Purpose: Most organizations integrate technology innovation through a complex, ad-hoc, topdown model of assimilation. However, a continuous and autonomous adaptation process may be more natural and improve the quality of assimilation. Organizational workers who function as “fractals” in a Complex Adaptive System (CAS) demonstrate higher quality of digital technology usage. The current study investigates whether “fractal workers” demonstrate more positive attitudes toward technology innovation, and whether these attitudes translate into quality technology usage. Design/methodology/approach: Online questionnaires were completed by a sample of 300 workers in 20 organizations that have recently introduced technology innovation. Pearson and regression analyses were used to examine the relationships between the functioning of workers as CAS fractals and their attitudes toward the innovation, and between their attitudes and the quality of technology usage. Findings: A strong positive correlation was found between functioning as CAS fractals and the attitudes toward technology innovation, and between these attitudes and the quality of technology usage. Practical implications: Increasing the autonomy of workers and encouraging them to function as CAS fractals within the organizational environment can facilitate an efficient, dynamic, and continuous process of adaptation to technology innovation. Originality/value: To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first empirical research to study how functioning as a CAS fractal translates into attitudes toward technology innovation and to technology usage within organizations. It sheds light on the important differences between assimilation and adaptation of technology innovation.

Introduction

The development of digital technologies and the Internet has had a remarkable impact, not only on the lives of individuals, but also on the organizational working and decision making process. Digital information technologies (IT) can facilitate the conversion of information collected in the organization and from specialized workers in it into organizational knowledge, by allowing global and updated communication, distribution of relevant content, and the sharing of work between workers, while transcending the limitations of time, place, and specialties (Potter & Mcgittigan, 2013; Tsui & Malhotra, 2005). As such, digital IT facilitate the generation of customer-tailored solutions and products in organizations (Stacey, Griffin, & Shaw, 2000) and shorten the duration required to integrate these solutions and products into the market (Jackson, 2008). Today, small organizations appear to increasingly use multidirectional communication applications (e.g.,Twitter) to better cope with a complex market and strong competition, while organizational workers use digital applications to enhance communication capabilities, distribute information, and make shared decisions within the organization. The type of digital applications that organizational workers use within the organization is influenced by the type of digital applications that they use in their personal lives, namely, by the culture, communication methods, and commerce that are typical of the surrounding environment (Gálvez-Rodríguez, Caba-Pérez, & López-Godoy, 2016). Nevertheless, in contrast to how digital applications typically enter the personal surroundings of the workers, many organizations still employ a relatively slow and complex process of implementing information systems, including digital applications. Such complex processes may detach the daily functioning of the workers from their organizational functioning, thus impairing the ability of the organization to connect with its environment, sell its products, or match between its products and the needs of clients.