Identifying Gaps in Institutional Theory

Institutional theory has been applied to various dimensions of extant IS literature. The major part of this literature, however, is dedicated to studying the influence of institutional isomorphic mechanisms at macro level in bringing legitimacy to organisational structure through IT/IS adoption, development, and use. The influences of micro activities and the interplay between macro and micro activities in bringing success and efficiency to the institutionalisation process have been given little attention. This paper utilises the institutional logics concept to identify existing gaps in institutional theory. The proposed framework aims to fill these gaps by utilising institutional theory in conjunction with technology-organisation-environment (TOE) framework. This paper concludes with an illustrative case study of a utility organisation in Australia to show how suitable management of interactions between macro and micro institutional logics through various stages of ERP institutionalisation helped this organisation to experience success and performance, in addition to legitimacy.