IT Mindfulness and ICT-Enabled Innovation: The Roles of Techno-Invasion, Cyberslacking and Age

What is it about?

Both technological factors and human elements—such as employees and broader organizational dynamics—can either facilitate or hinder ICT-enabled innovation. Successful innovation in this context depends on employees' ability to recognize and capitalise on opportunities to enhance system use. Mindfulness serves as a potential enabler by fostering awareness and proactive problem-solving, helping to mitigate emerging challenges. Additionally, technology mediates human-organization interactions, shaping how employees engage with ICT in the workplace. This mediation can have both positive and negative implications, as seen in phenomena like techno-invasion, which influences employees' experiences with digital systems. Recognizing the balancing act employees often perform to cope with techno-invasion, this study further explores the role of cyberslacking. To provide a comprehensive understanding, employee age is also examined as a moderating variable. Data from 358 public school teachers reveal that while IT mindfulness facilitates ICT-enabled innovation, techno-invasion poses a significant barrier. Moreover, the findings indicate that minor cyberslacking moderates the indirect relationship between IT mindfulness and innovation. A significant three-way interaction was observed among techno-invasion, minor cyberslacking, and age in shaping ICT-enabled innovation. This study underscores the intricate interplay between technological and human factors, demonstrating that innovation is not driven by technology alone but also shaped by organizational and behavioural dynamics. Furthermore, the findings highlight the dual role of cyberslacking, which can either foster or impede innovation. This dual nature of technology can be considered a pharmakon, both a remedy and a poison.

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Photo by Never Dull Studio on Unsplash

Photo by Never Dull Studio on Unsplash

Why is it important?

The present study holds theoretical significance as it examines the widely neglected socio-technical context of ICT and employes affordance theory to examine the research model. Practically, it paves the way for understanding how teachers’ use of digital technology facilitates or hinders innovation. It was revealed that along with the prerequisites of modern technological infrastructure or research and development efforts, human-technology interaction should also be considered a critical factor for ICT-enabled innovation. Also, cyberslacking was found to have both negative and positive effects on innovation. This finding is significant since it explains the context in which minor cyberslacking can fuel innovation or act as a barrier. The findings suggested that despite the direct impact of minor cyberslacking being positive, when acting as a moderator, it exacerbated the negative effect of techno-invasion on ICT-enabled innovation. While cyberslacking may provide temporary relief from immediate stressors, the findings suggested that it also stifles ICT-enabled innovation, acting more as a hindrance than a solution. This dual nature of technology can be considered a pharmakon, both a remedy and a poison. The very technology that enables cyberslacking and can be used for coping with techno-invasion is actually the source of the problem, causing techno-invasion. Hence, it is clear that the impact of cyberslacking within organizational contexts is complicated. This study contributes to a deeper understanding of the complexities of cyberslacking, highlighting its multifaceted effects and enriching scholarly discourse on the subject.