ) investigated the connection between information and communication technology (ICT) implementation and pedagogical change. They concluded that organisational interventions and pedagogical interventions interacted with each other in effecting changes in student learning. Korhonen et al. ( 2014 ) introduced an innovative school community model, which addresses the development of four elements: students’ learning and learning environments, teachers’ professionalism, leadership and partnerships, as central to the advancement of educational innovation related to versatile use of digital technology. The model is generic, which leaves considerable room for interpretation in examining how current practices in a school should be evaluated and improved.

To investigate schools, we followed the sociocultural approach to learning (John-Steiner and Mann 1996 ; Packer and Goicoechea 2000 ): a school is an environment of collaborative, social activities of teachers, pupils and other participants; and their activities shape and transform its culture, values, practices and other specific characteristics. This approach also has an impact on our methodological choices: we mainly investigated practices rather than beliefs or thoughts .

The interest in the present study is in exploring the critical elements to be considered and the development processes needed in schools for reforming school education. Our specific focus is on the use of digital technology: how new digital technology has been applied and how it could be used to improve pedagogical and knowledge practices.

School is a complicated object to study: it consists of various administrative levels , from the national policy level to classrooms; various actors , such as school staff and pupils inside a school as well as parents and local school administrators outside a school; contradictory aims , such as aiming to ensure relevant competence levels for pupils in the future, but simultaneously, carrying on the traditions and history of society. For the complexity of a school as a research object, the theoretical background for the present study is multifaceted: research about school improvement, research about innovation, research about pedagogical practices (especially the collaborative knowledge creation traditions) and studies about digital technologies in education.

The connection to societal goals is essential for a school; it forms the external structure and resources for schools—which certainly have a strong impact (e.g. Ranson et al. 2005 )—but the responsibility for improving an individual school from the inside rests with the principal and the teachers. For this reason, the focus in the present study is on the elements and practices inside individual schools, bearing in mind the external factors and stakeholders. The reason for leaving the external administration outside the approach of the study is pragmatic: we want to create a model for schools for their own use, to reflect and improve those practices that they are able to change themselves. An individual school can seldom affect upper-level administrative decisions, but schools always possess some autonomy to make changes in the work of teachers and pupils. As Lemke ( 2001 ) emphasised, educational researchers should be explicit about the level of phenomena and the primary unit of analysis that the investigation is focusing on, but also be aware of the influence of the phenomena at upper and lower levels (e.g. municipal-level administrative decisions or individual teachers’ personal motives). Leclerc et al. ( 2012 ) investigated individual principals and teachers and made school-level conclusions based on these data. This was similar to work by Peck et al. ( 2009 ) when they were investigating innovations in schools. The present study focuses on classroom and school-level practices by interviewing individuals (teachers and principals), observing teaching practices and by conducting surveys for teachers and pupils. We presuppose that there is a strong and essential interaction between the different levels; this is a major starting point of our study.

In the following section, we first describe how the study relates to previous research approaches and then introduce the innovative digital school (IDI school) model: its basic elements and their connection with previous research. The framework has been applied in our study to examine schools. In the empirical section, the application of the model has been examined through case studies from three comprehensive schools.

Review of relevant previous research approaches for developing the model

Research on school improvement and change.

School improvement is aimed at improving student outcomes, wherever the change takes place (Creemers and Reezigt 2005 ). The large body of research about school improvement is one of the cornerstones of understanding the structures and practices of schools, such as leadership practices, teachers’ professional collaboration or pedagogical practices. Studies about school improvement have indicated how schools have benefited from restructuring their common practices, such as teachers’ tasks, activities and learning practices, leadership practices and the ways pedagogical methods are organised, in order to meet the developmental challenges (Crook et al. 2010 ; Harris 2002b ; OECD 2015 ). The elements of consensus about the vision (in vision of the school) and shared leadership (in leadership) are based on the studies presented here.

The school improvement movement and related research are strongly connected to educational systems and the policy-based and societal goals of education. Countries differ in their goals and views about school improvement, and the means for improving education can even be contradictory—leading also to quite different results (Hargreaves 2011 ; OECD 2014 2015 ). In countries such as the UK, the approach has been hierarchical top-down, whereas in the Nordic countries, the emphasis is on democracy, meaning the goal is to give schools and teachers responsibility for the improvement (Sahlberg 2011 ; Wrigley 2003 ). The elements of practices of the teaching society are based on the approach of teachers’ responsibility for the school improvement.

Researchers have defined some necessary characteristics for a school as a learning organisation (Senge et al. 1994 ). These are mutual trust and willingness to engage in open communication by the participants (Creemers and Reezigt 2005 ; Harris 2002b ; Leclerc et al. 2012 ; Senge et al. 1994 ); teachers’ shared values and visions, which focus on student learning (Leclerc et al. 2012 ); and collaborative knowledge-sharing as a tool for continuous growth of both teachers and schools. Knowledge sharing is a fundamental transformation of the teaching profession itself and is a route for creating collaborative cultures (Fullan 2001 ; Leclerc et al. 2012 ; Pedder and MacBeath 2008 ). Furthermore, staff members have opportunities to influence the school’s activities and policies (Harris 2002b ; Newmann et al. 2000 ), teacher collaboration is further supported by practical arrangements such as allocating time for teacher collaboration and teachers assume collective responsibility for attaining goals (Creemers and Reezigt 2005 ; Leclerc et al. 2012 ; Newmann et al. 2000 ). The elements of practices of the teaching community and school-level knowledge practices are based on the studies presented here.

For school improvement, the role of the school principal is essential. The principal manages the processes, motivates, organises and involves the staff in improvement, shares values for creating and supporting common visions (DuFour and Mattos 2013 ; Harris 2002a ) and understands teachers’ learning as a vehicle for the school’s continuous improvement (Earley 2010 ). Leadership affects the atmosphere for collaboration and experimentation (Wong and Li 2011 ). School leadership is best understood as a distributed practice, stretched over the school’s social and situational contexts, which is also beneficial for teachers (Facer 2012 ; OECD 2015 ; Spillane et al. 2004 ). It is an interactive process to build social capacity and trust, and to support networking (Harris 2002a ; Leclerc et al. 2012 ; Resnick and Spillane 2006 ). A challenge for a principal as an educational leader is the requirement for networking with other principals, administrators and other external stakeholders, which provides new perspectives and promotes the creation of effective and sustainable improvement (Hargreaves and Fink 2003 ; Harris 2010 ). The elements of leadership are based on the studies presented here.

In addition to research on school improvement, the research on knowledge work gives essential inspiration on how to view schools as organisations. Brown and Duguid ( 2001 ) emphasised practices and their travelling within an organisation and through sub-cultures. This sharing and collaborative creation of knowledge and practices is realised via boundary objects, such as common ways of working or shared objects to be developed. Brown and Duguid were investigating business firms, but schools are also knowledge work organisations. The elements of development practices (in practices of the teaching community) and common knowledge practices with technology (in school-level knowledge practices) are based on the ideas of Brown and Duguid.

Research on innovation applied in school context

Research concerning innovation provides essential added value to understanding the improvement of pedagogical practices. There are various definitions of innovation, differing between the level of focus and the novelty of the innovation (OECD 2010 , 2014 ). Some definitions regard only fundamentally new change as innovation, some also accept inclusion of issues that are novel in the context of the users. Messmann and Mulder ( 2011 ) defined an innovation as follows: ‘products or processes that are new and applicable for a certain individual, group or organisation and that are useful for the same or a different individual, group or organization’ (p. 66). This definition is close to the approach adopted in the present study. The emergence, acceptance and distribution of innovations that focus on the connection between individuals and organisations are especially important when answering the question about how educational innovations are adopted and what are the conditions for their dissemination.

An educational innovation succeeds or fails with the teachers who shape it (Lieberman and Pointer Mace 2008 ). In every significant change, the locus of innovations in practice could be traced to insights and initiatives of individuals, and collective negotiations and actions through which the changes have been achieved (Peck et al. 2009 ). Messmann and Mulder ( 2011 ) found in their study that the most powerful processes of learning and innovation took place in informal professional and personal relationships and in teachers’ communities. Teachers were motivated to work for change, and their positive individual image was framed by the experience of social support by colleagues and the supervisor as well as a stimulating climate for innovation. This also created a social norm that innovative work was appreciated. Several matters facilitated innovative work behaviour: competence, impact, responsibility for change, motivation for change, supervisor’s support, participative safety, supportive atmosphere and job complexity (see also Kunnari and Ilomäki 2016 ). Furthermore, in studies of teachers’ learning in innovation projects, experiments in practice and teacher learning go hand in hand (Bakkenes et al. 2010 ; Ilomäki et al. 2017 ). According to Bakkenes et al. ( 2010 ), informal learning brought fewer positive results than organised learning, especially reciprocal working with a peer or in a collaborative project team. Pedder and MacBeath ( 2008 ) argued that for schools (in the UK), the challenge appears to be in reasserting the values of learning, risk-taking, critical introspection, experimentation and innovation at all levels of the school organisation, and putting these into practice. Preconditions for innovation in organisations resemble the characteristics of learning communities: supporting teachers’ competence, autonomy and collegiality motivate teachers to change their teaching approaches (Lam et al. 2010 ; OECD 2015 ).

The elements of vision of the school and pedagogical collaboration and sharing of expertise and development practices (in practices of the teaching community) are based on the studies presented here.

Technology adoption as an innovation in school

The expectations about rapid acceptance and implementation of digital technology into educational practices have not been fulfilled (EU 2013 ), although some promising results indicate the connection between new pedagogical practices (= less teacher-centred) and the use of digital technology (Donnelly et al. 2011 ; Overbay et al. 2010 ; OECD 2014 ). In schools, technology is often still used for prevailing teaching methods, such as information sharing, or doing simple exercises, rather than for promoting collaborative or creative activities, solving complex problems or improving students’ digital competence (Livingstone 2012 ; OECD 2010 ).

Two alternative explanations for transforming educational practices associated with ICT have been suggested (Cuban et al. 2001 ; Twining et al. 2013 ): The first is a ‘slow revolution’ and support for existing practices, in which small changes accumulate over time and create a slow-motion transformation towards new ways of working. Only routines are replaced, and no changes are made in learning content or pedagogical practices. This explanation is anchored to the notion of a time lag between the invention of new technology, the adoption of innovations and the slow spread of its virtues through the general population. According to this explanation, the adoption of technology is an inevitable result which will come about anyway. The second explanation, ‘active transformation’ tries to account for the sustaining of teacher-centred practices: teachers and school make plans and decide how technology should be implemented in how best to answer to the specific challenges the school has. The curriculum content and/or processes will be changed, and these are changes that could not have taken place without digital technology.

There is a large body of studies about how digital technology has been implemented in education; e.g. what resources schools, teachers and students have; how much digital technology is used in classrooms; and what practices digital technology is used for (OECD 2010 , 2011 , 2014 , 2015 ). First, it is essential that teachers and students have the opportunity to learn to use digital technology, and second, that they have meaningful and necessary resources to use it. Teachers’ digital competence, related to pedagogical understanding of using technology in education, is the corner stone of supporting students’ digital competence (Hakkarainen et al. 2000 , 2001 ). The elements of pedagogical practices and digital resources are based on the studies presented here.

Research on learning as knowledge creation

Those theoretical approaches emphasising learning as collaborative knowledge creation (Bereiter 2002 ; Paavola and Hakkarainen 2005 ; Hong and Sullivan 2009 ) have strongly influenced our views concerning the pedagogical development in schools through digital technologies. According to these approaches, teaching should primarily promote knowledge innovation and collective advancement of shared knowledge products (Scardamalia and Bereiter 2006 ; Hong and Sullivan 2009 ). Arguments for these approaches are the requirement to promote adaptive expertise, collaboration skills and capabilities to work creatively with knowledge, which are the competencies needed in education, working life and society in general. Recent discussions concerning the learning of ‘21st Century Skills’ have similarities with these ideas: school learning should focus more on supporting the development of the relevant competencies that are needed to cope with the challenges of the unknown future, instead of concentrating on content learning and routine tasks (Ananiadou and Claro 2009 ; Bell 2010 ).

Features of pedagogical practices representing the collaborative knowledge creation approach include learners’ engagement, goal-oriented production of knowledge objects for relevant purpose, collective efforts and resources and versatile use of modern technologies (Robin 2008 ; Bell 2010 ; Scardamalia and Bereiter 2006 ; Tan and McWilliam 2009 ). The role of technological applications in such practices is often to provide flexible tools for communication and networking, co-authoring of shared knowledge products and managing joint working processes (Lakkala et al. 2009 ). The elements of pedagogical practices are based on the studies presented in the two previous chapters.

Scardamalia and Bereiter ( 1999 ) suggested that to help students to succeed in the knowledge society, schools should become knowledge-building organisations, in which students are members, not clients. Their suggestions are in line with the ideas of learning as knowledge creation (in which tradition they have a profound contribution). The element of pupils’ involvement (in school-level knowledge practices) is based on the this approach.

The elements of innovative digital school

Based on previous research approaches reviewed above and our own studies (Ilomäki and Lakkala 2011 ; Lakkala and Ilomäki 2013 ), we created the innovative digital school (IDI school) model for investigating whether schools use digital technology in an innovative way to improve pedagogical and working practices. In developing the model, we have emphasised leaning on relevant previous research approaches to avoid criticisms about creating a model based on occasional empirical findings, which leads to a quasi-theoretical model (Wikeley et al. 2005 ). However, we have also used a data-driven approach with extensive data from everyday practices of schools in order to avoid the gap between the theoretical model and ordinary practices in the field. Such data-driven elements, also acknowledged somewhat by research, are especially elements in school-level practices: physical premises (Cleveland and Fisher 2014 ; Gislason 2010 ) and pupils’ involvement in school level activities (Katsenou et al. 2015 ; Svanbjörnsdóttir et al. 2016 ). Table  1 presents the relationship between the elements of IDI School model with relevant research approaches, the main conclusions of previous studies related to the elements of our model and the main references.

The elements are presented in visual form in Fig.  1 .

The innovative digital school model: elements of a school regarded as relevant for developing schools through digital technology

Aims and research questions of the study

The reason for developing the IDI school model was to offer a framework for research but also to provide a research-based model for schools to reflect on, understand and improve their own practices to achieve sustainable pedagogical improvements with the help of digital technologies. There is a need for research-based, practice-oriented methods that help schools and teachers themselves reflect and investigate their own practices and thus improve them (Angelides et al. 2004 ). The aim of the present study was to examine how the model can be used to evaluate the existing practices of the schools used as examples and to make recommendations for improving the practices. The following research questions were constructed:

How does the innovative digital school model help to identify good practices and points for improvement in using digital technology for school change in the example schools?

How does the model reveal the essential differences in using digital technology for school change between the example schools?

The study is an explanatory multiple case study for explaining how the theoretical model used supports the description of the cases and how the cases differed from each other (Yin 2014 ). The purpose is to increase understanding of the cases (Merriam 1998 ) and to create analytic generalisations for other cases and situations (Yin 2014 ). The study relies on holistic data collection strategies, following the mixed methods approach (Johnson and Onwuegbuzie 2004 ). The use of several approaches and methods leads to better understanding of the objects of investigation and mixing various methods gives a more accurate picture of what is going on, while different methods help to answer slightly different questions (Todd et al. 2004 ). They provide an opportunity to present a greater diversity of views (Teddle and Tashakkori 2003 ) and help us to understand complex phenomena (Newmann et al. 2000 ). In the study, the mixed methods followed the triangulation design model, the variant of multilevel research (Creswell and Plano Clark 2007 ) in which different methods are used to address different levels within the system (school) and the findings are merged into one overall interpretation.

Three basic education schools (grades 1–9) participated in the study. They all are located in the metropolitan area of Helsinki. The city’s education department is the local organiser of education and in principle; all schools have equal access to resources. The local administration organises the technical resources (network connections, computers and other digital tools, the virtual learning environment and other applications). The city has also provided good opportunities for in-service training about digital technology. However, the schools also have some capacity to acquire resources of their own choice, such as by participating in national development projects, or in voluntary teacher training events. All teachers have a university degree and they are qualified teachers.

All the schools are located in suburbs.

School A is located in a residential area of single-family houses. In the area, the unemployment rate was 4.8%, the proportion of inhabitants with a higher education background was 24.5% of the total, the number of inhabitants with a foreign background was 3.6% and the income per residence was €87,645 (Tikkanen and Selander 2014 ). The curriculum of the school emphasises environmental education and sustainable development. It is also the member of a programme which aims to reduce bullying. There were 360 pupils at school A in 2015.

School B is located in an area of small houses and blocks of flats. In the area, the unemployment rate was 7.1%, the number of inhabitants with a higher education background was 11.9%, the number of inhabitants with a foreign background was 9.9% and the income per residence was €57,335 (Tikkanen and Selander 2014 ). The school has no emphasis on any one subject; it aims to be a safe local school. There were 640 pupils at school B in 2015.

School C is located in an area of mainly blocks of flats. In the area, the unemployment rate was 15.1%, the number of inhabitants with a higher education background was 3.2%, the number of inhabitants with a foreign background was 23% and the income per residence was €32,182 (Tikkanen and Selander 2014 ). The school emphasises creativity and handicrafts, and it has two special classes emphasising digital technology from 3rd to 9th grade. The school has several special education classes, and it has organised preparatory teaching for immigrant pupils. There were 375 pupils in the school in 2015.

Participants

Participants of the study were principals (one from each school), teachers with permanent positions and 9th grade pupils. Principals and teachers were not asked for their age; the mean of pupils’ age varied from 15.3 to 15.6 between schools. Table  2 shows the number of participants and their gender.

The response rates to the survey of teachers and students at each school varied as described in Table 2 . Schools and their principals, teachers and pupils participated voluntarily in the study. Permission to participate in the study was sought from parents of the pupils concerning surveys and the videotaping of lessons.

Measures and data collection

From each school, the following data were collected:

Lesson observations

Five subject teachers using digital technology in teaching were recruited from each school for classroom observations and interviews. The lessons in which digital technology was somehow used by the teacher or pupils were chosen for observation. A pre-planned observation sheet of phenomena to be observed was used; the focus was on classroom practices, such as the nature of assignments, pupils’ activities in completing the assignments, the use of digital technology, pupils’ and teachers’ interaction regarding the assignment and technology as well as the focus of the teacher’s guidance. The teachers of the lessons that were observed were interviewed briefly before and after each lesson, concerning their observation about the goals and practices of the lesson. The lessons and the short interviews were videotaped; the videos were used to complement written observation notes. In Table  3 is a list of the lessons observed.

The principal and five teachers at each the school were interviewed using a semi-structured interview. The interviews focussed on the following themes: the use of digital technology in teaching, the school’s vision, the principal’s professional competence and its development, teachers’ collaboration practices and school community and the role of the principal. The principal was also asked about leadership issues. The interviews lasted about 1 h.

Data about the use of digital technologies were collected through questionnaires from pupils and teachers. Both questionnaires were based on questionnaires developed in previous studies (Hakkarainen et al. 2000 ; Hakkarainen et al. 2001 ), and for this study, they were modified to take into account recent technological development (e.g. questions about the use of Internet were added).

The teacher questionnaire was sent to all teachers with permanent positions at the schools. It consisted of questions concerning the following topics:

Digital competence: 17 Likert-type statements (1 = not at all, 5 = very well); e.g. How well do you manage spread sheet applications , e.g. Excel

The use of digital technology: 41 statements concerning the use at school and at home, the use of various Internet services, the use of various digital applications with pupils (answer options were not at all—seldom—monthly—weekly—daily)

The need for support and training in using technology: Four Likert-type statements (1 = completely inadequate, 7 = completely adequate)

The usefulness of digital technology in some pedagogical practices: 20 Likert-type statements (1 = totally useless, 7 = totally useful); e.g. Small - scale project works , e.g. information search for understanding a topic .

The pupil questionnaire was sent to 9th grade pupils. The questionnaire consisted of questions concerning the following topics:

Digital competence: 17 Likert-type statements (1 = not at all, 5 = very well)

The use of digital technology: 33 statements concerning the use at school and at home, the use of various Internet services, the use of various digital applications at school (answer options were not at all—seldom—monthly—weekly—daily)

In which subjects is ICT used at school, also the frequency: Seven statements concerning school subjects (answer options were not at all—seldom—monthly—weekly—daily)

Data analysis

Each type of data was first analysed separately as described below.

Observation notes and related short interviews were used to categorise the pedagogical approach of each lesson. The classification was created by the researchers through abductive use of theory-informed and data-grounded analysis on the data (Timmermans and Tavory 2012 ). The pedagogical infrastructure framework (Lakkala and Ilomäki 2015 ) was applied to define the elements examined in the practices: technical structures (role and organisation of technology use), social structures (role and nature of collaboration), epistemic structures (practices of using and creating knowledge) and cognitive structures (cognitive challenge of tasks, support for pupils’ self-regulation and metaskills). Three categories were created for defining the prevailing pedagogical approach of each lesson:

Structured content learning : Technology was used for teacher presentations or structured practicing (e.g. drill-and-practice tasks), individual tasks, focus on learning factual and declarative knowledge, low cognitive challenge and no explicit attention to metacognitive aspects of working

Learner - centred activating tasks : Technology was used for information seeking or minor authoring tasks (e.g. short essays), mainly individual tasks but some sharing between pupils, small-scale knowledge production, mid-level cognitive challenge, but no explicit attention to metacognitive aspects of working

Collaborative knowledge creation : Versatile use of technical applications for knowledge creation (e.g. reports), working mainly based on pair or group work, open-ended task lasting more than one lesson, high cognitive challenge and modelling of working strategies

The interviews were transcribed verbatim and then analysed following a theory-driven content analysis, using Atlas.ti software (version 7.1.5). The elements of the IDI school model (see Fig. 1 ) were used as categories to define which sections in each interview described which phenomenon of the school practices. The interview questions were designed to address the elements of the model, but in the analysis, we also considered that an answer referring to any of the elements might emerge under any question. In constructing the case descriptions of schools, the coding in Atlas.ti was used to extract all interview excerpts from an individual school concerning a certain school model element, in order to make the judgement and description of the nature and level of practices in that school.

Teacher and pupil surveys

The data were analysed with IBM SPSS 22. The means of items were compared using one-way ANOVA and Tamhane’s T2 post hoc tests.

Integration of the results from individual data sources

The dimensions and levels of each sub-element were constructed descriptively by combining the analysis results of separate data sets. The analysis was of iterative explanation building (Yin 2014 ): The analysis criteria, based on the IDI school model and described above, were first compared with the empirical evidence from the first case, and then revised and compared with the evidence from the other cases.

The dimensions of each phenomenon (elements of the IDI school model; see Fig. 1 ) and the data produced information about each element. Each element was scored in the following way: 1 (low level), 2 (average level) and 3 (high level). The scores were based on the analysis of all data sources, and the researchers together decided the scoring. In addition, the scores of the main elements were constructed as the means of the sub-elements. In Appendix , the analysis framework of the phenomena and the data is presented.

The results are first presented in the order of data and data analysis; the integration of the results is presented after that.

Practices at each school, according to the interviews and classroom observations

The practices are presented following the order of the elements of the IDI School model in Table 1 .

Visions concerning digital technology related mainly to technical skills and resources. The visions were emerging; most teachers shared them, but the visions were not fully clear in teachers’ minds. The school had several common development projects going on and the importance of development activities was emphasised in the interviews.

Shared leadership came true in systematically organised teacher teams, which included all teachers, and the active role of the executive team. The principal’s networking included basic collaboration inside school and with municipal school administrators and parents. The principal acted as an enabler of teachers’ development efforts (e.g., organising resources for training), but also as the promoter of new development initiatives.

Teachers had various established collaboration practices, such as pedagogical workshops, co-teaching between teachers or sharing of teaching plans and materials through virtual forums. The school had multiple development practices, e.g. national and international projects, or periodic joint reflection of teaching. The teachers interviewed actively collaborated with colleagues at the same school, but they did not do much networking outside the school.

Teachers’ perceptions of digital technology in education focussed on aspects related to motivation, increased variability in methods or increased student-centredness and learning effectiveness, but there were few mentions about collaborative or creative activities. The usage of digital tools in teaching included a range of methods, from drill-and-practice tasks to challenging long-term project work. Three of the five lessons observed represented collaborative knowledge creation practices; some teachers appeared to use advanced pedagogical methods with digital technology.

Plans for developing common school-level practices, e.g. about media usage and study practices, had been started. A joint Media Week was organised annually. A virtual learning platform was established as an information channel for teachers, and its usage with pupils was actively promoted. Teachers’ experience of the school premises was that they were quite flexible, but some teachers mentioned the lack of a computer laboratory and the distribution of computers as problems. Pupils were involved in school-level activities in various ways; e.g. the pupils’ media team was responsible for documenting school events, and a training event in which pupils guided teachers to use social media had been organised. School-level networking was based on the activity of some teachers and their classes participated in national and international projects.

Most interviewees thought that too few computers were available for teaching, and that login in the laptops took too much time in lessons. The teachers had common plans about which digital skills to teach to pupils in each subject and grade. Digitally more-competent teachers had organised training sessions for less-competent colleagues about the central applications, and teachers were encouraged to participate in in-service courses organised by the city.

Most of the teachers interviewed shared the opinion that there was no explicit vision in the school about digital technology. Some interviewees mentioned ensuring that pupils had good basic digital skills, whilst others emphasised the improvement in teachers’ digital competence, or flexible digital resources. Attitudes towards development efforts were positive, and some projects with other schools were going on, and there were plans for developing the school’s practices. However, the development interests appeared to be dependent on the motivation of individual teachers.

The teachers were divided into three administrative teams, each of which was allocated tasks based on needs; the teams had some responsibility of their own. The principal had established collaboration with the vice principals, the executive team and the principals of nearby schools, but there were no other explicit networks. The principal was described positively: the creator of a positive atmosphere, a pedagogical leader and a provider of resources for professional development.

Pedagogical collaboration included team discussions, some co-teaching practices, sharing of materials and informal discussions; it was mainly based on subject-specific groups and spontaneous and voluntary participation. The school had one common development programme (about learning to learn skills), but otherwise, development efforts included participation in training events and projects depended on the teachers’ own initiative. Two teachers mentioned an external organisation as a point of contact, but otherwise, networking included conventional partners: the city’s teacher training unit, teachers’ friends or parents. One teacher had no collaborators outside school.

Teachers’ pedagogical perceptions about digital technology included benefits concerning increased motivation, usage as a presentation tool, variation in methods and a useful writing tool. None of the teachers explicitly mentioned more challenging project- or inquiry-based methods or collaborative learning, but two of the lessons that were observed represented such practices.

Communication and sharing of materials among teachers was organised through web-applications, but otherwise no common knowledge practices were mentioned at the school, nor between teachers or pupils. Also, ICT courses for pupils were voluntary. Some teachers mentioned old-fashioned, inflexible premises and computer laboratories as a weakness; the problem was visible also in the lesson observations. One teacher had used older pupils as guides for younger pupils in technology use; otherwise, nobody described any practices for involving pupils in school-level activities. The interviews did not reveal any established school-level networks besides neighbouring schools participating in a common project.

Concerning the utility of digital resources, the teachers were not satisfied with the fixed computer laboratories and the shortage of equipment, especially mobile tools (like tablets). They were satisfied with the technical support but did not mention any examples of pedagogical support.

Digital visions appeared not to be shared visions; the teachers interviewed mentioned basic digital skills, increasing technology use and more versatile practices, or explicitly said that they were unaware what the vision is. The experience of the atmosphere was as supportive of development efforts, and the school participated in various national and international projects.

Leadership was shared through subject-based and task-based teams, and some teachers had taken the responsibility for development projects. The principal had active collaboration with local institutions at various educational levels, and she had taken an active role in renewing common practices.

The teachers had many collaboration practices: working in teams or projects, informal discussions, sharing of ideas and materials and interdisciplinary co-teaching. The interviewees mentioned development practices such as projects and training sessions, but participation in them happened only occasionally and participation was voluntary, depending on the teacher. The teachers had networks with various stakeholders in institutions related to their subject, e.g. the church, music college or police.

Teachers’ perceptions about technology in education included conventional issues, such as individualised teaching, up-to-date information sources or useful tools for pupils’ work, but in general, teachers’ opinions were very positive. The pedagogical practices that were mentioned with technology were versatile but not very innovative, like individual knowledge production or rehearsal of content. None of the lessons that were observed included challenging collaborative knowledge creation activities.

The teachers had made common plans about the teaching of ICT and media communication to different grades of students, and web-applications were used for information sharing between teachers. Other common knowledge practices were not mentioned in the interviews. Some teachers experienced old, inflexible school premises as a challenge for advancing digitalisation, but a new room for project learning was under construction. Pupils’ involvement in school-level responsibilities and activities was not mentioned. The school had collaboration arrangements with external organisations through multiple national and international development projects.

The utility of technical resources was experienced as being at quite a good level, but the heterogeneity of teachers’ digital competence was mentioned as a challenge. Teachers had good opportunities to participate in courses organised by the city, and there had been some internal training events, but the emphasis had been on technical skills, not on pedagogical issues.

Results of questionnaires with teachers and pupils

The results are presented in the order of the elements of the IDI school model shown in Table 1 .

Results of the teacher questionnaire

Perceptions of using digital technology in education.

Teachers were asked about the usefulness of digital technology in various pedagogical assignments. Table  4 shows the means, standard deviations (SDs) of teachers’ perceptions and the p value of statistical differences.

There were statistically significant differences in the following perceptions of the usefulness of digital technology: At school A, teachers’ evaluation scores were statistically significantly lower than the scores of teachers at the other schools in the following pedagogical practices: small-scale project work F (2,54) = 12.841, p  = .000; practicing skills F (2,54) = 10,866, p  = .000; small-scale products (like writings during one lesson) F (2,54) = 12.256, p  = .000; net discussions related to the topic F (2,54) = 6.412, p  = .003; and presenting information and support for illustration F (2,54) = 12.148, p  = .000. Tamhane’s T2 post-hoc comparisons were used to calculate the differences between the schools.

Pedagogical practices with digital technology

Teachers were asked about the use of various digital applications and Internet services in their own teaching; there were no statistically significant differences between schools in how much they reported using various applications and the Internet.

Teachers were also asked about using digital technology in various pedagogical practices. In Table  5 , the means and SDs of all practices are presented. There were a few statistically significant differences in the reported use of digital technology.

The statistically significant differences were found in the following items: small-scale projects F (2,54) = 13.233, practicing skills, F (2,54) = 10.988, p  = .000; small-scale products (like writings) F (2,54) = 9.084, p  = .000; and information presenting and support for illustration F (2,54) = 5.934, p  = .005. Tamhane’s T2 post-hoc comparisons were used for calculating the differences between the schools.

Teachers’ digital competence

The results showed, first, that there were no statistically significant differences between schools in teachers’ self-evaluated digital competence, and that teachers evaluated their competence in basic digital application as being quite high (scale 1–5), such as using email (mean 4.7), searching for information on the Internet (mean 4.7), word processing (mean 4.4), loading files from the Internet (mean 4.2) and using the digital learning environment (mean 3.8). These formed a group of basic digital competence. The second group of applications were using spreadsheets (mean 3.2), digital image processing (mean 3.1), graphics (mean 2.9) and social forums (mean 2.9). The lowest means were in virtual meeting tools (mean 2.3), creating www-pages (mean 2.3), publishing tools (mean 2.2), writing a blog (mean 2.2), publishing www-pages (mean 2.0), producing information to wiki (mean 1.9), voice and music (mean 1.9) and programming (mean 1.4).

Pedagogical and technological training and support

Figure  2 shows the means of teachers’ need for support and training for using digital technology.

Teachers’ need for support and training of digital technology

The evaluation of teachers at school A was that they needed both technical and pedagogical training less than teachers at the two other schools, and there was a statistically significant difference between schools A and B in need for technical training: F (2,54) = 9.993, p  = .000; and in need for pedagogical training: F (2,54) = 12.719, p  = .000, indicated with * in Fig.  2 .

Results of the pupil questionnaire

Pupils were asked which applications they use at school. In Table  6 , the means and SDs of those applications in which there were statistically significant differences between the schools are described.

The statistical significance of differences in means between the pupils of schools was analysed by using one-way ANOVA. The analysis indicated statistically significant differences in the means in the following items: using word processing: F (2,172) = 18.909, p  = .000; using spreadsheets: F (2,172) = 16.686, p  = .000; using email: F (2,172) = 38.490, p  = .000; using social forums: F (2,172) = 9.940, p  = .000; publishing in a web blog: F (2,172) = 22.253, p  = .000; using learning environments: F (2,172) = 17.316, p  = .000; publish pictures, texts or reports: F (2,172) = 5.811, p  = .004; develop my thoughts about the topic in a collaborative discussion: F (2,172) = 14.735, p  = .000; teacher guidance through the net for independent learning: F (2,172) = 9.678, p  = .000; freedom to surf in the Internet when assignments are done: F (2,172) = 15.361, p  = .000; and contact with pupils in other schools via email or the Internet: F (2,172) = 8.367, p  = .000; information search from the Internet: F (2,172) = 22.464, p  = .000; publishing in the Internet: F (2,172) = 7.281, p  = .001. Tamhane’s T2 post-hoc comparisons were used for calculating the differences between the schools.

There was also a difference in the statement about the use of ICT during leisure time for school work, in which pupils at school A had higher scores than pupils at the other schools. The statistically significant differences were between school A ( M  = 3.7, SD = .553) and schools B ( M  = 2.3, SD = .833) and C ( M  = 2.2, SD .956) ( F (2,172) = 55.259, p  = .000).

Pupils’ digital competence

Pupils at all three schools liked to use ICT at school, and there were no statistically significant differences concerning the statements measuring this: the use of ICT is easy ( M  = 4.2, SD = 1.034), the use of ICT makes learning more interesting ( M  = 3.9, SD = 1.111) and pupils would like to use ICT more at school ( M  = 3.8, SD = 1.192). Furthermore, there were no statistically significant differences in the use of technology at home and during leisure time.

Pupils also evaluated their competence in using various digital applications. The statistically significant differences in means and SDs between the pupils from the three schools are described in Table  7 .

The differences were analysed by using one-way ANOVA. No differences were found in applications which tend to be less used in schools, such as digital image processing, publishing tools, voice and music applications or programming. The analysis indicated statistically significant differences in means between pupils of participating schools in the following items: word processing F (2,172) = 13.287, p  = .000; spreadsheets F (2,172) = 15.092, p  = .000; email F (2,172) = 10.002, p  = .000; information search from the Internet F (2,172) = 6.492, p  = .002; writing a web blog, F (2,172) = 9.441, p  = .000; and using virtual learning environments F (2,172) = 9.042, p  = .000. Tamhane’s T2 post-hoc comparisons were used for calculating the differences between the schools.

Overview of the level of practices in the schools

In Table  8 , the results of the separate data sets have been integrated and scored for each school.

The scores show differences between schools: schools A and C are ‘strong’ schools in several major elements. At school A, digital resources are at an especially high level, and in general, school-level working practices are at a high level. At school C, leadership practices and teaching community practices are at a high level. School B has the lowest scores in every major element. In the ‘ Discussion ’ section, we will discuss about the differences more in detail.

In the study, we investigated the practices at three schools based on six elements defined in the innovative digital school model. We aimed to find out, first, if those elements could help in defining good practices and suggestions for improvement for developing the schools with digital technology; and second, if the model revealed essential differences between the schools.

Good practices and points for improvement in the example schools

In order to answer the first research question about how the IDI school model helps to identify good practices and points to be improved in using digital technology for school change, we describe the practices of each school separately.

Among the characteristics of school A were advanced and established practices in shared leadership, practices of the teaching community, advanced pedagogical practices with technology and school-level knowledge practices, including involvement of pupils and systematic promotion of their digital competence through pedagogical activities. However, shared visions about digital technology were only emerging, teachers’ digital competence was only average and the perceptions in the pedagogical usage of technology had considerable variety between teachers, although there were examples of inspiring pedagogical methods. Teachers did not report needing support for using technology which probably indicates both quite a good level of digital competence and well-organised support practices in the school. Pupils’ self-reported digital competence was at a high level especially concerning basic applications. Pupils reported using technology quite often during leisure time for school-related activities, and at school for various basic activities, but also for collaboration and networking. Based on the results, the following suggestions for improvements can be made for school A: (1) the teaching staff should focus on crystallising and sharing the school’s visions in using digital technology as the basis for further development (elements A1 and A2); (2) teachers should share their pedagogical ideas and experiments, e.g. in organised meetings and workshops (elements C1 and C2); and (3) teachers should develop their digital competence, such as by making use of the training resources made available by the city and by organising school-level small-scale training (elements F2 and F4).

School B had some shared leadership practices and the principal was appreciated, but otherwise the school was not very advanced in any of the measures. Attitudes towards development efforts were positive, but established practices were lacking. There were teachers who collaborated with each other, participated in development projects and used digital technology in teaching in advanced ways, but activity was based on teachers’ own initiative and voluntariness. Especially at the school level, knowledge practices were minimal, both concerning the promotion of pupils’ involvement and digital competence, and school-level networking. Teachers at the school reported needing both technical and pedagogical support in using digital technology. For school B, based on the results, the following suggestions for improvements can be made: (1) it is important to create a common vision for developing the use of digital technology (element A1) and promote development orientation among teachers (element A3). (2) The principal and the management team should create and organise systematic common practices to carry out improvements in all developmental areas (elements in C). (3) The digital resources should be evaluated and developed (all elements in F) and especially teachers’ digital competence should be improved (elements F3 and F4).

School C represents a school with high-level leadership practices, and a strong collaboration culture both inside the school and in the active external networking of both the principal, teachers and the whole school. The school had a strong development orientation in general, but it had not yet become true in the school-level knowledge practices, digital resources or advanced practices of using technology in teaching. School C has much potential for improvement, and based on the results, the following suggestions for improvements can be made: (1) the usage of digital technology for school improvement should be more deliberate through agreements of shared visions (elements A1 and A2); (2) the school should create systematic development of pedagogical and knowledge practices (elements D and E); and (3) all pupils’ and teachers’ digital competence should be improved, both with pedagogical practices (element D2) and training and support (elements F2, F3 and F4).

Differences between the schools investigated

To answer the second research question about how the model reveals essential differences in digital technology for school change, we compared the practices of schools by summarising the results of data analyses.

The results of the study indicate that there were some clear differences between the schools, although they also had a lot in common, especially in the principal’s role and teachers’ digital competence; common characteristics might be a result of common policies and practices of the city in these issues. Such elements, which are strongly dependent on school-level decisions, differed between the schools. Included here are teachers’ pedagogical practices and school community’s practices, including sharing of vision-level decisions. According to previous studies (Vieluf et al. 2012 ; OECD 2014 ), shared community-level practices are central to sustainable school improvement, but currently they represent practices which are not yet widespread in schools and require extending the teachers’ professional role beyond only taking responsibility for their own teaching in classrooms.

A clear difference between the three schools was in the presence or absence of practices involving pupils in school-level activities. Only at school A had shared, established practices for pupil engagement at school-level been developed, such as responsible pupil teams (e.g. media and environment teams) or pupils as guides in using digital technology. Various participatory practices presume seeing pupils in an active role in the classroom or at school, not only as objects of teaching during lessons (Facer 2012 ; Kehoe 2015 ; Pereira et al. 2014 ).

Also, the nature of pedagogical practices with digital technology differed between schools. At school A, pupils reported using digital technology more than pupils at the other two schools, both in the classroom and at home for school-related activities. The use focused on general applications and pedagogically ‘advanced’ practices, such as using a virtual learning environment and collaborating via the web. These practices probably helped to improve pupils’ basic digital competence: the regular use of digital tools was an essential condition for competence learning (see also OECD 2011 ; Aesaert et al. 2015 ). Furthermore, classroom practices were most advanced at school A and a comparisons of the teachers’ survey answers between the schools indicated that teachers at school A used and believed less in teacher-centred practices with digital technology than teachers at school C.

The innovative digital school model was not developed primarily for detailed comparisons of differences between schools. A more useful approach is to examine school profiles: the shape of the profile demonstrates the emphasis on the practices inside a school, and the level of the profile elements helps each school to position its strengths and development needs compared with reference schools. Figure  3 presents the results of Table  9 in a visual form illustrating the profiles of the three schools investigated.

A summary of the scores of the three schools in the elements of the IDI school model

The profiles demonstrate the differences between the schools: school A has quite advanced practices in all elements; school C is high in school-level practices involving teachers and the principal, but only average in practices directly affecting pupils; and school B is least-developed in all elements, but highest-developed in leadership and digital resources. We propose that one reason for the differences between schools is the level of vision and how well it is shared among teacher community. Schools A and C had remarkably higher scores in the elements of goals and the vision compared with school B (although even schools A and C could improve on this). These results are in line with previous research according to which an explicated and shared vision is a key element in school improvement and change (see, e.g. Senge et al. 1994 ; Antinluoma et al. 2018). At school B, the vision and goals, pedagogical practices with digital technology and school-level knowledge practices were all at a low level, although the digital resources are almost the same as at school C. For benefitting from digital technology in improving pedagogy, collaborative visions and efforts especially focusing on that are needed (Laurillard 2008 ); technology does not change pedagogical practices per se, which describes the situation at school B. At both schools A and C, the elements related to vision, leadership and teacher community received good or even high scores, but school A was more advanced in pedagogical practices with technology. It seems that to develop high-level pedagogical practices with technology, deliberate effort is needed.

Conclusions

Validity of the innovative digital school model.

The two aims of the IDI school model, to reveal good practices and points for development, as well as to expose differences, were fulfilled, from which we interpret that analytic generalisation (Yin 2014 ) from the model is possible. With qualitative data (classroom observations and interviews), we were able to identify new and innovative practices in the school context, developed in the schools for their individual needs. The quantitative data supported the findings based on qualitative data. Innovative practices were found, especially at the school which was evaluated as being the most advanced in all elements. One of the schools was least-developed in all the measures investigated, and the third school was in between: it had a strong development culture generally, but the focus of the development work had not been on using digital technology as a vehicle for change. In the latter two schools, digital technology was taken into use by individual teachers and often without integrating pedagogy and technology.

The IDI school model as a framework for investigating differences worked particularly well for those elements which are mainly the responsibility for leadership inside a school (visions of the school, practices of teaching community and school-level knowledge practices); there were clear differences in these between the schools, especially according to the qualitative data. The three schools had differences even though they each follow the same curriculum, and the same detailed legislation. The teachers’ educational background is homogeneous, and the schools are located in the same city, which is responsible for providing the resources for all the city’s schools. The role of the city probably explains why there were no statistically significant differences between teachers’ self-estimated digital competence and the use of digital technology in general.

Results of the qualitative and quantitative data were somewhat contradictory in the use of digital technology in classrooms. In the teacher surveys, there were no statistically significant differences between schools, but there were in the pupil surveys. Our explanation is that pupils use technology in some lessons so much that it affects the overall experience, and that pupils in 9th grade use technology more than pupils in lower grades.

Another contradictory issue in the surveys was the result of pedagogical practices. The teachers participating in the observations and interviews were probably more interested in digital technology and their practices were more advanced than the practices reported in the survey by many more teachers. As Kivinen et al. ( 2016 ) suggested, the technology use of the majority of teachers might represent the use of technology per se, which leads to a pragmatic solution in which technology does not support a knowledge creation approach in learning but is used for practical experiments and learner-centred activities.

The schools that were examined are located in areas of different socioeconomic backgrounds. The results do not show differences based on the background, which probably indicates the homogeneity of Finnish schools. All schools receive the same resources from the city, and parents do not make financial contributions for the education. The school from the area of lowest socioeconomic status has participated in various projects during years, and this has promoted the capacity of the teaching staff. Teachers’ development orientation has supported the school to develop advanced practices regardless of challenging socioeconomic background of the pupils.

The results of the study proved that mixed methods are needed when investigating the practices of a whole school. Using only the survey data would not have revealed some of the central differences between the schools and would have given a quite narrow view of the situation at each school. For the qualitative data, it would not have informed about the use of digital technology and the competence in using it. Collecting qualitative data requires more resources than using only surveys. However, we experienced that our data collection model (five teacher interviews and lesson observations, a principal interview and a survey of teachers and highest grade of pupils) was a reasonably inexpensive and valid way to examine the practices of a school.

Practical implications

The IDI school model is an attempt to address the need for practice-oriented methods that help schools and teachers to reflect on their own practices and improve them (Angelides et al. 2004 ), and to narrow the gap between empirical research and practical school work (Wikeley et al. 2005 ), especially related to the change processes of implementing new digital technologies in education.

The IDI school model can be used in schools as a shared conceptual framework for collective reflection, discussion and strategy planning. We have already had some promising experiences about using it in the in-service training of teachers and principals. The model can also be applied to collect best-practice examples from different schools and disseminate them to other schools, or to make school visits and benchmarking of practices more systematic.

At the municipal and national level, educational administrators may have an interest in evaluating the status of using digital technology in schools. As our study witnessed, quantitative data have limitations in describing collaborative pedagogical and working practices. Qualitative methods are important, but there is a need for accessible methods for collecting data widely about the current state of art in schools. The methods, experiences and results of the present study can work as a starting point for developing scalable methods.

As a policy-level implication, we suggest that local and national school administration focus on schools as knowledge work organisations when aiming to improvements, such as to increase the quality of pedagogical and knowledge practices with digital technology in schools. We suggest that all elements of the innovative digital school model be considered, and that the start should be committing the staff to change, by creating shared visions and aims about pedagogical development through digital technology, and by supporting school-level practices including both pupils and teachers.

Future research

In the present study, we used data from three schools to examine the applicability and validity of the IDI school model for evaluating the development of schools through digital technology. All three schools were in the same city and had similar municipal resources for digital technology and in-service teacher training, which allowed differences to be revealed, especially in those practices that schools can influence individually in that context. In future research, it would be important to test the model with a larger collection of schools from different contexts (size, location, socioeconomic background, etc.) and from different countries and cultures, thus also confirming the validation of the model.

Another interesting line of research would be to conduct studies in which the development of the same schools was followed longitudinally. Such studies could include interventional aspects: the investigated schools would get feedback and support from researchers to develop their practices further, and new data would be collected after some period for evaluating the influence of deliberate development efforts.

In the future, schools will face even more challenges and requirements that the school community will have to answer. The best and most effective schools reflect their practices and constantly improve their ways of working. We believe that the innovative digital school model offers a tool for schools and for researchers involved in this work.

Change history

18 march 2019.

In the original publication of this article (Ilomäki & Lakkala, 2018) the appendix Table 9 in PDF is in wrong place due to typeset mistake, which should be at the end of the manuscript. The original PDF version has been corrected.

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Impacts of digital technologies on education and factors influencing schools' digital capacity and transformation: A literature review

Stella timotheou.

1 CYENS Center of Excellence & Cyprus University of Technology (Cyprus Interaction Lab), Cyprus, CYENS Center of Excellence & Cyprus University of Technology, Nicosia-Limassol, Cyprus

Ourania Miliou

Yiannis dimitriadis.

2 Universidad de Valladolid (UVA), Spain, Valladolid, Spain

Sara Villagrá Sobrino

Nikoleta giannoutsou, romina cachia.

3 JRC - Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, Seville, Spain

Alejandra Martínez Monés

Andri ioannou, associated data.

Data sharing not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.

Digital technologies have brought changes to the nature and scope of education and led education systems worldwide to adopt strategies and policies for ICT integration. The latter brought about issues regarding the quality of teaching and learning with ICTs, especially concerning the understanding, adaptation, and design of the education systems in accordance with current technological trends. These issues were emphasized during the recent COVID-19 pandemic that accelerated the use of digital technologies in education, generating questions regarding digitalization in schools. Specifically, many schools demonstrated a lack of experience and low digital capacity, which resulted in widening gaps, inequalities, and learning losses. Such results have engendered the need for schools to learn and build upon the experience to enhance their digital capacity and preparedness, increase their digitalization levels, and achieve a successful digital transformation. Given that the integration of digital technologies is a complex and continuous process that impacts different actors within the school ecosystem, there is a need to show how these impacts are interconnected and identify the factors that can encourage an effective and efficient change in the school environments. For this purpose, we conducted a non-systematic literature review. The results of the literature review were organized thematically based on the evidence presented about the impact of digital technology on education and the factors that affect the schools’ digital capacity and digital transformation. The findings suggest that ICT integration in schools impacts more than just students’ performance; it affects several other school-related aspects and stakeholders, too. Furthermore, various factors affect the impact of digital technologies on education. These factors are interconnected and play a vital role in the digital transformation process. The study results shed light on how ICTs can positively contribute to the digital transformation of schools and which factors should be considered for schools to achieve effective and efficient change.

Introduction

Digital technologies have brought changes to the nature and scope of education. Versatile and disruptive technological innovations, such as smart devices, the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR), blockchain, and software applications have opened up new opportunities for advancing teaching and learning (Gaol & Prasolova-Førland, 2021 ; OECD, 2021 ). Hence, in recent years, education systems worldwide have increased their investment in the integration of information and communication technology (ICT) (Fernández-Gutiérrez et al., 2020 ; Lawrence & Tar, 2018 ) and prioritized their educational agendas to adapt strategies or policies around ICT integration (European Commission, 2019 ). The latter brought about issues regarding the quality of teaching and learning with ICTs (Bates, 2015 ), especially concerning the understanding, adaptation, and design of education systems in accordance with current technological trends (Balyer & Öz, 2018 ). Studies have shown that despite the investment made in the integration of technology in schools, the results have not been promising, and the intended outcomes have not yet been achieved (Delgado et al., 2015 ; Lawrence & Tar, 2018 ). These issues were exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced teaching across education levels to move online (Daniel, 2020 ). Online teaching accelerated the use of digital technologies generating questions regarding the process, the nature, the extent, and the effectiveness of digitalization in schools (Cachia et al., 2021 ; König et al., 2020 ). Specifically, many schools demonstrated a lack of experience and low digital capacity, which resulted in widening gaps, inequalities, and learning losses (Blaskó et al., 2021 ; Di Pietro et al, 2020 ). Such results have engendered the need for schools to learn and build upon the experience in order to enhance their digital capacity (European Commission, 2020 ) and increase their digitalization levels (Costa et al., 2021 ). Digitalization offers possibilities for fundamental improvement in schools (OECD, 2021 ; Rott & Marouane, 2018 ) and touches many aspects of a school’s development (Delcker & Ifenthaler, 2021 ) . However, it is a complex process that requires large-scale transformative changes beyond the technical aspects of technology and infrastructure (Pettersson, 2021 ). Namely, digitalization refers to “ a series of deep and coordinated culture, workforce, and technology shifts and operating models ” (Brooks & McCormack, 2020 , p. 3) that brings cultural, organizational, and operational change through the integration of digital technologies (JISC, 2020 ). A successful digital transformation requires that schools increase their digital capacity levels, establishing the necessary “ culture, policies, infrastructure as well as digital competence of students and staff to support the effective integration of technology in teaching and learning practices ” (Costa et al, 2021 , p.163).

Given that the integration of digital technologies is a complex and continuous process that impacts different actors within the school ecosystem (Eng, 2005 ), there is a need to show how the different elements of the impact are interconnected and to identify the factors that can encourage an effective and efficient change in the school environment. To address the issues outlined above, we formulated the following research questions:

a) What is the impact of digital technologies on education?

b) Which factors might affect a school’s digital capacity and transformation?

In the present investigation, we conducted a non-systematic literature review of publications pertaining to the impact of digital technologies on education and the factors that affect a school’s digital capacity and transformation. The results of the literature review were organized thematically based on the evidence presented about the impact of digital technology on education and the factors which affect the schools’ digital capacity and digital transformation.

Methodology

The non-systematic literature review presented herein covers the main theories and research published over the past 17 years on the topic. It is based on meta-analyses and review papers found in scholarly, peer-reviewed content databases and other key studies and reports related to the concepts studied (e.g., digitalization, digital capacity) from professional and international bodies (e.g., the OECD). We searched the Scopus database, which indexes various online journals in the education sector with an international scope, to collect peer-reviewed academic papers. Furthermore, we used an all-inclusive Google Scholar search to include relevant key terms or to include studies found in the reference list of the peer-reviewed papers, and other key studies and reports related to the concepts studied by professional and international bodies. Lastly, we gathered sources from the Publications Office of the European Union ( https://op.europa.eu/en/home ); namely, documents that refer to policies related to digital transformation in education.

Regarding search terms, we first searched resources on the impact of digital technologies on education by performing the following search queries: “impact” OR “effects” AND “digital technologies” AND “education”, “impact” OR “effects” AND “ICT” AND “education”. We further refined our results by adding the terms “meta-analysis” and “review” or by adjusting the search options based on the features of each database to avoid collecting individual studies that would provide limited contributions to a particular domain. We relied on meta-analyses and review studies as these consider the findings of multiple studies to offer a more comprehensive view of the research in a given area (Schuele & Justice, 2006 ). Specifically, meta-analysis studies provided quantitative evidence based on statistically verifiable results regarding the impact of educational interventions that integrate digital technologies in school classrooms (Higgins et al., 2012 ; Tolani-Brown et al., 2011 ).

However, quantitative data does not offer explanations for the challenges or difficulties experienced during ICT integration in learning and teaching (Tolani-Brown et al., 2011 ). To fill this gap, we analyzed literature reviews and gathered in-depth qualitative evidence of the benefits and implications of technology integration in schools. In the analysis presented herein, we also included policy documents and reports from professional and international bodies and governmental reports, which offered useful explanations of the key concepts of this study and provided recent evidence on digital capacity and transformation in education along with policy recommendations. The inclusion and exclusion criteria that were considered in this study are presented in Table ​ Table1 1 .

Inclusion and exclusion criteria for the selection of resources on the impact of digital technologies on education

To ensure a reliable extraction of information from each study and assist the research synthesis we selected the study characteristics of interest (impact) and constructed coding forms. First, an overview of the synthesis was provided by the principal investigator who described the processes of coding, data entry, and data management. The coders followed the same set of instructions but worked independently. To ensure a common understanding of the process between coders, a sample of ten studies was tested. The results were compared, and the discrepancies were identified and resolved. Additionally, to ensure an efficient coding process, all coders participated in group meetings to discuss additions, deletions, and modifications (Stock, 1994 ). Due to the methodological diversity of the studied documents we began to synthesize the literature review findings based on similar study designs. Specifically, most of the meta-analysis studies were grouped in one category due to the quantitative nature of the measured impact. These studies tended to refer to student achievement (Hattie et al., 2014 ). Then, we organized the themes of the qualitative studies in several impact categories. Lastly, we synthesized both review and meta-analysis data across the categories. In order to establish a collective understanding of the concept of impact, we referred to a previous impact study by Balanskat ( 2009 ) which investigated the impact of technology in primary schools. In this context, the impact had a more specific ICT-related meaning and was described as “ a significant influence or effect of ICT on the measured or perceived quality of (parts of) education ” (Balanskat, 2009 , p. 9). In the study presented herein, the main impacts are in relation to learning and learners, teaching, and teachers, as well as other key stakeholders who are directly or indirectly connected to the school unit.

The study’s results identified multiple dimensions of the impact of digital technologies on students’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes; on equality, inclusion, and social integration; on teachers’ professional and teaching practices; and on other school-related aspects and stakeholders. The data analysis indicated various factors that might affect the schools’ digital capacity and transformation, such as digital competencies, the teachers’ personal characteristics and professional development, as well as the school’s leadership and management, administration, infrastructure, etc. The impacts and factors found in the literature review are presented below.

Impacts of digital technologies on students’ knowledge, skills, attitudes, and emotions

The impact of ICT use on students’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes has been investigated early in the literature. Eng ( 2005 ) found a small positive effect between ICT use and students' learning. Specifically, the author reported that access to computer-assisted instruction (CAI) programs in simulation or tutorial modes—used to supplement rather than substitute instruction – could enhance student learning. The author reported studies showing that teachers acknowledged the benefits of ICT on pupils with special educational needs; however, the impact of ICT on students' attainment was unclear. Balanskat et al. ( 2006 ) found a statistically significant positive association between ICT use and higher student achievement in primary and secondary education. The authors also reported improvements in the performance of low-achieving pupils. The use of ICT resulted in further positive gains for students, namely increased attention, engagement, motivation, communication and process skills, teamwork, and gains related to their behaviour towards learning. Evidence from qualitative studies showed that teachers, students, and parents recognized the positive impact of ICT on students' learning regardless of their competence level (strong/weak students). Punie et al. ( 2006 ) documented studies that showed positive results of ICT-based learning for supporting low-achieving pupils and young people with complex lives outside the education system. Liao et al. ( 2007 ) reported moderate positive effects of computer application instruction (CAI, computer simulations, and web-based learning) over traditional instruction on primary school student's achievement. Similarly, Tamim et al. ( 2011 ) reported small to moderate positive effects between the use of computer technology (CAI, ICT, simulations, computer-based instruction, digital and hypermedia) and student achievement in formal face-to-face classrooms compared to classrooms that did not use technology. Jewitt et al., ( 2011 ) found that the use of learning platforms (LPs) (virtual learning environments, management information systems, communication technologies, and information- and resource-sharing technologies) in schools allowed primary and secondary students to access a wider variety of quality learning resources, engage in independent and personalized learning, and conduct self- and peer-review; LPs also provide opportunities for teacher assessment and feedback. Similar findings were reported by Fu ( 2013 ), who documented a list of benefits and opportunities of ICT use. According to the author, the use of ICTs helps students access digital information and course content effectively and efficiently, supports student-centered and self-directed learning, as well as the development of a creative learning environment where more opportunities for critical thinking skills are offered, and promotes collaborative learning in a distance-learning environment. Higgins et al. ( 2012 ) found consistent but small positive associations between the use of technology and learning outcomes of school-age learners (5–18-year-olds) in studies linking the provision and use of technology with attainment. Additionally, Chauhan ( 2017 ) reported a medium positive effect of technology on the learning effectiveness of primary school students compared to students who followed traditional learning instruction.

The rise of mobile technologies and hardware devices instigated investigations into their impact on teaching and learning. Sung et al. ( 2016 ) reported a moderate effect on students' performance from the use of mobile devices in the classroom compared to the use of desktop computers or the non-use of mobile devices. Schmid et al. ( 2014 ) reported medium–low to low positive effects of technology integration (e.g., CAI, ICTs) in the classroom on students' achievement and attitude compared to not using technology or using technology to varying degrees. Tamim et al. ( 2015 ) found a low statistically significant effect of the use of tablets and other smart devices in educational contexts on students' achievement outcomes. The authors suggested that tablets offered additional advantages to students; namely, they reported improvements in students’ notetaking, organizational and communication skills, and creativity. Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) reported a small positive effect of one-to-one laptop programs on students’ academic achievement across subject areas. Additional reported benefits included student-centered, individualized, and project-based learning enhanced learner engagement and enthusiasm. Additionally, the authors found that students using one-to-one laptop programs tended to use technology more frequently than in non-laptop classrooms, and as a result, they developed a range of skills (e.g., information skills, media skills, technology skills, organizational skills). Haßler et al. ( 2016 ) found that most interventions that included the use of tablets across the curriculum reported positive learning outcomes. However, from 23 studies, five reported no differences, and two reported a negative effect on students' learning outcomes. Similar results were indicated by Kalati and Kim ( 2022 ) who investigated the effect of touchscreen technologies on young students’ learning. Specifically, from 53 studies, 34 advocated positive effects of touchscreen devices on children’s learning, 17 obtained mixed findings and two studies reported negative effects.

More recently, approaches that refer to the impact of gamification with the use of digital technologies on teaching and learning were also explored. A review by Pan et al. ( 2022 ) that examined the role of learning games in fostering mathematics education in K-12 settings, reported that gameplay improved students’ performance. Integration of digital games in teaching was also found as a promising pedagogical practice in STEM education that could lead to increased learning gains (Martinez et al., 2022 ; Wang et al., 2022 ). However, although Talan et al. ( 2020 ) reported a medium effect of the use of educational games (both digital and non-digital) on academic achievement, the effect of non-digital games was higher.

Over the last two years, the effects of more advanced technologies on teaching and learning were also investigated. Garzón and Acevedo ( 2019 ) found that AR applications had a medium effect on students' learning outcomes compared to traditional lectures. Similarly, Garzón et al. ( 2020 ) showed that AR had a medium impact on students' learning gains. VR applications integrated into various subjects were also found to have a moderate effect on students’ learning compared to control conditions (traditional classes, e.g., lectures, textbooks, and multimedia use, e.g., images, videos, animation, CAI) (Chen et al., 2022b ). Villena-Taranilla et al. ( 2022 ) noted the moderate effect of VR technologies on students’ learning when these were applied in STEM disciplines. In the same meta-analysis, Villena-Taranilla et al. ( 2022 ) highlighted the role of immersive VR, since its effect on students’ learning was greater (at a high level) across educational levels (K-6) compared to semi-immersive and non-immersive integrations. In another meta-analysis study, the effect size of the immersive VR was small and significantly differentiated across educational levels (Coban et al., 2022 ). The impact of AI on education was investigated by Su and Yang ( 2022 ) and Su et al. ( 2022 ), who showed that this technology significantly improved students’ understanding of AI computer science and machine learning concepts.

It is worth noting that the vast majority of studies referred to learning gains in specific subjects. Specifically, several studies examined the impact of digital technologies on students’ literacy skills and reported positive effects on language learning (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Grgurović et al., 2013 ; Friedel et al., 2013 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ; Chen et al., 2022b ; Savva et al., 2022 ). Also, several studies documented positive effects on specific language learning areas, namely foreign language learning (Kao, 2014 ), writing (Higgins et al., 2012 ; Wen & Walters, 2022 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ), as well as reading and comprehension (Cheung & Slavin, 2011 ; Liao et al., 2007 ; Schwabe et al., 2022 ). ICTs were also found to have a positive impact on students' performance in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) disciplines (Arztmann et al., 2022 ; Bado, 2022 ; Villena-Taranilla et al., 2022 ; Wang et al., 2022 ). Specifically, a number of studies reported positive impacts on students’ achievement in mathematics (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Hillmayr et al., 2020 ; Li & Ma, 2010 ; Pan et al., 2022 ; Ran et al., 2022 ; Verschaffel et al., 2019 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ). Furthermore, studies documented positive effects of ICTs on science learning (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Liao et al., 2007 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ; Hillmayr et al., 2020 ; Kalemkuş & Kalemkuş, 2022 ; Lei et al., 2022a ). Çelik ( 2022 ) also noted that computer simulations can help students understand learning concepts related to science. Furthermore, some studies documented that the use of ICTs had a positive impact on students’ achievement in other subjects, such as geography, history, music, and arts (Chauhan, 2017 ; Condie & Munro, 2007 ), and design and technology (Balanskat et al., 2006 ).

More specific positive learning gains were reported in a number of skills, e.g., problem-solving skills and pattern exploration skills (Higgins et al., 2012 ), metacognitive learning outcomes (Verschaffel et al., 2019 ), literacy skills, computational thinking skills, emotion control skills, and collaborative inquiry skills (Lu et al., 2022 ; Su & Yang, 2022 ; Su et al., 2022 ). Additionally, several investigations have reported benefits from the use of ICT on students’ creativity (Fielding & Murcia, 2022 ; Liu et al., 2022 ; Quah & Ng, 2022 ). Lastly, digital technologies were also found to be beneficial for enhancing students’ lifelong learning skills (Haleem et al., 2022 ).

Apart from gaining knowledge and skills, studies also reported improvement in motivation and interest in mathematics (Higgins et. al., 2019 ; Fadda et al., 2022 ) and increased positive achievement emotions towards several subjects during interventions using educational games (Lei et al., 2022a ). Chen et al. ( 2022a ) also reported a small but positive effect of digital health approaches in bullying and cyberbullying interventions with K-12 students, demonstrating that technology-based approaches can help reduce bullying and related consequences by providing emotional support, empowerment, and change of attitude. In their meta-review study, Su et al. ( 2022 ) also documented that AI technologies effectively strengthened students’ attitudes towards learning. In another meta-analysis, Arztmann et al. ( 2022 ) reported positive effects of digital games on motivation and behaviour towards STEM subjects.

Impacts of digital technologies on equality, inclusion and social integration

Although most of the reviewed studies focused on the impact of ICTs on students’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes, reports were also made on other aspects in the school context, such as equality, inclusion, and social integration. Condie and Munro ( 2007 ) documented research interventions investigating how ICT can support pupils with additional or special educational needs. While those interventions were relatively small scale and mostly based on qualitative data, their findings indicated that the use of ICTs enabled the development of communication, participation, and self-esteem. A recent meta-analysis (Baragash et al., 2022 ) with 119 participants with different disabilities, reported a significant overall effect size of AR on their functional skills acquisition. Koh’s meta-analysis ( 2022 ) also revealed that students with intellectual and developmental disabilities improved their competence and performance when they used digital games in the lessons.

Istenic Starcic and Bagon ( 2014 ) found that the role of ICT in inclusion and the design of pedagogical and technological interventions was not sufficiently explored in educational interventions with people with special needs; however, some benefits of ICT use were found in students’ social integration. The issue of gender and technology use was mentioned in a small number of studies. Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) reported a statistically significant positive interaction between one-to-one laptop programs and gender. Specifically, the results showed that girls and boys alike benefitted from the laptop program, but the effect on girls’ achievement was smaller than that on boys’. Along the same lines, Arztmann et al. ( 2022 ) reported no difference in the impact of game-based learning between boys and girls, arguing that boys and girls equally benefited from game-based interventions in STEM domains. However, results from a systematic review by Cussó-Calabuig et al. ( 2018 ) found limited and low-quality evidence on the effects of intensive use of computers on gender differences in computer anxiety, self-efficacy, and self-confidence. Based on their view, intensive use of computers can reduce gender differences in some areas and not in others, depending on contextual and implementation factors.

Impacts of digital technologies on teachers’ professional and teaching practices

Various research studies have explored the impact of ICT on teachers’ instructional practices and student assessment. Friedel et al. ( 2013 ) found that the use of mobile devices by students enabled teachers to successfully deliver content (e.g., mobile serious games), provide scaffolding, and facilitate synchronous collaborative learning. The integration of digital games in teaching and learning activities also gave teachers the opportunity to study and apply various pedagogical practices (Bado, 2022 ). Specifically, Bado ( 2022 ) found that teachers who implemented instructional activities in three stages (pre-game, game, and post-game) maximized students’ learning outcomes and engagement. For instance, during the pre-game stage, teachers focused on lectures and gameplay training, at the game stage teachers provided scaffolding on content, addressed technical issues, and managed the classroom activities. During the post-game stage, teachers organized activities for debriefing to ensure that the gameplay had indeed enhanced students’ learning outcomes.

Furthermore, ICT can increase efficiency in lesson planning and preparation by offering possibilities for a more collaborative approach among teachers. The sharing of curriculum plans and the analysis of students’ data led to clearer target settings and improvements in reporting to parents (Balanskat et al., 2006 ).

Additionally, the use and application of digital technologies in teaching and learning were found to enhance teachers’ digital competence. Balanskat et al. ( 2006 ) documented studies that revealed that the use of digital technologies in education had a positive effect on teachers’ basic ICT skills. The greatest impact was found on teachers with enough experience in integrating ICTs in their teaching and/or who had recently participated in development courses for the pedagogical use of technologies in teaching. Punie et al. ( 2006 ) reported that the provision of fully equipped multimedia portable computers and the development of online teacher communities had positive impacts on teachers’ confidence and competence in the use of ICTs.

Moreover, online assessment via ICTs benefits instruction. In particular, online assessments support the digitalization of students’ work and related logistics, allow teachers to gather immediate feedback and readjust to new objectives, and support the improvement of the technical quality of tests by providing more accurate results. Additionally, the capabilities of ICTs (e.g., interactive media, simulations) create new potential methods of testing specific skills, such as problem-solving and problem-processing skills, meta-cognitive skills, creativity and communication skills, and the ability to work productively in groups (Punie et al., 2006 ).

Impacts of digital technologies on other school-related aspects and stakeholders

There is evidence that the effective use of ICTs and the data transmission offered by broadband connections help improve administration (Balanskat et al., 2006 ). Specifically, ICTs have been found to provide better management systems to schools that have data gathering procedures in place. Condie and Munro ( 2007 ) reported impacts from the use of ICTs in schools in the following areas: attendance monitoring, assessment records, reporting to parents, financial management, creation of repositories for learning resources, and sharing of information amongst staff. Such data can be used strategically for self-evaluation and monitoring purposes which in turn can result in school improvements. Additionally, they reported that online access to other people with similar roles helped to reduce headteachers’ isolation by offering them opportunities to share insights into the use of ICT in learning and teaching and how it could be used to support school improvement. Furthermore, ICTs provided more efficient and successful examination management procedures, namely less time-consuming reporting processes compared to paper-based examinations and smooth communications between schools and examination authorities through electronic data exchange (Punie et al., 2006 ).

Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) reported that the use of ICTs improved home-school relationships. Additionally, Escueta et al. ( 2017 ) reported several ICT programs that had improved the flow of information from the school to parents. Particularly, they documented that the use of ICTs (learning management systems, emails, dedicated websites, mobile phones) allowed for personalized and customized information exchange between schools and parents, such as attendance records, upcoming class assignments, school events, and students’ grades, which generated positive results on students’ learning outcomes and attainment. Such information exchange between schools and families prompted parents to encourage their children to put more effort into their schoolwork.

The above findings suggest that the impact of ICT integration in schools goes beyond students’ performance in school subjects. Specifically, it affects a number of school-related aspects, such as equality and social integration, professional and teaching practices, and diverse stakeholders. In Table ​ Table2, 2 , we summarize the different impacts of digital technologies on school stakeholders based on the literature review, while in Table ​ Table3 3 we organized the tools/platforms and practices/policies addressed in the meta-analyses, literature reviews, EU reports, and international bodies included in the manuscript.

The impact of digital technologies on schools’ stakeholders based on the literature review

Tools/platforms and practices/policies addressed in the meta-analyses, literature reviews, EU reports, and international bodies included in the manuscript

Additionally, based on the results of the literature review, there are many types of digital technologies with different affordances (see, for example, studies on VR vs Immersive VR), which evolve over time (e.g. starting from CAIs in 2005 to Augmented and Virtual reality 2020). Furthermore, these technologies are linked to different pedagogies and policy initiatives, which are critical factors in the study of impact. Table ​ Table3 3 summarizes the different tools and practices that have been used to examine the impact of digital technologies on education since 2005 based on the review results.

Factors that affect the integration of digital technologies

Although the analysis of the literature review demonstrated different impacts of the use of digital technology on education, several authors highlighted the importance of various factors, besides the technology itself, that affect this impact. For example, Liao et al. ( 2007 ) suggested that future studies should carefully investigate which factors contribute to positive outcomes by clarifying the exact relationship between computer applications and learning. Additionally, Haßler et al., ( 2016 ) suggested that the neutral findings regarding the impact of tablets on students learning outcomes in some of the studies included in their review should encourage educators, school leaders, and school officials to further investigate the potential of such devices in teaching and learning. Several other researchers suggested that a number of variables play a significant role in the impact of ICTs on students’ learning that could be attributed to the school context, teaching practices and professional development, the curriculum, and learners’ characteristics (Underwood, 2009 ; Tamim et al., 2011 ; Higgins et al., 2012 ; Archer et al., 2014 ; Sung et al., 2016 ; Haßler et al., 2016 ; Chauhan, 2017 ; Lee et al., 2020 ; Tang et al., 2022 ).

Digital competencies

One of the most common challenges reported in studies that utilized digital tools in the classroom was the lack of students’ skills on how to use them. Fu ( 2013 ) found that students’ lack of technical skills is a barrier to the effective use of ICT in the classroom. Tamim et al. ( 2015 ) reported that students faced challenges when using tablets and smart mobile devices, associated with the technical issues or expertise needed for their use and the distracting nature of the devices and highlighted the need for teachers’ professional development. Higgins et al. ( 2012 ) reported that skills training about the use of digital technologies is essential for learners to fully exploit the benefits of instruction.

Delgado et al. ( 2015 ), meanwhile, reported studies that showed a strong positive association between teachers’ computer skills and students’ use of computers. Teachers’ lack of ICT skills and familiarization with technologies can become a constraint to the effective use of technology in the classroom (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Delgado et al., 2015 ).

It is worth noting that the way teachers are introduced to ICTs affects the impact of digital technologies on education. Previous studies have shown that teachers may avoid using digital technologies due to limited digital skills (Balanskat, 2006 ), or they prefer applying “safe” technologies, namely technologies that their own teachers used and with which they are familiar (Condie & Munro, 2007 ). In this regard, the provision of digital skills training and exposure to new digital tools might encourage teachers to apply various technologies in their lessons (Condie & Munro, 2007 ). Apart from digital competence, technical support in the school setting has also been shown to affect teachers’ use of technology in their classrooms (Delgado et al., 2015 ). Ferrari et al. ( 2011 ) found that while teachers’ use of ICT is high, 75% stated that they needed more institutional support and a shift in the mindset of educational actors to achieve more innovative teaching practices. The provision of support can reduce time and effort as well as cognitive constraints, which could cause limited ICT integration in the school lessons by teachers (Escueta et al., 2017 ).

Teachers’ personal characteristics, training approaches, and professional development

Teachers’ personal characteristics and professional development affect the impact of digital technologies on education. Specifically, Cheok and Wong ( 2015 ) found that teachers’ personal characteristics (e.g., anxiety, self-efficacy) are associated with their satisfaction and engagement with technology. Bingimlas ( 2009 ) reported that lack of confidence, resistance to change, and negative attitudes in using new technologies in teaching are significant determinants of teachers’ levels of engagement in ICT. The same author reported that the provision of technical support, motivation support (e.g., awards, sufficient time for planning), and training on how technologies can benefit teaching and learning can eliminate the above barriers to ICT integration. Archer et al. ( 2014 ) found that comfort levels in using technology are an important predictor of technology integration and argued that it is essential to provide teachers with appropriate training and ongoing support until they are comfortable with using ICTs in the classroom. Hillmayr et al. ( 2020 ) documented that training teachers on ICT had an important effecton students’ learning.

According to Balanskat et al. ( 2006 ), the impact of ICTs on students’ learning is highly dependent on the teachers’ capacity to efficiently exploit their application for pedagogical purposes. Results obtained from the Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) (OECD, 2021 ) revealed that although schools are open to innovative practices and have the capacity to adopt them, only 39% of teachers in the European Union reported that they are well or very well prepared to use digital technologies for teaching. Li and Ma ( 2010 ) and Hardman ( 2019 ) showed that the positive effect of technology on students’ achievement depends on the pedagogical practices used by teachers. Schmid et al. ( 2014 ) reported that learning was best supported when students were engaged in active, meaningful activities with the use of technological tools that provided cognitive support. Tamim et al. ( 2015 ) compared two different pedagogical uses of tablets and found a significant moderate effect when the devices were used in a student-centered context and approach rather than within teacher-led environments. Similarly, Garzón and Acevedo ( 2019 ) and Garzón et al. ( 2020 ) reported that the positive results from the integration of AR applications could be attributed to the existence of different variables which could influence AR interventions (e.g., pedagogical approach, learning environment, and duration of the intervention). Additionally, Garzón et al. ( 2020 ) suggested that the pedagogical resources that teachers used to complement their lectures and the pedagogical approaches they applied were crucial to the effective integration of AR on students’ learning gains. Garzón and Acevedo ( 2019 ) also emphasized that the success of a technology-enhanced intervention is based on both the technology per se and its characteristics and on the pedagogical strategies teachers choose to implement. For instance, their results indicated that the collaborative learning approach had the highest impact on students’ learning gains among other approaches (e.g., inquiry-based learning, situated learning, or project-based learning). Ran et al. ( 2022 ) also found that the use of technology to design collaborative and communicative environments showed the largest moderator effects among the other approaches.

Hattie ( 2008 ) reported that the effective use of computers is associated with training teachers in using computers as a teaching and learning tool. Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) noted that in addition to the strategies teachers adopt in teaching, ongoing professional development is also vital in ensuring the success of technology implementation programs. Sung et al. ( 2016 ) found that research on the use of mobile devices to support learning tends to report that the insufficient preparation of teachers is a major obstacle in implementing effective mobile learning programs in schools. Friedel et al. ( 2013 ) found that providing training and support to teachers increased the positive impact of the interventions on students’ learning gains. Trucano ( 2005 ) argued that positive impacts occur when digital technologies are used to enhance teachers’ existing pedagogical philosophies. Higgins et al. ( 2012 ) found that the types of technologies used and how they are used could also affect students’ learning. The authors suggested that training and professional development of teachers that focuses on the effective pedagogical use of technology to support teaching and learning is an important component of successful instructional approaches (Higgins et al., 2012 ). Archer et al. ( 2014 ) found that studies that reported ICT interventions during which teachers received training and support had moderate positive effects on students’ learning outcomes, which were significantly higher than studies where little or no detail about training and support was mentioned. Fu ( 2013 ) reported that the lack of teachers’ knowledge and skills on the technical and instructional aspects of ICT use in the classroom, in-service training, pedagogy support, technical and financial support, as well as the lack of teachers’ motivation and encouragement to integrate ICT on their teaching were significant barriers to the integration of ICT in education.

School leadership and management

Management and leadership are important cornerstones in the digital transformation process (Pihir et al., 2018 ). Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) documented leadership among the factors positively affecting the successful implementation of technology integration in schools. Strong leadership, strategic planning, and systematic integration of digital technologies are prerequisites for the digital transformation of education systems (Ređep, 2021 ). Management and leadership play a significant role in formulating policies that are translated into practice and ensure that developments in ICT become embedded into the life of the school and in the experiences of staff and pupils (Condie & Munro, 2007 ). Policy support and leadership must include the provision of an overall vision for the use of digital technologies in education, guidance for students and parents, logistical support, as well as teacher training (Conrads et al., 2017 ). Unless there is a commitment throughout the school, with accountability for progress at key points, it is unlikely for ICT integration to be sustained or become part of the culture (Condie & Munro, 2007 ). To achieve this, principals need to adopt and promote a whole-institution strategy and build a strong mutual support system that enables the school’s technological maturity (European Commission, 2019 ). In this context, school culture plays an essential role in shaping the mindsets and beliefs of school actors towards successful technology integration. Condie and Munro ( 2007 ) emphasized the importance of the principal’s enthusiasm and work as a source of inspiration for the school staff and the students to cultivate a culture of innovation and establish sustainable digital change. Specifically, school leaders need to create conditions in which the school staff is empowered to experiment and take risks with technology (Elkordy & Lovinelli, 2020 ).

In order for leaders to achieve the above, it is important to develop capacities for learning and leading, advocating professional learning, and creating support systems and structures (European Commission, 2019 ). Digital technology integration in education systems can be challenging and leadership needs guidance to achieve it. Such guidance can be introduced through the adoption of new methods and techniques in strategic planning for the integration of digital technologies (Ređep, 2021 ). Even though the role of leaders is vital, the relevant training offered to them has so far been inadequate. Specifically, only a third of the education systems in Europe have put in place national strategies that explicitly refer to the training of school principals (European Commission, 2019 , p. 16).

Connectivity, infrastructure, and government and other support

The effective integration of digital technologies across levels of education presupposes the development of infrastructure, the provision of digital content, and the selection of proper resources (Voogt et al., 2013 ). Particularly, a high-quality broadband connection in the school increases the quality and quantity of educational activities. There is evidence that ICT increases and formalizes cooperative planning between teachers and cooperation with managers, which in turn has a positive impact on teaching practices (Balanskat et al., 2006 ). Additionally, ICT resources, including software and hardware, increase the likelihood of teachers integrating technology into the curriculum to enhance their teaching practices (Delgado et al., 2015 ). For example, Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) found that the use of one-on-one laptop programs resulted in positive changes in teaching and learning, which would not have been accomplished without the infrastructure and technical support provided to teachers. Delgado et al. ( 2015 ) reported that limited access to technology (insufficient computers, peripherals, and software) and lack of technical support are important barriers to ICT integration. Access to infrastructure refers not only to the availability of technology in a school but also to the provision of a proper amount and the right types of technology in locations where teachers and students can use them. Effective technical support is a central element of the whole-school strategy for ICT (Underwood, 2009 ). Bingimlas ( 2009 ) reported that lack of technical support in the classroom and whole-school resources (e.g., failing to connect to the Internet, printers not printing, malfunctioning computers, and working on old computers) are significant barriers that discourage the use of ICT by teachers. Moreover, poor quality and inadequate hardware maintenance, and unsuitable educational software may discourage teachers from using ICTs (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Bingimlas, 2009 ).

Government support can also impact the integration of ICTs in teaching. Specifically, Balanskat et al. ( 2006 ) reported that government interventions and training programs increased teachers’ enthusiasm and positive attitudes towards ICT and led to the routine use of embedded ICT.

Lastly, another important factor affecting digital transformation is the development and quality assurance of digital learning resources. Such resources can be support textbooks and related materials or resources that focus on specific subjects or parts of the curriculum. Policies on the provision of digital learning resources are essential for schools and can be achieved through various actions. For example, some countries are financing web portals that become repositories, enabling teachers to share resources or create their own. Additionally, they may offer e-learning opportunities or other services linked to digital education. In other cases, specific agencies of projects have also been set up to develop digital resources (Eurydice, 2019 ).

Administration and digital data management

The digital transformation of schools involves organizational improvements at the level of internal workflows, communication between the different stakeholders, and potential for collaboration. Vuorikari et al. ( 2020 ) presented evidence that digital technologies supported the automation of administrative practices in schools and reduced the administration’s workload. There is evidence that digital data affects the production of knowledge about schools and has the power to transform how schooling takes place. Specifically, Sellar ( 2015 ) reported that data infrastructure in education is developing due to the demand for “ information about student outcomes, teacher quality, school performance, and adult skills, associated with policy efforts to increase human capital and productivity practices ” (p. 771). In this regard, practices, such as datafication which refers to the “ translation of information about all kinds of things and processes into quantified formats” have become essential for decision-making based on accountability reports about the school’s quality. The data could be turned into deep insights about education or training incorporating ICTs. For example, measuring students’ online engagement with the learning material and drawing meaningful conclusions can allow teachers to improve their educational interventions (Vuorikari et al., 2020 ).

Students’ socioeconomic background and family support

Research show that the active engagement of parents in the school and their support for the school’s work can make a difference to their children’s attitudes towards learning and, as a result, their achievement (Hattie, 2008 ). In recent years, digital technologies have been used for more effective communication between school and family (Escueta et al., 2017 ). The European Commission ( 2020 ) presented data from a Eurostat survey regarding the use of computers by students during the pandemic. The data showed that younger pupils needed additional support and guidance from parents and the challenges were greater for families in which parents had lower levels of education and little to no digital skills.

In this regard, the socio-economic background of the learners and their socio-cultural environment also affect educational achievements (Punie et al., 2006 ). Trucano documented that the use of computers at home positively influenced students’ confidence and resulted in more frequent use at school, compared to students who had no home access (Trucano, 2005 ). In this sense, the socio-economic background affects the access to computers at home (OECD, 2015 ) which in turn influences the experience of ICT, an important factor for school achievement (Punie et al., 2006 ; Underwood, 2009 ). Furthermore, parents from different socio-economic backgrounds may have different abilities and availability to support their children in their learning process (Di Pietro et al., 2020 ).

Schools’ socioeconomic context and emergency situations

The socio-economic context of the school is closely related to a school’s digital transformation. For example, schools in disadvantaged, rural, or deprived areas are likely to lack the digital capacity and infrastructure required to adapt to the use of digital technologies during emergency periods, such as the COVID-19 pandemic (Di Pietro et al., 2020 ). Data collected from school principals confirmed that in several countries, there is a rural/urban divide in connectivity (OECD, 2015 ).

Emergency periods also affect the digitalization of schools. The COVID-19 pandemic led to the closure of schools and forced them to seek appropriate and connective ways to keep working on the curriculum (Di Pietro et al., 2020 ). The sudden large-scale shift to distance and online teaching and learning also presented challenges around quality and equity in education, such as the risk of increased inequalities in learning, digital, and social, as well as teachers facing difficulties coping with this demanding situation (European Commission, 2020 ).

Looking at the findings of the above studies, we can conclude that the impact of digital technologies on education is influenced by various actors and touches many aspects of the school ecosystem. Figure  1 summarizes the factors affecting the digital technologies’ impact on school stakeholders based on the findings from the literature review.

Factors that affect the impact of ICTs on education

The findings revealed that the use of digital technologies in education affects a variety of actors within a school’s ecosystem. First, we observed that as technologies evolve, so does the interest of the research community to apply them to school settings. Figure  2 summarizes the trends identified in current research around the impact of digital technologies on schools’ digital capacity and transformation as found in the present study. Starting as early as 2005, when computers, simulations, and interactive boards were the most commonly applied tools in school interventions (e.g., Eng, 2005 ; Liao et al., 2007 ; Moran et al., 2008 ; Tamim et al., 2011 ), moving towards the use of learning platforms (Jewitt et al., 2011 ), then to the use of mobile devices and digital games (e.g., Tamim et al., 2015 ; Sung et al., 2016 ; Talan et al., 2020 ), as well as e-books (e.g., Savva et al., 2022 ), to the more recent advanced technologies, such as AR and VR applications (e.g., Garzón & Acevedo, 2019 ; Garzón et al., 2020 ; Kalemkuş & Kalemkuş, 2022 ), or robotics and AI (e.g., Su & Yang, 2022 ; Su et al., 2022 ). As this evolution shows, digital technologies are a concept in flux with different affordances and characteristics. Additionally, from an instructional perspective, there has been a growing interest in different modes and models of content delivery such as online, blended, and hybrid modes (e.g., Cheok & Wong, 2015 ; Kazu & Yalçin, 2022 ; Ulum, 2022 ). This is an indication that the value of technologies to support teaching and learning as well as other school-related practices is increasingly recognized by the research and school community. The impact results from the literature review indicate that ICT integration on students’ learning outcomes has effects that are small (Coban et al., 2022 ; Eng, 2005 ; Higgins et al., 2012 ; Schmid et al., 2014 ; Tamim et al., 2015 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ) to moderate (Garzón & Acevedo, 2019 ; Garzón et al., 2020 ; Liao et al., 2007 ; Sung et al., 2016 ; Talan et al., 2020 ; Wen & Walters, 2022 ). That said, a number of recent studies have reported high effect sizes (e.g., Kazu & Yalçin, 2022 ).

Current work and trends in the study of the impact of digital technologies on schools’ digital capacity

Based on these findings, several authors have suggested that the impact of technology on education depends on several variables and not on the technology per se (Tamim et al., 2011 ; Higgins et al., 2012 ; Archer et al., 2014 ; Sung et al., 2016 ; Haßler et al., 2016 ; Chauhan, 2017 ; Lee et al., 2020 ; Lei et al., 2022a ). While the impact of ICTs on student achievement has been thoroughly investigated by researchers, other aspects related to school life that are also affected by ICTs, such as equality, inclusion, and social integration have received less attention. Further analysis of the literature review has revealed a greater investment in ICT interventions to support learning and teaching in the core subjects of literacy and STEM disciplines, especially mathematics, and science. These were the most common subjects studied in the reviewed papers often drawing on national testing results, while studies that investigated other subject areas, such as social studies, were limited (Chauhan, 2017 ; Condie & Munro, 2007 ). As such, research is still lacking impact studies that focus on the effects of ICTs on a range of curriculum subjects.

The qualitative research provided additional information about the impact of digital technologies on education, documenting positive effects and giving more details about implications, recommendations, and future research directions. Specifically, the findings regarding the role of ICTs in supporting learning highlight the importance of teachers’ instructional practice and the learning context in the use of technologies and consequently their impact on instruction (Çelik, 2022 ; Schmid et al., 2014 ; Tamim et al., 2015 ). The review also provided useful insights regarding the various factors that affect the impact of digital technologies on education. These factors are interconnected and play a vital role in the transformation process. Specifically, these factors include a) digital competencies; b) teachers’ personal characteristics and professional development; c) school leadership and management; d) connectivity, infrastructure, and government support; e) administration and data management practices; f) students’ socio-economic background and family support and g) the socioeconomic context of the school and emergency situations. It is worth noting that we observed factors that affect the integration of ICTs in education but may also be affected by it. For example, the frequent use of ICTs and the use of laptops by students for instructional purposes positively affect the development of digital competencies (Zheng et al., 2016 ) and at the same time, the digital competencies affect the use of ICTs (Fu, 2013 ; Higgins et al., 2012 ). As a result, the impact of digital technologies should be explored more as an enabler of desirable and new practices and not merely as a catalyst that improves the output of the education process i.e. namely student attainment.

Conclusions

Digital technologies offer immense potential for fundamental improvement in schools. However, investment in ICT infrastructure and professional development to improve school education are yet to provide fruitful results. Digital transformation is a complex process that requires large-scale transformative changes that presuppose digital capacity and preparedness. To achieve such changes, all actors within the school’s ecosystem need to share a common vision regarding the integration of ICTs in education and work towards achieving this goal. Our literature review, which synthesized quantitative and qualitative data from a list of meta-analyses and review studies, provided useful insights into the impact of ICTs on different school stakeholders and showed that the impact of digital technologies touches upon many different aspects of school life, which are often overlooked when the focus is on student achievement as the final output of education. Furthermore, the concept of digital technologies is a concept in flux as technologies are not only different among them calling for different uses in the educational practice but they also change through time. Additionally, we opened a forum for discussion regarding the factors that affect a school’s digital capacity and transformation. We hope that our study will inform policy, practice, and research and result in a paradigm shift towards more holistic approaches in impact and assessment studies.

Study limitations and future directions

We presented a review of the study of digital technologies' impact on education and factors influencing schools’ digital capacity and transformation. The study results were based on a non-systematic literature review grounded on the acquisition of documentation in specific databases. Future studies should investigate more databases to corroborate and enhance our results. Moreover, search queries could be enhanced with key terms that could provide additional insights about the integration of ICTs in education, such as “policies and strategies for ICT integration in education”. Also, the study drew information from meta-analyses and literature reviews to acquire evidence about the effects of ICT integration in schools. Such evidence was mostly based on the general conclusions of the studies. It is worth mentioning that, we located individual studies which showed different, such as negative or neutral results. Thus, further insights are needed about the impact of ICTs on education and the factors influencing the impact. Furthermore, the nature of the studies included in meta-analyses and reviews is different as they are based on different research methodologies and data gathering processes. For instance, in a meta-analysis, the impact among the studies investigated is measured in a particular way, depending on policy or research targets (e.g., results from national examinations, pre-/post-tests). Meanwhile, in literature reviews, qualitative studies offer additional insights and detail based on self-reports and research opinions on several different aspects and stakeholders who could affect and be affected by ICT integration. As a result, it was challenging to draw causal relationships between so many interrelating variables.

Despite the challenges mentioned above, this study envisaged examining school units as ecosystems that consist of several actors by bringing together several variables from different research epistemologies to provide an understanding of the integration of ICTs. However, the use of other tools and methodologies and models for evaluation of the impact of digital technologies on education could give more detailed data and more accurate results. For instance, self-reflection tools, like SELFIE—developed on the DigCompOrg framework- (Kampylis et al., 2015 ; Bocconi & Lightfoot, 2021 ) can help capture a school’s digital capacity and better assess the impact of ICTs on education. Furthermore, the development of a theory of change could be a good approach for documenting the impact of digital technologies on education. Specifically, theories of change are models used for the evaluation of interventions and their impact; they are developed to describe how interventions will work and give the desired outcomes (Mayne, 2015 ). Theory of change as a methodological approach has also been used by researchers to develop models for evaluation in the field of education (e.g., Aromatario et al., 2019 ; Chapman & Sammons, 2013 ; De Silva et al., 2014 ).

We also propose that future studies aim at similar investigations by applying more holistic approaches for impact assessment that can provide in-depth data about the impact of digital technologies on education. For instance, future studies could focus on different research questions about the technologies that are used during the interventions or the way the implementation takes place (e.g., What methodologies are used for documenting impact? How are experimental studies implemented? How can teachers be taken into account and trained on the technology and its functions? What are the elements of an appropriate and successful implementation? How is the whole intervention designed? On which learning theories is the technology implementation based?).

Future research could also focus on assessing the impact of digital technologies on various other subjects since there is a scarcity of research related to particular subjects, such as geography, history, arts, music, and design and technology. More research should also be done about the impact of ICTs on skills, emotions, and attitudes, and on equality, inclusion, social interaction, and special needs education. There is also a need for more research about the impact of ICTs on administration, management, digitalization, and home-school relationships. Additionally, although new forms of teaching and learning with the use of ICTs (e.g., blended, hybrid, and online learning) have initiated several investigations in mainstream classrooms, only a few studies have measured their impact on students’ learning. Additionally, our review did not document any study about the impact of flipped classrooms on K-12 education. Regarding teaching and learning approaches, it is worth noting that studies referred to STEM or STEAM did not investigate the impact of STEM/STEAM as an interdisciplinary approach to learning but only investigated the impact of ICTs on learning in each domain as a separate subject (science, technology, engineering, arts, mathematics). Hence, we propose future research to also investigate the impact of the STEM/STEAM approach on education. The impact of emerging technologies on education, such as AR, VR, robotics, and AI has also been investigated recently, but more work needs to be done.

Finally, we propose that future studies could focus on the way in which specific factors, e.g., infrastructure and government support, school leadership and management, students’ and teachers’ digital competencies, approaches teachers utilize in the teaching and learning (e.g., blended, online and hybrid learning, flipped classrooms, STEM/STEAM approach, project-based learning, inquiry-based learning), affect the impact of digital technologies on education. We hope that future studies will give detailed insights into the concept of schools’ digital transformation through further investigation of impacts and factors which influence digital capacity and transformation based on the results and the recommendations of the present study.

Acknowledgements

This project has received funding under Grant Agreement No Ref Ares (2021) 339036 7483039 as well as funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program under Grant Agreement No 739578 and the Government of the Republic of Cyprus through the Deputy Ministry of Research, Innovation and Digital Policy. The UVa co-authors would like also to acknowledge funding from the European Regional Development Fund and the National Research Agency of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, under project grant PID2020-112584RB-C32.

Data availability statement

Declarations.

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How digital technologies reshape marketing: evidence from a qualitative investigation

• Original Article
• Open access
• Published: 17 January 2023
• Volume 2023 , pages 27–58, ( 2023 )

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• Federica Pascucci   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-7326-6067 1 ,
• Elisabetta Savelli   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2785-0403 2 &
• Giacomo Gistri   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2988-9758 3  

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Digital technologies are now imperative for markets and society, and digital transformation is becoming a key area of business innovation. However, digital transformation is complex, and firms still lack the abilities to fully grasp and exploit its opportunities. This study investigates how digital technologies are currently implemented by companies. In particular, since digital transformation can reshape the traditional process of value creation in which marketing is primarily involved, the article analyses the impact of digital transformation on traditional marketing, including its role, organisation, and instruments. The study conducted qualitative research in the form of in-depth interviews with managers working for companies operating in different Italian industries. The results show that digital technologies are widely used by firms, although they often belong to the category of traditional tools, and companies are more ‘digitalised’ than ‘digitally transformed’. Digital technologies impact marketing by improving the abilities of market analytics, pricing, and channel management and helping to build relationships with clients to achieve value co-creation. Professional skills are variously augmented, while organisational processes are becoming more effective and flexible through the use of multiple knowledge and cross-functional experiences. Research and managerial implications are discussed in light of the main barriers and risks involved in the implementation of digital transformation.

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1 Introduction

Society is undergoing a constant technological transformation that involves changes in all areas – from the economy to culture and politics. The business world is profoundly influenced by this transformation, which is occurring across industries, albeit at varying intensities. Data from the most recent report by Anitec-Assinform (2021) indicate that TLC & media, industry, and banking are the three sectors in Italy that reveal the highest investments in absolute value totalling €8.815, €7.909, and €7.989 million, respectively. In this context, some technologies can be considered already mature, such as mobile business, cloud computing, and the Internet of Things (IoT), whereas other technologies seem to be emergent, including blockchain and artificial intelligence. In the industrial sector, the digital investment mainly aims to improve customer engagement, enhance relationships with employees, reduce time-to-market through agile manufacturing and supply chain management, promote operational efficiency, and advance data exploitation.

In light of this evolution, there is growing interest in the topic of digital transformation (DT). Both academics and practitioners have proposed several definitions of DT, which has thus become a ‘hype’ or ‘buzzword’; however, not enough attention has been paid to what DT is and how it can be conceptualised (Gong & Ribiere, 2021 ; Hausberg et al., 2019 ). Scholars agreed that the implications of DT are profound and manifold. Moreover, DT extends beyond the adoption of one or more digital technologies, as it entails rethinking the market approach and value proposition, changing organisational processes and structures, and, in some cases, innovating the business model, thus involving a plurality of internal and external actors (Broekhuizen et al., 2021 ).

In this context, marketing can play a fundamental role, considering its important function of connecting firms and the market. It can help a company adapt to the constantly changing needs and trends coming from the external environment. However, to address the challenges of DT, marketing theory has to be enriched with new concepts, logic, and tools that are in line with the ongoing evolution (De Luca et al., 2020 ). According to Kumar et al., ( 2021 ), the future of marketing lies in firms’ efforts to acquire a holistic understanding of their customers’ needs and behaviours across platforms, devices, and varied products and services. To this end, it is fundamental to investigate the impact of new digital technologies on marketing strategies both to understand how they are currently being leveraged and to identify potential areas that merit deeper exploration.

To answer these calls, the present study explores how DT is currently perceived and implemented by companies and how it affects marketing by influencing its role, organisation, and internal processes. The main objective is to understand the complex relationship between DT and marketing by investigating (i) how DT can be leveraged by marketing processes and resources; and (ii) how DT can improve the value creation process in which the marketing function is involved. Existing literature on this topic is quite fragmented, as studies have considered one single marketing activity or decision, and the findings have often been discordant. Thus, further analyses are recommended.

Specifically, the contribution of this exploratory analysis is twofold. First, unlike existing studies, the present research considers marketing as a whole strategy and process, thus generating a holistic view of DT implications. In this respect, the findings reveal some important changes concerning the role and organisation of marketing and the management of its activities. Second, the study identifies potential risks and barriers to DT encountered by the firms and how companies are trying to overcome them. From these risks and barriers, we derive some useful recommendations for managers and policymakers.

The paper is structured as follows. Following this introduction, Sect.  2 describes the theoretical background of the study and establishes four research questions. Section  3 sets the methodology, and Sect.  4 presents the findings of the multiple interviews. Section  5 discusses the implications for theory and practice, and Sect.  6 concludes the paper by highlighting both the limitations of the study and future research directions.

2 Theoretical background

2.1 digital transformation.

The term ‘digital transformation’ has entered the agendas and debates of both scholars and practitioners, and the concept is currently a ‘hot topic’. Conceptual and empirical research on DT has grown enormously in recent years in different fields, and many literature reviews have been published (Krishen et al., 2021 ). In the Scopus database, the number of articles, conference papers, books, and book chapters containing ‘digital transformation’ in the title, keywords, and abstract increased from 2 to 3,109 between 2000 and 2021.

The topic of DT can be investigated from two key perspectives: that of the firm which adopts digital technologies or that of the customers at whom the company’s actions are directed. This paper focuses on the first perspective, which recognises the multidisciplinary nature of the phenomenon in involving changes in strategy, organisation, technologies, supply chains, and marketing (Verhoef et al., 2021 ). For companies, digital technologies may enhance operational efficiency and the effectiveness of existing processes (Pascucci, 2017 ). Moreover, they can provide new opportunities to enable business model innovations (Ancillai et al., 2022 ), such as digital servitisation (Frank et al., 2019 ; Gebauer et al., 2021 ; Grandinetti et al., 2020 ).

According to this dual nature of DT implications, it is possible to distinguish three stages of DT (Verhoef et al., 2021 ): digitisation, which is the encoding of analog information into a digital format; digitalisation, which is the adoption of digital technologies to improve existing business processes; and DT, which is the development of a new business model based on digital technologies. In line with this conceptualisation, DT is the most pervasive and complex stage of transformation (Gong & Ribiere, 2021 ), and most firms, especially SMEs, are still in the second stage. Each stage places specific demands on firms’ digital resources, organisational structure, growth strategy, and metrics. As a result, DT can have different levels of maturity as a changing process and there is not ‘one best way’ to implement DT; rather, each firm needs to devise its approach (Checchinato et al., 2021 ).

Although the growing number of studies on DT, some authors have argued that the phenomenon remains under-investigated (Fernandez-Ravira et al., 2021 ), and there is still a need to understand the true nature of change and transformation (Gong & Riviere, 2021 ). Moreover, despite the opportunities presented by technological progress, it seems that firms are not yet fully exploiting the potential of digital technologies, as many companies have failed to obtain the expected results. Thus, DT represents ‘a substantial problem of practice’ (Hinterhuber et al., 2021 , p. 3). In this regard, Gebauer et al., ( 2020 ) have highlighted a ‘digitalisation paradox’ in which ‘companies invest in digitalisation but struggle to earn the expected revenue growth’ (p. 315). In light of this, our first research question (RQ1) is as follows:

How do firms conceive of DT? In particular, how and why do they leverage digital technologies for it?

2.2 Marketing in the age of DT

Marketing is one business area witnessing DT on an intense scale and experimenting with new technologies, such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, and the IoT (Grewal et al., 2020 ; Kumar et al., 2021 ). Digitalisation has radically transformed the customer journey since individuals are now constantly connected. Moreover, the era of digital technologies features exceptional growth in customer empowerment. Because of the abundance of information and interaction opportunities, consumers no longer accept the role of passive recipients of firms’ messages (Auh et al., 2019 ; Akhavannasab et al., 2018 ). This change requires innovative approaches to marketing communication and forces brands to interact with individual customers quickly, openly, and continuously.

All of these trends have led companies to adopt a customer-centric approach, which prioritises the customer first and foremost in their organisational strategies (Shah et al., 2006 ). Consequently, relationships between firms and their customers are evolving, and firms should invest in building stronger, closer, and longer-lasting customer relationships in both B2B and B2C markets. Digital technologies have helped firms in pursuing this aim. For instance, with CRM technologies, companies can gather customer information through many touchpoints and share the needed information across the company to align marketing decisions with customers’ needs and values, identify more profitable customers, guide investment decisions, quickly respond to customer requests, and deliver customised offerings and experiences (Nasir, 2015 ).

Customer data form the basis of a customer-centric organisation. Data are assuming an increasingly central role in marketing as a fundamental resource for building and maintaining customer relationships, personalising products, services, and the marketing mix, and automating marketing processes in real-time. Nowadays, firms operate in ‘data-rich environments’ (Wedel & Kannan, 2016 ), such as web and social media, which have brought an explosion of real-time data, especially unstructured ones, that can reshape the management of marketing activities and thereby afford new business opportunities.

The combination of data proliferation, algorithmic advancement (artificial intelligence), and more powerful computing and storage capabilities supports the transformation of data into business insights, decisions, and actions, thus allowing for the development of a marketing ‘data-driven approach’ (Anderson, 2008 ; Pascucci et al., 2022 ), which helps companies to customise products and optimise marketing decisions for customers on a real-time basis (Wirtz et al., 2017 ).

Because of the growing relevance of data-driven decisions, marketing analytics has become central to modern organisations and now represents a new frontier in marketing research (Sheth, 2021 ). However, the increased volume and variety of data remain mostly untapped by firms, and many organisations have failed to incorporate the data effectively in their decision-making processes (Tabesh et al., 2019 ). Thus, many firms have not effectively realised their ‘big data dreams’ (Mazzei & Noble, 2017 ). Previous research has identified a shortage of organisational resources (e.g. infrastructure, human resources, and competencies) and cultural and technological barriers (Tabesh et al., 2019 ) as the main reasons for this failure. Organisations that aim to profit from (big) data analytics, indeed, should have the following elements: first, a culture and leaders that recognise the importance of data, analytics, and data-driven decision making; second, a governance structure that prevents silos and facilitates the integration of data and analytics into the organisation’s overall strategy and processes; and third, a critical mass of marketing analysts who collectively provide sufficiently deep expertise in analytics as well as substantive marketing knowledge (Wedel & Kannan, 2016 ).

Anyway, this evolution is transforming the way marketing strategies are developed and implemented, and produces an overall reshaping of the marketing mix management (Caliskan et al., 2021 ). As a result, a new marketing approach (i.e., Digital Marketing: Krishen et al., 2021 ), organisation, and skills are required. Notably, scholars have developed the new ‘Marketing 4.0’ (Kartajaya et al., 2016 ; Jara et al., 2012 ), which is based on the assumption that customers are not only looking for products and services to satisfy their needs but also demanding to be part of the production process. This aspect calls for a shift towards a more collaborative, interactive, and inclusive approach, which Marketing 4.0 tries to enable to improve brand and customer relationships (Dash et al., 2021 ).

For marketing policies, the rise of social media has dramatically changed how firms manage their brands. Consumers have become ‘pivotal authors’ of brand stories, and firms need to pay attention to such consumer-generated content and coordinate firm-generated content accordingly (Gensler et al., 2013 ).

The participatory role of customers is also at play in the product customisation enabled by digital technologies, such as virtual, augmented, or mixed reality, that have the potential to not only increase customer participation in the new product design (Mourtzis & Doukas, 2012 ) – but also to create new types of improved customer experiences in all steps of the customer journey (Hoyer et al., 2020 ; Flaviàn et al., 2019 ). Notably, heterogeneity exists in consumer demand for customisation, and a better understanding of these differences is vital for brand managers to effectively develop and deliver customisation opportunities for consumers (Pallant et al., 2020 ).

Digital transformation also impacts pricing decisions. The growing availability of data and pricing algorithms is enabling personalised and dynamic pricing, in which prices can change by the day, every hour, or for each customer according to the data that are collected and analysed. This widespread practice is especially prevalent in the service sector (Abrate et al., 2012 ).

Finally, DT allows consumers to utilise and move seamlessly across multiple channels in their customer journey (Hansen & Sia, 2015 ). Along with these developments, ‘omnichannel management’ is increasingly emerging as a new strategic approach – in contrast to ‘multichannel management’ – to manage the simultaneous and synergetic interplay between channels and thus provide the seamless customer experience that customers expect (Verhoef et al., 2015 ).

In the wake of all of these evolution trends, digital marketing studies have increased substantially over the past 20 years. Nevertheless, digital marketing is still growing and has not yet reached maturity (Krishen et al., 2021 ). In addition, the existing literature is quite fragmented as previous research is mainly focused on specific marketing activities, and findings have often been discordant. Therefore, our second research question (RQ2) is as follows:

what are the impacts that DT is currently having on marketing activities and firm-customer relationships?

While digital changes present numerous opportunities, they undoubtedly pose some challenges as well. Leeflang et al., ( 2014 ) have already identified three main challenges for digital marketers: the ability to generate and leverage deep customer insights, the management of brand reputation in a marketing environment where user-generated content is predominant, and the assessment of the effectiveness of digital marketing. The issue of human resources and capabilities remains a particularly prominent topic, as there is a widening gap between the accelerating complexity of markets and technologies and the evolution of firms’ digital marketing capabilities. Increased data complexity creates a ‘digital talent gap’ (Leeflang et al., 2014 ) that is aggravated by the difficulty of finding employees who are capable of combining quantitative and analytics skills with marketing skills. In this regard, Herhausen et al. ( 2021 ) have identified two marketing capability gaps: the ‘practice gap’, concerning the deficit between managers’ current practices and their ideal digital marketing capabilities; and the ‘knowledge gap’, which is the divide between the digital marketing transformation and the extant scholarly knowledge that underpins it. Matarazzo et al., ( 2021 ) have found that dynamic capabilities, especially sensing and learning capabilities, are generally fundamental facilitators of DT in SMEs. According to these authors, DT is a learning process, as it requires new human resources and some changes to organisational structure, which demonstrates the relevance of the ‘soft’ dimension of DT as opposed to the technological dimension. Likewise, Eller et al., ( 2020 ) have determined that the recruitment of employees with the required skills is a significant barrier to successful digitalisation among SMEs, and a digital strategy with concrete key performance indicators and actions to monitor the process is a fundamental driver of digitalisation. In particular, there is a need to more closely align marketing and information technology (IT) in terms of knowledge and capabilities (Graesch et al., 2021 ).

Authors have largely agreed that scarce attention has been given to the related competencies that firms need to fully exploit the potential of digital technologies. It could be interesting and useful to investigate the reason for this gap, study how digital technologies are being leveraged, and identify the most critical areas. Thus, our third research question (RQ3) is as follows:

What is impact of DT on marketing organization and competences?

A further debate in the marketing literature concerns the implications of DT for the role and relevance of marketing within the company. According to some scholars, marketing is losing its influence and has become marginalised, as marketing decisions have moved to other departments (Homburg et al., 2015 ; Verhoef & Leeflang, 2009 ). In the same vein, Quinn et al., ( 2016 ) have stated that evolution ‘has precipitated a managerial sense of crisis for marketing, triggering a transformation that has repercussions for the future of the discipline and its practice’ (p. 2104). In contrast, other authors have posited that technological evolution has contributed over time to the role and scope of marketing within organisations expanding from primarily involving the development and management of creative communication to now including the implementation of data-driven and technology-enabled marketing practices that are not only relevant to firms and customers but also financially accountable (Shah & Murthi, 2021 ). Based on this discussion, it is interesting to explore how DT may have changed the function of marketing and the main implications of this evolution. Therefore, our fourth research question (RQ4) is as follows:

How might DT have changed the overall role and importance of marketing within firms?

3 Methodology

This research employed a multiple case study methodology to perform an exploratory analysis of DT in 11 Italian firms operating in different industries. Considering the novelty and complexity of DT, the case study approach is particularly suitable, as it emphasises the richness of the phenomenon and deeply grounds the findings in the varied empirical evidence that is collected (Eisenhardt, 1989 ). Case studies are particularly useful for providing in-depth answers to ‘how’ and ‘why’ research questions, thus supporting a holistic, comprehensive, and realistic understanding of a certain phenomenon. Moreover, Hausberg et al., ( 2019 ) have directly called for more case studies that describe the benefits, values, and weaknesses of DT implementations.

The research team conducted in-depth and semi-structured interviews (n = 20) based on face-to-face and online meetings with individuals who had key-roles in DT, including those of chief officer (CO), chief digital officer (CDO), or chief marketing officer (CMO). Semi-structured interviews suited the study’s explorative aim because they allow researchers to follow a structured approach while also leaving space for interviewees to freely talk about their experiences and opinions (Yin, 2009 ). Each interview lasted nearly two hours, was conducted in Italian, and was audio-recorded, transcribed, and analysed. The number of interviews, within each company, has been determined in line with the principle of theoretical saturation, thus interviews have been conducted till the information gathered has been considered sufficient for the scope of the analysis and no further relevant information could have been added by additional interviews (Strauss & Corbin, 1990 ).

The interview guide was aimed at exploring DT in terms of four aspects: first, the implemented technologies (technological macrotrends); second, the implications of technology adoption for marketing processes; third, the implications of technology adoption for human resources and organisation; and fourth, the implications of technology adoption for customer relationships. The interview guide was carefully designed based on the previously analysed literature on DT and marketing.

In addition to the primary data from the interviews, secondary data were gathered from newspaper and magazine articles, corporate presentations, companies’ reports, and their own websites. These allowed for the triangulation of data, which provides greater depth to the study of a phenomenon from different perspectives (Denzin, 1984 ).

Figure  1 depicts the overall framework that guided the case study development and analysis.

Framework of analysis

As for the sample, a purposeful procedure (Patton, 2005 ) was used to select firms from the Marche region. This area has n.145.609 firms (2021), which represents the 2.8% of all Italian firms. Manufacturing and commerce are the main sectors. Marche’s entrepreneurial density (i.e., number of firms per inhabitant) is higher than the Italian one (97 firms per 1000 inhabitants vs. 87, https://statistica.regione.marche.it ). Such entrepreneurial vocation makes Marche Region an interesting context to investigate the phenomenon of firms’ digital transformation.

Companies have been selected to represent the principal industries of this area and to provide a clear picture of the current situation while considering different sectors, as well as different needs and criticalities from the perspective of the DT phenomenon. Thus, because the intention was to get a broad variety of DT cases, the sample covers various industries and sizes (see Table  1 ). Moreover, we selected only incumbent firms, as their legacy ensures that they have experience with DT challenges and barriers and must navigate conflicts and trade-offs between existing and new ways of conducting business (Verhoef et al., 2021 ). Finally, considering our research objective, all the selected firms must be involved in some form of DT, being aware of the importance to invest in new technologies.

Although the analysis has been conducted at a regional level, the findings are significant as Marche is one of the most industrialised regions in Italy, and the distribution of its industries is quite similar to the Italian one, with a prelevance of small and medium sized firms.

The collected data have been examined following Eisenhardt’s ( 1989 ) guidelines for within-case and cross-case analyses. Each case was thoroughly studied to obtain insights into the relationship between DT and marketing. Then, the cases were compared to analyse similarities and differences and gain a richer understanding of the DT phenomenon.

4.1 Intra-case analysis

DT is an ongoing process in the analysed companies that was variously perceived and implemented. Table  2 shortly depicts the current status of DT within each company, by showing the main technologies adopted and relative business areas of application.

Algam EKO operates in the musical instruments industry. The company employs digital technologies mostly to interact with customers and suppliers. Specifically, it has been using mobile technology/smart apps since 2016 and is active on social media since 2009, especially on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram. AI applications are in progress, intending to bring online the experience that is lived in physical retail, by creating ad hoc videos in collaboration with retailers. Algam EKO doesn’t use IoT or Blockchain technologies yet.

Ariston Thermo works in the thermal comfort, burners, and components sectors. Since it is a multinational company that grew up through many acquisitions, digital technologies have been used to create greater harmonization within the group. They started with assistance services. Having sensors inside the boilers the company would be able to know if there is a malfunction and, therefore, intervene earlier, sometimes solving the problem completely remotely without going to customers’ homes. This brought a very different customer service model and also important business insights with data collection, storage, and utilization. About AI and IoT the company is at its beginning. The integration between IoT and Blockchain remains an objective of the near future. Also for digital communications, Ariston Thermo is in its infancy. It is present on social media platforms but it needs to find its soul, as it is still very jagged because social media are not managed centrally and strategically. As the Chief Digital Officer said:

Everyone does his own so we are still at the stage of trying to understand who is doing and what to bring it back to a trend . (Ariston Thermo Spa)

Biesse operates in the mechatronics industry. The company launched “Sophia” in 2016, an Industrial Internet of things (IIoT) platform based on sensors connected to machinery, which monitor the activities of customers and generate real-time information. Sophia allows cloud computing for data management in open systems; big data analytics for the optimization of products and services as well as production processes; IIoT as multidirectional communication between products and customers’ processes. The advent of new digital technologies had a positive impact also on the branding strategy of the Group, involving a greater presence of the brand in digital channels such as social media platforms, which contributed to redefining the brand as more innovative, digital, clear, and simple.

Diansen owns the construction industry. Recently, an increasing number of customers have begun to adopt social media, especially Instagram, to find specific content once asked by professionals. Customers have become increasingly active and started to interact with the company through these channels so, since 2017, the company has decided to increase its presence on social media, by enriching the content offer, the level of interaction, and the users’ engagement. DT pushed the company to be more effective in digital marketing by using tools such as email marketing platforms, digital content platforms, and CRM software. Diansen didn’t start using more sophisticated applications such as Big Data, AI, or Blockchain yet, even if they consider AI potentially useful for production processes.

Doucal’s works in the footwear industry. Digitization was driven primarily by the evolution of the external context. In Doucal’s, DT started from production and then came to marketing, as a result of the original company’s orientation on the product. Marketing has always meant communication and, recently, social media communication (since 2015). Doucal’s did not introduce AI, Blockchain systems, IoT, or mobile technologies yet but it has been using Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software since 2018 to automate and manage core business processes. Considering production, artisans involved in cutting, wear smart glasses with a micro camera to capture the actions in real-time. Filming is carried out on anonymous workstations and divided according to both the shoe model and the specific processing. In this way, the intangible assets become explicit and usable even at a distance and on different platforms for example for the training of new personnel.

Eden Viaggi – Alpitour is a tour operator. In July 2016, it has been released the app “My Alpitour World” to be the personal travel assistant of customers at every stage of their journey, from booking to their return, to offering personalized services during their holidays. To find and interact with customers Eden Viaggi – Alpitour mostly used social media, since 2010. In particular Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. So far, the company looked at AI with skepticism in its industry, especially considering the use of chatbots to interact with customers and the marketing director remarked that it is difficult to have questions that can be so standardized as to have an adequate answer from a machine or an algorithm. Since 2019, the company is also using Big Data and analytics to develop customized forecasts and commercial proposals. While IoT technologies did not have been implemented, they are experiencing Blockchain and an NFT is being developed within the hotel division.

Go World is another tour operator. The company considers AI, IoT, and Blockchain technologies more suitable for larger players in the sector where decision-making and control processes are more complex. In the same way, Go World did not implement mobile technology/smart apps because they think are more appropriate in B2C contexts than in B2B, where most of the company business is located. On the other hand, the company uses social media to interact with its customers and in 2019 it started to plan a new e-commerce platform that uses Big data and analytics to commercialize customized products. Besides, an e-learning platform has been used for travel agent training.

IT Consult works in the knowledge management industry. Specifically, it develops software for document management using the “Josh platform”. The company is therefore fully involved in the dynamics of digital transformation. The main challenge concerned the definition of digital marketing activities and their integration with other established commercial actions. IT Consult did not practice IoT, Blockchain, or AI but it uses social media to communicate and interact with its customers, mainly YouTube, LinkedIn, and Facebook. The company also habits marketing automation tools in mailing such as “MailChimp” and Microsoft Dynamic for CRM.

Magazzini Gabrielli is a big retailer operating in the large-scale distribution industry. Digitalization involved particularly communication activities, which were usually based on distinct physical and digital channels. Most of the endeavors went to the need for integration following the omnichannel trend. The company also used Big data and analytics to plan marketing actions along the customer journey. To communicate and send promotions, Magazzini Gabrielli started in 2020 using social media platforms, specifically Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. In 2021 it has been launched also the OasiTigre app that operates as a kind of digital fidelity card. The company did not use AI, Blockchain, or IoT technologies yet.

Salumificio Ciriaci operates in the food industry. It was founded in 1937 with the idea of producing quality, healthy, and genuine products processed with traditional methods. Recently, there was a generational and managerial change and it has been launched a rebranding strategy to link the quality of the product to the quality of the territory enhancing the supply chain. In this regard, it has been implemented a communication strategy through social media. In 2020 the company also introduced a cold room monitoring system with an app. However, till now, it didn’t employ IoT, AI, or Blockchain technologies.

Finally, Simonelli Group owns the mechanical industry. The company doesn’t have used Blockchain technology yet. There is an ongoing project about IoT to support product preventive maintenance. They are also experiencing Big Data applied to CRM. The company uses social media and started to develop an app system related to products. It is a system made up of a connected machine and two platforms: the former is more technical while the latter is more oriented to the coffee culture that supports customers and service connoisseurs. So DT has helped in offering a system package to the customers, rather than a chain between distributors and customers.

4.2 Cross-cases analysis

4.2.1 how dt has been conceived and performed in business practice.

The above analysis depicts a very fragmented scenario, characterised by the adoption of several technologies by the analysed companies, according to different aims and business purposes.

Overall, social media emerged as the most widely used digital technology that companies employ to both communicate and interact with customers, based on a different product or channel page. Despite the social media presence has been usually established for less than five years, the growing investment in such technologies reflects an increasing interest in their current and future adoption. Moderate interest was found in mobile technologies and smart applications. As seen before, Salumificio Ciriaci recently launched an application allowing for automated monitoring of the cold rooms, while Go World anticipated the launch of a multimedia application catalog in 2022 based on high-resolution photographs describing tourism offerings to the final customers. More advanced technologies, such as artificial intelligence applied to production or preventive maintenance, Big Data processing software, blockchain systems, and IoT applications were still under-employed, especially among the smallest firms. Notably, only some companies in the mechanical sector (i.e. Biesse and Simonelli Group) used digital automation and simulation software between machines to improve the overall efficiency of production processes. On the other hand, some respondents highlighted the use of ERP software connected to CRM strategies and tools applied to both customers and sales management (i.e., Doucal’s Srl; Magazzini Gabrielli Spa).

The heterogeneous (and sometimes sparse) adoption of digital technologies by companies is due to several factors, which have been recognised as potential facilitators of or barriers to the digitalisation process. The main facilitators emerging from the interviews can be grouped according to their internal or external origin. Meanwhile, the barriers can be categorised into cultural factors, change management obstacles, or perceived risks associated with DT. Table  3 provides a brief description of such variables.

The above factors influenced the way companies invested in digital technologies and implemented digital tools within the organisation as well as the different impacts of DT on firms’ activities and processes, especially the marketing function.

4.2.2 The role of DT in supporting customer/firms relationships

The increasing use of digital technologies radically changed customer behavior and journey.

The investigated companies recognized that the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a growing willingness on the part of the demand to use digital means to inform themselves, learn about and make purchases, and communicate in both B2B and B2C contexts. Customers have become particularly focused on the digital presence of companies with which they wish to engage, with particular attention to websites and social media pages:

Today, the first point of contact is online, and if we miss the opportunity to make a good impression on the buyer, we risk losing his interest. It is useless to have the best product in the world if you do not know how to present yourself. (Salumificio Ciriaci Srl)

Some companies (e.g., Algam EKO Srl, Ariston Thermo Spa, and Biesse Spa) noted how the digital revolution has led to a sort of ‘hybridisation’ between the customer journey of B2B and B2C customers:

Compared to the past, we have to completely rethink the way we interact with our customers. Today, our customers are looking for new machines online in the same way a consumer is looking for a new smartphone. We are still biased towards B2B logic, but we will have to evolve towards B2B models with B2C logic. (Biesse Spa)

Similarly, Ariston Thermo, while recognizing different types of key-customers (i.e., end-user, installer, technical assistance center, designer, and distributor) considered the importance of DT to define a shared vision among them. Digital technologies, indeed, allowed the company to better interact with the different actors, thus improving its overall customer-centric approach and ability to provide customer-based solutions:

It is necessary to develop a clearer vision of the final purchase process: ‘which digital outlet is contacted?’ ‘How did the customer come into contact with the company?’ ‘How is it possible to bring him on board?’ ‘How can we keep him engaged?’ ‘How can we measure his satisfaction?’ ‘How can we support him?’ To date, the answers to these questions are almost everywhere in the company, but they have never been seen with a customer-centric approach. Once this reasoning has been finalised, hybrid solutions can be developed for other customers in the B2B and B2C contexts. (Ariston Thermo Spa)

Hence, digital technologies usually evolved the customer journey into a more dynamic and interactive process, based on multiple touchpoints through which customers can meet companies and their brands, inform themselves about products and easily specify their needs, expectations, experiences, and (dis)satisfaction. As a result, the investigated companies recognised a greater ability – and propensity – of their customers to collaborate in the value creation process, to achieve tailor-made solutions. Doucal’s Srl, for example, noted that customers today are much more focused on data than in the past and are willing to share data with the company:

We collaborate much more to understand the needs and expectations of the final consumer. Thanks to the amount of data that can be collected online, new prospects for collaboration with the retail world are opening up. (Doucal’s Srl)

Similarly, Eden Viaggi - Alpitour recognised that interactive communication on social media has enabled customers to learn about a travel experience before undertaking it:

Customers are increasingly used to moving between channels at different stages of their customer journey. Many begin to inquire online and then complete the purchase at the agency. (Eden Viaggi - Alpitour Spa)

In this way, customers can increasingly contribute to the co-planning and co-creation of their trip, thus increasing the possibility to achieve more modular packages and make travel changes with greater ease and speed.

The above changes in consumer behavior and the customer journey influenced the firms-customers relationships and how companies manage them. Overall, relationships were intensified as digital technologies allow customers to be reached online, have their technical problems resolved through video-remote assistance, shop online, and enjoy faster and more streamlined interactions with suppliers.

From a technological standpoint, the main tool companies used to manage customer relationships is CRM, which has been recently strengthened to better predict demand, optimise the effectiveness of the sales team, manage contacts, and provide after-sales assistance. Through CRM, companies can benefit from a constantly updated customer history, which they can use as a basis for planning more targeted and timely marketing actions. In many cases, CRM is conceived of as a sort of ‘facilitator’ which was introduced to satisfy the need to track the customer journey more systematically and to interact with the end-user. Furthermore, CRM was used to reduce information asymmetry, simplify the purchasing process by enabling companies to offer customers the most relevant content and products for their needs, and make the sales process more flexible, as the continuous evolution of sales portals allows for selecting or building customized packages and products. Relationships with customers could only benefit from these technological advances.

However, relationship management has also benefited from a different way of managing traditional marketing activities, under the effect of DT. First of all, DT has improved the overall market knowledge and companies’ ability to understand market trends, opportunities, and threats, thus enhancing current and future strategic awareness. Specifically, the increased application of digital tools resulted in significant improvement in customer knowledge thanks to the introduction of specific software, which improved the sales control, as well as the use of social media insights or web analytics enhancing the firms’ ability to address customer expectations and provide targeted marketing proposals:

We do a lot of analysis related to social network insights; we work a lot on web analytics by connecting them with many other data sources. This allows us to analyse in-depth our current and potential customers as well as the customers of our competitors. We are also experimenting with the use of portals that allow complex data analysis, such as Hubspot. (Simonelli Group Srl)

The management of marketing policies has been adapted consequently.

In terms of product, the increasing market knowledge and the possibility to interact with the demand, combined with the adoption of specific software and digital technologies, improved the companies’ ability to provide more innovative and customized solutions. Advanced design software and product lifecycle management platforms have been considered critical tools enabling product simulations and better time-to-market performance (e.g., Ariston Thermo Spa). In some cases, the adoption of virtual reality applications (e.g., Ariston Thermo Spa, Biesse Spa) reduced the need for field tests, resulting in cost savings and shorter lead times. Besides innovation, companies recognized that DT enhances product value enrichment by means of digital sensors that make the product easily connected and more functional. Even in cases where digitalisation mainly concerned service components, companies perceived an increase in their overall value offering due to enrichment of the product’s intangible components. In this regard, the Biesse experience has been emblematic, trough the launch of the ‘Sophia project’, which allowed to provide a new generation of services, including the monitoring of machines’ production, the preventive maintenance, the improvement of customer assistance for maintenance activities, and the overall reduction of delivery times - which avoid downtime and production interruptions. Even in other companies having a more traditional production concept compared to Biesse Spa, it was explicitly stated that digital applications were introduced to support the service offering. For example, Diasen Srl had recently added a Chatbot to the company website, aimed at delivering real-time support in the early stages of the customer journey. Similarly, Algam Eko had developed ad hoc software (i.e. Epoint) that creates a sort of ‘conversational marketing’ with consumers. Even if consumers are unable to find information from retailers, they can use the software to contact the company directly and in real-time via a chat.

Besides product and service innovation, some respondents particularly stressed the role of DT in enhancing the opportunities for product/service customization, as underlined in the tourism sector:

The Travel Template software allows you to create very tailored solutions, by offering an editable technological infrastructure to the final customer. (Eden Viaggi - Alpitour Spa)

Of course, the possibility to provide customized product innovation, aligned with the demand’s expectations, and the increasing ability to engage customers in the firm’s value creation process influenced firms-customers relationships, making them more stable, profitable, and beneficial to both.

Similar thoughts concern the communication policy. The use of digital tools for communication was widespread among the investigated companies. Eden Viaggi - Alpitour Spa reported devoting almost 70% of their communication expenditures on digital channels to date. According to the respondents, this trend has been strongly accelerated by the pandemic but it is likely to continue in the future, as digital technologies allow for quickly reaching the market worldwide with both standardised and targeted messages. Digital communication channels were perceived as effective for several reasons. First, they contribute to increase the brand visibility, giving companies the possibility to achieve new target markets and to align the brand identity with targets’ expectations:

The online presence has allowed for improving the target market, especially reaching the youngest consumers. (Doucal’s Srl) Digital technologies have allowed us to differentiate our branding strategy by cluster and community, which would have been difficult to achieve with traditional tools. Based on the above differentiation, we have developed different brands exploiting the potentiality of the digital presence. (Go World)

In this way, companies improved brand-costumer interactions, enhancing the customer’s engagement with the brand as well as the frequency of interactions with the company.

Digital communication channels also enabled more interactive and personalised communication based on customer needs and interests. Notably, in Diasen Srl, the implementation of CRM software and the use of platforms such as Hubspot made it possible to develop ad hoc and geolocalised promotional activities and to obtain highly detailed information about prospects and customers. Moreover, digital tools facilitated the enrichment of interactive and multimedia content, including informative webinars about product offerings or the introduction of a virtual showroom:

In times of pandemic, we had to adjust our communication strategy to always appear present and up to date in the eyes of customers. For this reason, we have developed new initiatives, such as the ‘Go World Emporium’ (an online shop with products from all over the world) and the ‘Go Europe’, which provides private flights aimed at high-spending targets, to show that we are active and there can be hope in the future, even if with different modalities from the classical tourism. In this period, moreover, there has been a lot of negative communication about travel; it was necessary to show that we can offer something new, especially enhancing local traditions and typical products of tourism destinations. (Go World)

Despite some respondents reported using external agencies specialised in digital communication to fill internal gaps – as DT requires new skills for integrating online communication with the traditional one and properly employing the relative KPIs – companies realized that building long-term customer relationships is, today, unacceptable without the use of modern communication technologies and digital communication channels have become imperative among the firms analysed to provide customers with timely, personalized and meaningful information that increase trust, image, customers’ intimacy and commitment towards the company itself.

Firms-customers relationship improvement further benefited from the digitalization of sales activities. In our study, the area of sales was one of the most influenced by the DT process, which produced an increasing use of digital channels (e.g., e-commerce) besides the traditional ones, as well as the moving towards an omnichannel approach integrating online and offline channels in order to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty. It is worthy of notice the case of Salumificio Ciriaci Srl, which was recently exploring a potential collaboration with an international player, the Asian e-commerce giant Alibaba. While this collaboration has not materialised due to several regulatory issues, it suggests that firms – including small-sized ones – are really open to digitalisation. Alongside the integration of channels, DT has encouraged the improvement of new services related to sales processes (e.g. click & collect, click & home, click & drive), which has been further accelerated by the pandemic. Meanwhile, some firms (e.g., Biesse Spa) explicitly highlighted that DT also required an extensive revision of sales force management, implying the development of training programs to boost salespeople’s abilities and willingness to sell the digital solutions:

Salespersons remained stuck in their product-oriented mindset. They considered machines selling more profitable and used digital services mainly to attract clients into buying extra products. The sales team showed a critical lack of motivation and did not comply with the new digital servitisation strategy until additional organisational measures (KPIs and training) were taken. (Biesse Spa)

Anyway, digital technologies were critical to redesigning the information flow of data along the marketing channels. Firm-salespersons relationships have been reinforced, by means of more interactive communication and the adoption of sales-related CRM software – which improved reporting activities and the interactions between marketing, sales departments, and the overall sales control management – and the firm/customers relationships were generally reinforced since digital channels and services allow companies to generate customer value by designing more customised solutions and distribution plans.

4.2.3 Competencies and culture required to implement DT effectively

Notwithstanding the increasing adoption of digital technologies and the overall awareness of the respondents about the opportunities to use them for marketing purposes and customer relationship management, several concerns and organizational issues still limit their current use and exploitation. For example, although firms recognized the potential of digital technologies to improve market knowledge, in certain companies (e.g. Ariston Thermo Spa, Salumificio Ciriaci Srl), the use of digital tools to this end has been only recently implemented and needs to be further strengthened. In some cases (e.g. Go World), digital tools such as social media were considered unreliable and ineffective, especially when operating with niche targets, while other interviewed have not yet felt the need to use digital technologies for market analysis since they operate in traditional and mature sectors, such as the construction industry.

Some concerns also emerged in relation to branding management in the digital context, since managers feared the potential risk of damaging their brand identity if it is not consistent with the specific nature of each digital channel and related target market. Moreover, they were worried about the need to manage several touchpoints in an integrated way. Indeed, such integration efforts could require substantial human and time resources, which would result in high costs and long-term investments.

Sometimes, DT has been discussed in terms of potential threat also for business-customer relationships. For instance, customers who are reluctant or unable to adopt digital solutions may perceive digitalisation as an obstacle (Biesse Spa). In the tourism sector, disintermediation between agents and customers could worsen the customer experience:

The journey begins when you buy, with the customers’ storytelling, which helps to choose and define the contents of the travel experience. The more one digitises, the more it becomes mass-produced and the more experience is lost, which is the heart of travel. (Go World)

Similarly, in the retailing context, a company interviewed – that was traditionally founded on offline channels – warned of the risk of being unable to grasp the full potential of digital technology by failing to offer customers a usable digital service (e.g. e-commerce, click & pay). It declared to prefer personal dynamics of human relationships and relegated technologies to the role of simplifying processes, such as those of contract acquisitions and the monitoring of sales activities (Magazzini Gabrielli).

Some constraints to DT implementation have been also related to product specificities, as emerged from the analysis of Diasen Srl. It observed how DT has changed the process of introducing customers to the product. In particular, in the first phases of the funnel, some professionals (i.e. architects and engineers) who are more digitally advanced than construction companies and applicators have become ‘influencers’ and gained more power; however, closing negotiations and taking charge of the order still follow traditional logic and channels, as the products are generally extremely complex from a technical point of view.

However, what emerged from this study was a general gap in human skills and firms’ culture, which limits the use of digital tools and the effective implementation of the DT process. The analysed companies are partially aware of it and are trying to find potential solutions.

In terms of human resources, the companies believed they had a gap in digitisation and were taking action to fill them, regardless of size and industry specificities. They considered human resources as a critical means within DT processes, hence they are investing in training programs, which are generally outsourced to external partners, such as consultancy agencies, universities, and specialised research centers. In this respect, traditional figures such as Product Specialist has been transformed into Product Marketing Specialist by learning commercial and digital skills alongside technical ones. Some companies also resorted to external recruitment of already trained figures to occupy certain top-level positions in the organisation, in which they would act as ‘guides’ and ‘incentivise’ change, even for the remaining internal staff:

For a change that affects the approach to work, and consequently the corporate culture, the seed must be grafted with already formed figures who bring that ‘spark’ also from the outside. (Ariston Thermo Spa)

As an example, Diasen Srl introduced the Digital Marketing Specialist, while Biesse Spa established the Digital Marketing Manager (having the role of connector between sales, services, IT, and marketing) and the Customer Journey Builder (who had the task of creating automated e-mail paths to inform customers about the status of the contracts purchased).

However, the best option was a mix of internal training and the acquisition of new resources. Indeed, competencies are new, and the required profiles for managing DT are very complex:

The knowledge and skills required concern the technological field to guide the progress of the platform, the business environment to obtain, analyse and interpret Big Data, and the organisational skills of control and management of change. (Biesse Spa) There is certainly a basic skill, which is IT, that does not change, but digital is not just IT, on the contrary. (Ariston Thermo Spa)

Therefore, both internal and external figures have been exposed to multidisciplinary training, which usually begins with an internal assessment of the organisation’s digital skills to both define a starting point and plan a series of training programmes that will be useful to lead the whole organisation to the next step.

Overall, the development of skills and capabilities integrating technological knowledge with the user experience, user interface, product, and service management implied the adoption of new organizational models for the marketing function as well as for the whole company, which shows increasing simplicity and openness of both internal and external borders. So, DT did not concern only the managerial sphere but also involved the whole organization and the training or acquisition of new resources has been closely linked to strategic planning.

Changes in human skills and structural models have been accompanied by process advances concerning the development of new ways to manage work in project teams as well as a widespread tendency (which, in some cases, is still a necessity) to review the cultural approach of the organisation to overcome the ‘culture of silos’ in favour of more organisational openness inspired by a data-driven orientation. As an expression of this cultural change, DT projects are often managed through a hybrid approach, where top-down leadership drives major changes, and bottom-up initiatives help to iron out the difficulties. This requires specific initiatives, as occurred in Biesse Spa, for instance, where a bi-weekly meeting between managers and employees was established to check on the progress of the DT roadmap. Such meetings allowed managers and employees to share their progress, doubts, and challenges and to effectively collaborate to solve problems.

4.2.4 The role of marketing in DT processes

The marketing function has been implemented in different ways within the companies. In some cases, it covered operational roles mainly related to communication and sales management (e.g., GoWorld); in others, it was a key-strategic function with advanced marketing intelligence and analytics tasks (e.g. Simonelli Group Spa). The increasing use of digital technologies usually changed the role and importance of marketing. Internal interactions with other departments have been substantially improved, thus enhancing the positive contamination of skills and knowledge:

Marketing activities are traditionally widespread within Biesse, as it is a B2B company. The marketing department has been developed over the last years from a specific function that mainly dealt with communication activities (e.g. fair management) to a more integrated and integrative department, coordinating sales, service, and IT processes. (Biesse Spa) The digitalization realized also internally by the company has facilitated the relationships and developed a sort of “business to employee” that has favoured the interchange and the development of knowledge between marketing and the other departments. (Algam EKO Srl)

As a result, marketing operators have acquired a richer knowledge, integrating traditional skills and competencies (e.g. communication skills) with different ones, concerning the use of IT, the production process, as well as sales management.

The marketing department has been developed over the last years from a specific function that mainly dealt with communication activities (e.g. fair management) to a more integrated and integrative department, coordinating sales, service, and IT processes. (Biesse Spa)

The continuous interaction with IT, service and sales functions, and other departments – based on both internal workgroups and the employment of new professional figures with a role of connector – demonstrated essential to develop marketing strategies more in line with the digital innovation process. As a consequence, the role of marketing has improved and become strategically relevant for the companies’ success, since it helps companies to better orient their efforts towards the demand and to provide value propositions aligned with customers’ needs and expectations:

Marketing coordinates the different activities both within the company and within the department itself. It performs communication activities and market analysis controls channels and sales management and plays as a supporter in the development/implementation of new projects. There is a central office that is organized in different subareas, based on their activity, but they usually work in teams, so there is a continuous and transversal exchange, and especially in the last 2 years the logic of connecting all touch points has been applied. (Simonelli Group Spa) The marketing assistant allows us to strengthen the overall company’s market orientation and digital culture, generating quicker and more effective responses to the market . (IT Consult)

Moreover, in some cases, marketing activities have become the catalyst of innovation, as they enhanced the overall understanding of customers, competitors, and market trends, which helps the management to define new products and service solutions. As the respondent of Magazzini Gabrielli stated:

Over the last two years, marketing has assumed an important role in service and driving innovation. (Magazzini Gabrielli)

Similarly, in Biesse Spa, the marketing department has been increasingly working as an enabler of innovative processes as it facilitates their spread and understanding both internally and towards customers. It actively responds to the firm’s need of creating a solid brand image and structure and to co-create value with customers.

Of course, some companies are still in the early stage of marketing development, as they operate in very traditional markets (e.g. Salumificio Ciriaci Srl) and, sometimes, they continue to confuse marketing with few operational activities such as communication (e.g. Doucal’s Srl, Diasen Srl). However, under the pressure of DT, all companies have recently increased their investment in marketing and it has been gradually involved in the strategic decision-making processes:

The company is approaching marketing in recent years, following the generational change and the introduction of digital technologies. Our logo has been redesigned according to the logic of brand repositioning. The site has been entirely remade, including an emotional video able to attract more customers. We have opened a social account intending to communicate the quality of our products and the basic values that characterize us. (Salumificio Ciriaci Srl)

Despite companies often entrusted to external agencies and expertises, as they have not yet developed the required marketing skills internally, DT helped them to acquire a solid awareness of the importance of marketing and of what this function can do for the long-term competitiveness of the company.

5 Discussion and implications

5.1 theoretical implications.

Our findings provide interesting and novel insights addressing the basic research questions underlying this study.

Regarding RQ1 ( How do firms conceive of DT? In particular, how and why they leverage digital technologies for it? ), our results confirm existing evidence that companies are facing heterogeneous paths of DT under the pressure of both exogenous and endogenous factors. They use a variety of digital technologies, some of which (e.g. AI, Big Data, blockchain systems, IoT) are still under-employed. In line with prior research (Gong & Ribiere, 2021 ; Verhoef et al., 2021 ), this finding suggests that DT is perceived and implemented by companies in different ways, but it is an ongoing process usually starting with digitisation and then arriving at the DT stage by way of the ‘digitalisation’ phase. The investigated companies that were using common technologies, such as social media and mobile and smart applications, were still in the intermediate step of ‘digitalisation’, which implies the encoding of analogic information into a digital format to improve existing business processes (Verhoef et al., 2021 ). Only few companies (e.g. Biesse and Simonelli Group) had nearly reached the ultimate stage of DT, which involves a strong adaptation of their internal procedures, organisation, and business model. Consistent with Hinterhuber et al., ( 2021 ), the interviewed companies are usually aware of the opportunities linked to digital technologies in terms of business process efficiency, professional ability improvements, and increases in the speed and control of processes. Yet, at the practical level, DT is not without pitfalls, as it implies important cultural and organisational changes. Moreover, managers tend to adopt a prudent attitude towards DT, as they recognise potential risks (e.g. loss of contact with customers, a potential digital divide within the company) that could negatively affect the long-term survival and competitiveness of the firm. The extant literature has mainly focused on motivators and triggering factors underlying DT. Thus, an original and novel contribution of the present study is its identification of such barriers to DT and the ways in which companies are trying to overcome them. As discussed later in this section, this contribution can inform practical suggestions and potentially useful interventions for companies undergoing a digitalisation process.

However, the most important contribution of this study is its overall investigation of the relationship between marketing and the DT phenomenon. Krishen et al., ( 2021 ) have recently noted that research on digital marketing is still growing, and more of these analyses are needed, as their findings have often been discordant. Moreover, the existing literature is quite fragmented, as studies have focused on single marketing activities or decisions, such as pricing (e.g. Abrate et al., 2012 ) or distribution (e.g. Hansen & Sia, 2015 ), rather than on marketing as a whole process and approach.

By contrast, this study investigated how digital technologies can reshape strategic and operational marketing activities, thus changing (i) the way firms/customers relationships are managed, (ii) how marketing skills and activities are organized, and (iii) the overall role and importance of marketing within the company.

As for the first issue (i.e. RQ2: what are the impacts that DT is currently having on marketing activities and firm-customer relationships?) , digital technologies offered companies an increasing amount of data and improved the ability to collect, store, process, and transmit information (Sheth, 2021 ; Wedel & Kannan, 2016 ). Such information can be easily conveyed and used to align offerings to a variety of demands by enhancing the coordination and synchronisation of production and distribution processes (i.e. the transfer from warehouses to distributors, order management, and related services). Overall, our results reveal that DT can improve a company’s responsiveness to customer needs, by promotingand new ways of managing the strategic and operational aspects of marketing processes. At the product level, for instance, the interviewed companies recognised that DT not only boosted simplicity in how customers learn about, find, purchase, and consume products and services but also increased efficacy in how products are conceived, realised, and tested. An example that was mentioned was the application of virtual reality to test products, which saved money and reduced lead time. At the communication level, digital channels received large attention by the investigated companies as they facilitate interactive and personalised communication. In line with prior studies (e.g., Zhang & Lin 2015 ) social media channels, for example, are currently employed by all the analysed firms, regardless of sector and firm-size, as they recognise the opportunity to allow customers to easily access to both products and information, which became particularly critical in times of pandemic crisis. Digital transformation also impacted the content of marketing messages, which nurtured brand strategies by focusing more on company values than on the technical features of products. At the same time, there was an awareness and concern regarding the need to manage many touchpoints in an integrated way. Concerning distribution, companies highlighted how DT encouraged an omnichannel approach to increasing customer satisfaction and loyalty. Furthermore, some companies observed that DT prompted an extension revision of sales management by uncovering the salient need for training programmes and new managerial positions. Finally, at the pricing level, DT enabled personalised offers and dynamic pricing. All this resulted in a more customized approach to the market, based on ongoing interaction with customers who can express their needs and participate in the value-creation process more easily and effectively than it was in the past. Besides that, the increasing amount of information can also impact the demand side by boosting consumer empowerment (Auh et al., 2019 ; Akhavannasab et al., 2018 ). The customer journey has been changed in both B2B and B2C contexts. Some of the bigger companies analysed talked about a ‘hybridisation’ of the customer journey because even in the B2B market, the huge availability of information pushes players to adopt typical paradigms of B2C environments. This hybridization imposes the organisation of marketing processes in a customer-centric way (Shah et al., 2006 ), even if it requires important investments. Notably, through CRM, customer knowledge can be constantly updated and diffused within a company, and marketing actions can be better targeted – often in real time. In this respect, CRM can be considered a kind of ‘facilitator’ to manage relationships and interact with customers at different stages of the customer journey (Nasir, 2015 ). Overall, in a DT context, the firm-customer relationships are usually strengthened, experiencing more stability and long-term satisfaction, as individual gratification is enhanced when people feel listened to (Collins, 2022 ).

The growing adoption of digital technologies also influenced how the marketing function is organised and its internal resources and capabilities are managed, providing empirical evidence answering our RQ3 ( What is impact of DT on marketing organization and competences? ). Enhancement of the strategic and analytical dimension of marketing tends to imply the need to improve cross-functional coordination between business units, which favours the adoption of informal integration mechanisms and a significant strengthening of coordination activities.

Consistent with Graesch et al., ( 2021 ), our findings reflect the importance of integrating marketing and IT areas to maintain a fair balance between digitisation and market objectives. If excessive weight is attributed to the technological dimension, there may be a risk of creating a value proposition that does not correspond to real customer needs. Hence, it is vital to improve communication between marketing and other corporate functions, especially those managing the digitisation process, to promote inter-functional coordination and the sharing of common objectives. This effort can sometimes require the introduction of new professional figures, the adaptation of existing skills through repeated training courses, or the development of a new approach to organisational problems based on overcoming ‘silo culture’ and opening up to flatter, flexible structures such that information can flow rapidly across the borders between marketing and other company departments. Over and above, to effectively realise DT, our study suggests an immense need for cultural change, as some scholars have remarked (Leeflang et al., 2014 ; Wedel & Kannan, 2016 ). In some cases among the analysed companies, the cultural inadequacy of management – mainly intended as a lack of culture of change that is necessary to reduce.

individual resistance to technology and related organizational changes – as proved to be a factor hindering the company’s ability to progress in the field of digital innovations. This finding underlines the need to start a process of acculturation for the internal staff of a company and the marketing area to promote the spread of a common culture, language, and way of thinking in compliance with the company’s innovative objectives.

Finally, the research findings recommend an overall improvement of the strategic role of marketing within the analysed companies, which provides evidence to address our RQ4 ( How might DT have changed the overall role and importance of marketing within firms? ). The interviews reflected a growing awareness of the strategic importance of marketing as a result of the recent pandemic crisis as well, which has made more evident the need to defend the competitive position with new and refined tools and methods (Savelli et al., 2021 ). However, under the pressure of DT, it further emerged that marketing no longer has the traditional role of aligning the variety allowed by technologies with consumers’ needs. Indeed, digital technologies are definitively replacing standardisation with customisation, thus improving opportunities to satisfy customers’ needs and wants. Hence, to some extent, digitalisation moderates the role of marketing as a ‘reducer’ of market complexity that increases the possibility of matching the production variance to diversified needs. Consequently, the role of marketing is changing to that of a creator of appropriate languages that allow for an effective interaction both between business functions and between firms and customers. Our findings suggest that marketing is increasingly becoming a connector of different skills and a strategic function for companies in strengthening the digital culture without losing sight of the market orientation and consumer culture (Shah & Murthi, 2021 ). When shifting the focus from the product to the language, the examined companies demonstrated a need to devote more attention to strategic marketing decisions (i.e. targeting and positioning) as well as achieve greater integration between marketing and other business units to increase collaboration and internal coordination. This perspective could imply that traditional marketing is in decline, which would leave space for a more interactive and less centralised approach in which customers (in both B2B and B2C settings) play an increasingly active role in the value creation process.

5.2 Practical implications

Potential barriers and risks associated with DT can delay digital evolution and sometimes limit its exploitation, especially among the smallest firms. Therefore, there is a need for proper interventions at both the firm level and the public/institutional level. Specifically, the present findings indicate the urgency of three paths of intervention occurring at the cultural, organisational, and relational levels.

Overcoming existing cultural barriers and employee resistance to collaboration in DT is the basic condition. It might be achieved through the use of initiatives, such as internal communication campaigns that reinforce employees’ awareness of digital technologies or ad hoc rewards that encourage the commitment and interest of personnel in digital innovation. Senior and top-level management should assume a key role. By endorsing cross-functional projects, they could enhance inter-function collaborations and knowledge sharing, thus fostering cultural empathy.

Besides the cultural domain, organisational changes are also necessary to properly exploit DT opportunities. Such changes are critical since they involve both structural and human dimensions. The interviewed companies were suffering from a lack of competencies and technological skills. Moreover, a few cases highlighted the matter of the managerial approach to DT, from which different suggestions derive. In this respect, internal training activities should be improved to raise engagement and understanding of digital technologies and enhance the ability and willingness of employees to properly use digital solutions. Companies should offer internal training courses and promote external training activities by private and public institutions (e.g. higher education, universities). Since the introduction of new expertise demands economic efforts and long-term investments, activating collaboration with an external supplier while building internal competencies and know-how was a valid solution among the analysed companies. As for the managerial approach, the companies varied from top-down to bottom-up approaches. Maybe there is no one solution that is best for every situation. However, the same managers recommended a mixed-leadership approach as an effective solution. Such approach combines a bottom-up orientation with a top-down one; in this way, top managers can maintain a strategic role in guiding the DT process and minimising resistance, while bottom-up initiatives can facilitate engagement and commitment. To this end, the use of regular measurements (e.g. reports, meetings) might be useful for making incremental DT progress visible.

Finally, because the successful realisation of DT depends on an increasing number of actors, all subjects must collaborate towards the same goal and act as partners in the same project. This partnership requires a positive attitude towards co-creation, the ability to work together, and, above all, a stable and trust-based relationship network that assists firms in accessing digital resources. Particularly, at the inter-organisational level, communication with dealers, suppliers, and final customers could be augmented by regular visits, rewards programs, and training initiatives aimed at encouraging collaboration and long-term relationships.

6 Conclusions, limitations, and future research directions

This study has investigated the complex relationship between DT and marketing through a multiple-case study approach. In summary, the contribution of this exploratory analysis is twofold. First, unlike existing studies, which have been fragmented and focused specifically on single activities or decisions, the present research considers marketing as a whole strategy and process, thus generating a holistic view of DT implications. The findings reveal some important changes concerning the role and organisation of marketing and the management of its activities. As part of a technologically intensive context in which both firm and customer behaviours are rapidly evolving, marketing should support the development of new business models and refine the traditional ones. Although marketing was implemented in varying ways among the investigated firms, DT enhanced its strategic role: marketing goals appeared less related to policy (i.e. 4P) management, the time horizon of decision-making became wider, analytical and control activities were carried out more systematically, and channel relationship management intensified. Moreover, organisational structures tended to flatten and be simplified, and the connections between marketing and other business functions become even more critical, which gestures to a systemic and customer-oriented approach as the most effective option. Overall, DT implies an improvement in the ability of marketing to more deeply and creatively understand the challenging trends of the society and the market. This change can enable a company to offer innovative products and services that meet the needs of the target demand, thus providing benefits to both customers and the company itself.

Second, the study has identified potential risks and barriers to DT encountered by the firms, especially the smallest ones. From these risks and barriers, we derive some useful recommendations for managers and policymakers. We particularly underline the need to intervene in three main dimensions: the cultural dimension to foster employees’ awareness and interest in digital technologies and inter-functional collaboration; the organisational dimension to fill gaps in competencies and technological skills and improve the managerial approach to DT, and the relational dimension to encourage collaboration and long-term relationships among the network of actors involved in DT.

Like any research, this study is subject to limitations, which can reveal fruitful opportunities for future research. First, the multiple case study research method presents some shortcomings. A main concern is the generalisation of results; while beyond the scope of our analysis, future research could seek to empirically validate the results with a larger sample. Moreover, this study considered 11 case studies within a single region, Marche, of a single country, Italy. Future studies could use a wider sample representing different geographical areas. Finally, it could be interesting for a future study to follow the transformation of investigated firms according to a longitudinal approach. Such research could illustrate the effects of the transformation in the medium to long term, including in terms of economic and competitive performance.

In conclusion, the findings of our research show that DT marks a new era of marketing evolution. The digital technological leap corresponds with increasing compliance between marketing theory and practice, especially among SMEs. It is well known that the predominance of SMEs has been a determining factor in the ‘ Marketing-non marketing all’italiana ’ (Varaldo et al., 2006 ), which features peculiar characteristics compared to the standard of managerial theory. Digital transformation seems to favour a realignment of the theoretical/conceptual and practical dimensions of marketing, which makes it easier and more practicable to conduct certain strategic activities, such as market analysis, market segmentation, and marketing mix customisation. This evolution has also highlighted the relevance of marketing for a firm’s competitiveness and success.

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Acknowledgements

The Authors would like to thank the participants at the research group: Andrea Perna, Valerio Temperini, Luca Marinelli, Chiara Ancillai, Pier Luigi Fraboni, Martina Pellegrino, Elisa Barbizzi, Silvia Gallegati (Università Politecnica delle Marche, AN, Italy); Tonino Pencarelli, Fabio Musso, Roberta Bocconcelli, Alessandro Pagano, Marco Cioppi, Barbara Francioni, Ilaria Curina, Emanuela Conti (University of Urbino Carlo Bo, PU, Italy); Elena Cedrola, Patrizia Silvestrelli (University of Macerata, MC, Italy).

Special thanks to the companies and staffs who participated in this study, for their collaboration in carrying out the research project.

Open access funding provided by Università Politecnica delle Marche within the CRUI-CARE Agreement.

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Pascucci, F., Savelli, E. & Gistri, G. How digital technologies reshape marketing: evidence from a qualitative investigation. Ital. J. Mark. 2023 , 27–58 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s43039-023-00063-6

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Digital economy, green dual innovation and carbon emissions, 1. introduction, 2. theoretical framework and hypotheses, 2.1. digital economy and carbon emissions, 2.2. the mediating role of green dual innovation, 2.3. the moderating role of social concerns, 3. empirical analysis of the impact of the digital economy on carbon emissions, 3.1. model construction, 3.2. variable description and data source, 3.2.1. variable description, 3.2.2. data source and description, 3.3. regression analysis of benchmark model, 3.4. robustness test, 3.5. endogenous analysis, 4. mechanisms of the digital economy’s role in carbon emissions, 4.1. model construction for mechanism testing, 4.2. analysis of mediating effects based on green dual innovation, 4.3. panel threshold analysis based on green dual innovation, 4.4. analysis of moderating effects based on social concerns, 5. further analysis, 5.1. heterogeneity analysis based on foreign investment, 5.2. heterogeneity analysis based on technology transactions, 5.3. heterogeneity analysis based on geographic location, 6. conclusions and policy recommendations, author contributions, institutional review board statement, data availability statement, acknowledgments, conflicts of interest.

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Zhang, Y.; Liu, X.; Yang, J. Digital Economy, Green Dual Innovation and Carbon Emissions. Sustainability 2024 , 16 , 7291. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16177291

Zhang Y, Liu X, Yang J. Digital Economy, Green Dual Innovation and Carbon Emissions. Sustainability . 2024; 16(17):7291. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16177291

Zhang, Yu, Xiaomeng Liu, and Jiaoping Yang. 2024. "Digital Economy, Green Dual Innovation and Carbon Emissions" Sustainability 16, no. 17: 7291. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16177291

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