Jonny Holmstrom

Biography

Jonny Holmstrom was born in Arvidsjaur in 1968. He received his Ph.D. from Umeå University in 2000, and has been a visiting scholar at Georgia State University and Florida International University. Holmstrom is a senior editor at Information and Organization and serves at the editorial boards for European Journal of Information Systems and Communications of the AIS. Holmstrom has written 2 books and has published over 100 scholarly articles in professional journals and edited volumes. He is also a popular speaker on digital, economic and political issues, issues which he is also actively debating on Twitter. Holmstrom has also conducted a series of interviews with thought leaders in the digital innovation realm discussing topics such as the challenges and opportunities for scholars in the digital world, what constitutes a strong research environment, and what practical implications we should expect from scholars today.

Work

Jonny Holmstrom is a professor of Informatics at Umeå University and director and co-founder of the Swedish Center for Digital Innovation. He writes, consults and speaks on topics such as IT management, IT innovation, and strategies for leveraging IT-based value for firms. Holmstrom is the founder and CEO for Holmstrom Management and Communications, co-founder and CEO for Remus Minds, and co-founder of Remus Technologies. He uses rigorous research to gain insight into how firms can leverage value from IT use. His work has appeared in journals such as Communications of the AIS, Convergence, Design Issues, European Journal of Information Systems, Industrial Management and Data Systems, Information and Organization, Information Resources Management Journal, Information Systems Journal, Information Technology and People, Journal of the AIS, Journal of Global Information Technology Management, Journal of Strategic Information Systems, Research Policy, Scandinavian Journal of Information Systems, and The Information Society.

IT and Organizational Change

Holmstrom’s early work examined the interaction between information technology and organizations. Prior research often assumed information technology to be either an objective, external force with deterministic impacts on organizations, or the outcome of social action. Holmstrom’s research suggested that either view is incomplete, and he proposed to take both perspectives into account. Drawing from actor-network theory as analytical lens, Holmstrom has explored the role of IT in contexts such as municipal organizations, airports, and digital cash projects. In these studies, Holmstrom stressed the notion of non-human agency in which processes, technological tools and other similar concepts can be viewed as non-human actors that acquire an identity of their own.

Digital Innovation

In more recent research, Holmstrom has addressed digital innovation and digital transformation, specifically how organizations are dealing with “the digitization of everything” as a challenge and an opportunity. To deal with digital transformation, Holmstrom argues that organizations need to develop a comprehensive digital strategy. Holmstrom’s research addresses how digital capabilities increasingly determines which companies create or lose value. Among these studies we find studies of firms in the mining industry, the paper and pulp industry, and the publishing industry. He also published a Harvard Business School case focusing on the ways in which digitization brings challenges as well as opportunities to firms in the publishing industry.

Awards

Jonny Holmstrom was awarded a post-doctoral fellowship by the STINT Foundation (The Swedish Foundation for International Co-operation in Research and Higher Education) for post-doctoral research at Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA in 2000/2001. He was also awarded a fellowship by the STINT Foundation to enable a visiting research position at Decision Sciences and Information Systems Department, College of Business Administration, Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA, in 2004. Holmstrom received Royal Skytteanska Samfundets award for young researchers at the Social Sciences faculty, Umeå University, in 2005, and Nordea’s Scientific Award 2007. In 2009 he received Umeå University’s Young Researcher Award and the AIS senior scholars award for best IS journal paper of the year in 2010. Holmstrom was also awarded with the Pedagogical Award of the Year in the IS discipline in Sweden 2011 by the Swedish Association of Information Systems.

Consulting

Over the past decade, Holmstrom has consulted with for-profit and non-profit organizations about how to manage digital technology. His recent engagements include the tech lab Remus Technologies.