A Method for Analyzing Practicing Managers' Perception on the Disruptive Nature of Digitalization in Machine-Building Industry

The purpose of the paper is to demonstrate a technology foresight method where Visual Analogue Scale is used with an experimental survey design to investigate views and perceptions of possible future disruption caused by digitalization in an established machine-building industry. We demonstrate the usability of the method in detecting differences in future worldviews of practicing managers with results highlighting polarized responses with significant clustering among groups. For example, the respondents that were inclined to view that digital technologies are disruptive, i.e. change the paradigm of value creation in machine-building, also viewed that it is more related to service and business models than products and operation. Digitally enabled concepts like open innovation and industrial internet were perceived to be more disruptive drivers than the digital technologies themselves.