Social media and constructing the digital identity of organizations: A bibliometric analysis

Abstract

Objective: The study aimed to map the stock of knowledge on organizational identity in a digital environment.

Research Design & Methods: We systematically reviewed the literature to map the current research landscape and identify gaps that need to be addressed to better understand how organizational identity is constructed in a digital environment. We used a bibliometric visual analysis to provide a comprehensive overview of the field. We ran a co-occurrence of words analysis to identify central and peripheral themes.

Findings: Organizational identity and digital organizational identity seem to be topics detached from mainstream research. Most of the literature has adopted the individual level of analysis and left other levels of analysis unattended, including the organizational level in particular. We see this gap as a major theoretical and empirical vacuum in the existing literature.

Implications & Recommendations: We identified a research gap regarding the lack of research on the construction of organizational identity in the digital environment at various levels of analysis. We also found that scholars did not devote attention to the micro level of analysis, i.e. individual interactions such as posts, tweets, etc. although it may be instrumental to the construction of an organization’s digital identity.

Contribution & Value Added: The article contributes to research on organizational identity shaped in the digital world, especially from the perspective of social media. We show gaps in existing approaches and levels of analysis.

Keywords

communication, digital communication, digital identity, social media, organizational identity

Author Biography

Wojciech Czakon

Wojciech Czakon is Full Professor of Strategy at the Faculty of Management and
Communication of the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland. His research revolves around
the behavioral underpinnings of strategic decisions and actions. Recent publications focus on
the role of trust, perceptions, preferences and frames in various strategic decisions and their
performance impact. Guest-editor of several special issues and organizer of workshops and
conference tracks on coopetition. Member of the Polish Academy of Sciences Committee for
Management and Organization Science, former vice-president of EURAM.

Monika Jedynak

Monika Jedynak is an assistant professor at the Institute of Economics, Finance and Management of the Jagiellonian University in Krakow. Her scientific interests focus on inter-organizational cooperation, in particular socially responsible cooperation. A new direction of research is the processes of digital transformation of organizations, the formation of digital identity of organizations and the role of social media in these processes

Karolina Mania

Karolina Mania (Ph.D. in law) is an assistant professor in the Institute of Economics, Finance and Management at the Jagiellonian University and an attorney-at-law. Karolina Mania received several prestigious research grants: The National Science Centre The Kosciuszko Foundation scholarship, SYLFF Research Abroad, The Ryoichi Sasakawa Young Leaders Fellowship Fund Program. She is an expert in funding programs and tenders managed by the European Commission and other EU bodies in the field of Internet law and ODR.  Since 2019, she is the President of the Kosciuszko Foundation Alumni Association. She is the author of a monograph on online dispute resolution (ODR) "Internet domain as the object of amicable settlement of disputes" (Wolters Kluwer Polska, 2016) and multiple papers on the use of electronic communication in a legal sector and legal technology. Field of research: Internet law, e-Commerce, alternative dispute resolution, online dispute resolution, legal management, legal technology.

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