Johanne Thunes

• Gualdi, Francesco & Thunes, Johanne (2026). The Public Sector Is Outsourcing Paradox: A Theoretical Reflection. Proceedings of European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS). doi: https:/aisel.aisnet.org/ecis2026/govtrans/govtrans/14/. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  While digital transformation (DT) of the public sector implies that digital technologies become deeply integrated in the public sector’s structures, service delivery, and operations, IS outsourcing is a strategic decision to move digital technologies and competencies out of the organisation. In this paper, we ask if there is a fundamental contradiction between IS outsourcing strategies and the pursuit of DT within the public sector. To explore this potential incompatibility, we build on paradox theory and identify paradoxical tensions to expose how the aims of DT in the public sector may conflict with ongoing IS outsourcing efforts. By exposing this paradox, we call for more research and critical reflections related to these paradoxical tensions and exhort policymakers to carefully consider whether the IS outsourcing strategies they are pursuing are still compatible with the goals and values of public sector DT.

• Thunes, Johanne; Kempton, Alexander Moltubakk & Grisot, Miria (2025). Making Health Data Infrastructures. An infrastructuring perspective on data work perspective on data work. Scandinavian Journal of Information Systems (SJIS). ISSN 0905-0167. 37. doi: 10.17705/3SJIS/037.29. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Healthcare organizations strive to become increasingly data-driven. Achieving this vision requires significant efforts to make data accessible, intelligible, and integrated into healthcare practices. In this paper, we explore data work as infrastructuring, focusing on the ongoing practices required to make and maintain data infrastructures in municipal healthcare. Based on an interpretive case study of a Scandinavian health agency, we identify four distinct data infrastructuring work practices: accessing, structuring, reconfiguring, and visualizing data. Our findings show how these practices enable a sociotechnical network of health data embedded in local practices. Through this study, we make three contributions to the research on data work. First, our findings expand the empirical knowledge on data work in healthcare by showing data work in the backrooms of healthcare where data infrastructures are set up and developed. Second, we contribute to the conceptualization of data work by framing it as infrastructuring, meaning data work aimed at enabling a sociotechnical network of health data embedded in local practices. Third, we elaborate on this conceptualization by showing how it involves efforts at transforming data from objects of work to embedded enablers of work.

• Utvik, Vetle Alvenes & Thunes, Johanne (2025). Distributing The Value Of Digital Innovation: A Digital Public Goods Lens. In Grisot, Miria; Sæbø, Johan Ivar & Kempton, Alexander Moltubakk (Ed.), Selected Papers of the 48th Information Systems Research Seminar in Scandinavia. Association for Information Systems (AIS). Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The value created from digital innovation are increasingly being centralized and monopolized by a few large tech platform companies. The promise of democratized innovation through digital technology has instead been overshadowed by platform companies controlling markets and the resources for innovation. Scholars are calling for research that explores fairer approaches to value creation and capture value from digital innovation. This paper aims to contribute to this call by exploring how the concept of digital public goods (DPGs) can serve as a lens to understand value creation and capture from digital innovation. We draw on the notion of public goods from economics, which describes goods that are non-excludable and non-rivalrous. Then, we apply the concept of DPGs to an empirical case of the Norwegian Altinn platform, which aims to support digital innovation of public services, targeting citizens, private businesses, and public organizations. We specifically examine how value created and captured from the innovation of a funeral administration system using the Altinn platform. We contribute to the literature on digital innovation and digital public goods with an exploration of how a lens of DPGs can play a role in future research on digital innovation.

• Thunes, Johanne & Kempton, Alexander Moltubakk (2025). Digital Adaptivity In Government Organizations. In Li, Magnus; Hylving, Lena & Mønsted, Troels Sune (Ed.), The proceedings of the 16th Scandinavian Conference on Information Systems (SCIS) held in Oslo, Norway, 2025. Association for Information Systems (AIS). ISSN 9781958200148. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Governments are facing environments that are constantly changing. Being able to adapt in uncertain conditions is, therefore, crucial. In this paper, we investigate what we term digital adaptivity in government organizations. We build on conceptual developments on digital phenomena to better understand how governments can utilize digital technology to become increasingly adaptive. We ask the following research question: “What is digital adaptivity and how is it enabled in government organizations?” To approach this question, we first conceptualize digital adaptivity and define it as the digitally enabled ability to react and adapt to change and variability in an uncertain environment. Second, we study how this potential can be enabled in practice through an empirical case study on the development of a digital health platform in a Scandinavian municipality. We contribute with a theoretical model that illustrates the potential for digital adaptivity in the complex environments of government organizations.

• Thunes, Johanne & Kempton, Alexander Moltubakk (2025). Balancing Insourcing and Outsourcing towards Digital Government: Establishing Obligatory Gateways as an Approach for Targeted Insourcing. In Bui, Tung (Eds.), Proceedings of the 58th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), Hilton Waikoloa Village, January 7-10, 2025. University of Hawai'i at Manoa. ISSN 9780998133188. p. 1946–1955. doi: 10.24251/HICSS.2025.240. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  While outsourcing has been the leading information systems (IS) sourcing trend since the 1980s, we now see more insourcing initiatives in the public sector. In this paper, we investigate how public sector organizations can balance insourcing and outsourcing, by building on the concept of targeted insourcing. We explore an approach of targeted insourcing through a case study on a Scandinavian municipality, who through in-house competence has built a platform that connects insourced and outsourced systems. Our study has two main contributions. First, we contribute to the literature on digital government by showcasing how government organizations can approach IS sourcing. Second, we contribute by expanding existing knowledge on targeted insourcing through identifying and conceptualizing an approach we term establishing obligatory gateways. Finally, we argue that more research is required on how IS sourcing affects digital government initiatives.

• Thunes, Johanne & Kempton, Alexander Moltubakk (2024). Low-code driven backsourcing: A phenomenon-focused case study, The proceedings of the 15th Scandinavian Conference on Information Systems (SCIS). Association for Information Systems (AIS). ISSN 9781958200094. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  In this paper, we conceptualize and investigate the emerging phenomenon of low-code driven backsourcing. With the central role of digital technology in contemporary organizations and the challenges of outsourcing strategies, including unmet organizational expectations and the necessity for in-house competence, we explore the integration of low-code development-a development approach requiring minimal coding skills-as a new Information Systems (IS) sourcing approach. By conducting a qualitative case study within a large Scandinavian municipality's development unit, we examine how low-code development facilitates the backsourcing of information systems. Our case study focuses on two teams that successfully replaced vendor-built systems with internally developed ones, leveraging their contextual knowledge of the services they were supporting. This research contributes to the IS field by conceptualizing low-code driven backsourcing as a significant phenomenon. We discuss its impact on sourcing strategies and address the call for more insights into the backsourcing process from a public sector perspective. Through our analysis, we identify characteristics of using low-code for IS backsourcing and propose future research avenues to further understand the implications of this phenomenon.

• Thunes, Johanne; Ulshagen, Andrea & Utvik, Vetle Alvenes (2023). Information Systems Resilience: The Role of Flexibility and Stability. In Anderson, Richard; Vannini, Sara; Ahmed, Syed Ishtiaque; Vashistha, Aditya & Raza, Agha Ali (Ed.), ICTD '22: Proceedings of the 2022 International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development. Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). ISSN 9781450397872. doi: 10.1145/3572334.3572382. Full text in Research Archive
• Thunes, Johanne & Kempton, Alexander Moltubakk (2023). Achieving digital transformation in the public sector through targeted insourcing, Proceedings of the European Conference on Information Systems ECIS 2023. Association for Information Systems (AIS). ISSN 9781958200087. Full text in Research Archive

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• Thunes, Johanne & Kempton, Alexander Moltubakk (2023). Achieving digital transformation in the public sector through targeted insourcing. Full text in Research Archive
• Thunes, Johanne; Kempton, Alexander Moltubakk; Aanestad, Margunn & Stray, Viktoria (2026). Beyond outsourcing: a case study on digital sourcing decisions. Universitetet i Oslo. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  In this thesis, I argue for the need to look beyond cost minimization in sourcing decisions. Over the last two decades, digitalization has changed the sourcing landscape, and the outsourcing literature has not kept up. It includes novel aspects and challenges, such as knowledge exchange, organizational learning, and digital transformation. Recently, generative artificial intelligence (AI) has received much attention. The problem is not only to decide whether to outsource or not, but also how to organize and govern digital solutions. The thesis explores the role of digital sourcing, the implications of digitalization, and the impact of recent technological advancements. The empirical material consists of interviews with software professionals who had experience in client organizations. The professionals were held responsible for digital sourcing decisions. The study was informed by both an ongoing set of software projects and the relevant literature. The main contribution of this thesis is a new analytical framework for digital sourcing decisions. While existing frameworks are rooted in cost arguments, this analytical framework takes a broader perspective, incorporating decision-level outsourcing. Second, the thesis contributes to the literature on digital sourcing, where empirical research is still scarce. Third, it also contributes to IS research in digital transformation and operations. Finally, the thesis presents lessons relevant to practitioners.

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