Conceptualization of the Organizational Digital Strategy

The advancement of digital technologies in recent years has affected almost all businesses in all industries. the transformation resulting from these digital technologies is inevitable for businesses, and what determines the winner and loser in this environment is the knowledge and ability to use these technologies strategically. therefore, the role of it strategy in business should be reconsidered and instead of addressing it at the operational level, a business-level strategy should be developed to compete in this digital transformation environment. such a strategy is called digital strategy or digital business strategy or digital transformation strategy. since digital transformation is a new concept and its related strategies in business are not well conceptualized, this research seeks to conceptualize what digital strategy is in an organization using meta-synthesis method. for this purpose, during seven stages of meta-synthesis, related researches in this field were identified from valid scientific databases and by filtering them, 18 studies were selected for the coding process. in the coding process, 8 main pillars were extracted to identify the various aspects involved in the definition of the digital strategy. the result of this study defines digital strategy as follows: “digital strategy is part or all of the business-level strategy that is agile and creates value by creating and utilizing digital resources and capabilities at all levels and units of an organization. this strategy, by aligning and integrating vertically and horizontally within the organization and coopetition in a dynamic business ecosystem, redefines all the different dimensions of business and recreates relationships with customers, employees, and all actors in this digital ecosystem.” the results of this research can be useful in the formulation and proper implementation of digital strategy in the organization and become a basis for identifying its dimensions and types in academic researches.