Digital Company and e-Management The new organizational environment

Gone are the days when digital technologies and the Internet were integrated into the corporate landscape, and now we're witnessing the systematization of their use – and the changes they generate – in the diversity of personal and professional situations. Private and public companies, local authorities and institutions are all equally concerned by this societal transformation, despite their respective purposes.

The gradual expansion of the functional scope of management is in line with the growing influence of digital technologies on the company, in the general sense of the term. It concerns, in a broadened spectrum, the methods of information, communication, collaboration, knowledge sharing and collective intelligence specific to any work organization. Above all, it takes place against a backdrop of increasing use of these technologies in both the private and professional spheres.

If the question of how management should evolve is becoming increasingly acute today, it has its origins in the major changes companies have had to face since the mid-1970s. At that time, a new form of work organization emerged, distinguished from the previous one by a refocusing on core business activities, in conjunction with the growing process of outsourcing and subcontracting of less central tasks. At the same time, this modality requires the formalization of a more structured and rational organization, through a mechanism that will later accelerate – with the extension of digital technologies and the Internet – in the concept of the extended enterprise. At the same time, this change is leading to a far-reaching reflection on the redefinition of the company through the expression of its identity, culture and ethics.

In 1977, in his book The Visible Hand of Managers, Chandler demonstrated the importance of coordination in the production of a good. In this way, the company proves to be more efficient than the market, thanks to the attention it pays to its own organization. The latter provides managers with a clear understanding of the sequence of tasks they supervise, and knowledge of the various elements that make up the production chain for a product, as well as its distribution. Chandler's demonstration is based on the emergence of a new form of enterprise – in monopoly or oligopoly – which replaces the previous one characterized by information asymmetry between the elements of its ecosystem. The gradual structuring of the company's hierarchical system, with its emphasis on managerial information, remedied some of the shortcomings previously observed. In this context, the 1980s saw the emergence of personal computing before – 10 years later – the emergence of digital technologies and the Internet, against a backdrop of market globalization and growing international...