Two Tales of Technology: Business and IT Managers’ Technological Frames Related to Cloud Computing

While cloud computing is becoming a mainstream IT sourcing option, especially large companies struggle with the internal governance of cloud and the issue of shadow IT. This study takes a technological frames perspective to contrast the knowledge and expectations that business versus IT stakeholders have regarding cloud IT. Our interview data from 20 business and IT managers display the incongruences between these two groups’ technological frames and how this relates to their governing actions: While business managers emphasize the benefits frames of cloud computing and tend to undermine IT governance, IT managers stress its threat frames and their desire to strengthen the IT governance framework. We discuss how these frame incongruences are related and how they can be resolved. This discussion contributes to the literature a stakeholder-specific view that may help understand the duality of the shadow IT phenomenon. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.