The Role of Digital Technology in Scaling Social Innovations

Abstract

Objective: social innovation plays a crucial role in addressing social challenges, but innovation initiatives can be remote and short-term. Scalability is essential for ex-panding the impact of these solutions, thus making it critical to investigate the factors that may contribute to this process. A promising approach to enhancing the scalability of social innovations lies in the use of digital technology. The objective of this study was to understand how digital technologies contribute to scale social innovations. Methods: we conducted a qualitative multiple case study that analyzed three social innovation initiatives. Results: our key contributions include: (1) identifying different types of digital technology that can be applied in the social context; (2) providing evidence that scaling out, scaling up, and scaling deep can occur simultaneously and reinforce one another; (3) understanding the role of technology in scaling social innovations by facilitating operationalization, strengthening trust, and building relationships and network engagement. Conclusions: it is expected that the results and contributions will foster reflections on the importance of establishing a digital infrastructure that favors initiatives aimed at solving societal challenges.