Reworking Boundaries: A Qualitative Case Study on Engineers’ Professional Identity and Habitus in the Face of Digital Transformation

Digital transformation has the potential to fundamentally change organizations, to alter working conditions, and to redefine core employee competencies. Such changes may spark novel dynamics between employee groups. In this study, we focus on engineers as a professional group that is particularly affected by these changes and examine emerging group dynamics in response to digital transformation. Drawing on a qualitative case study, we investigate how engineers construct group identities and status in relation to the increasing importance of software experts. We show that engineers experience digital transformation as an identity threat that leads to a pronounced awareness of their professional habitus and an identity (re)negotiation. If not approached carefully, digital transformation may trigger adverse group dynamics and jeopardize the overall transformation process.