Abstract
Traditional B2B incumbents often struggle to adapt legacy cultures to digital transformation. While literature favors Adhocracy for innovation, many firms rely on Clan cultures prioritizing cohesion. This mixed-methods single-case study examines a B2B distributor to understand how such configurations influence digital maturity. Triangulating data from the Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument (OCAI), a Digital Maturity Model (DMM), and interviews, we reveal a cultural paradox: a strong Clan–Adhocracy blend enables early-stage exploration through trust and creativity but generates a structural “Process Void” due to weak Hierarchy values. This void manifest as consensual inertia and person-dependent workflows, impeding the scaling of digital initiatives. We introduce a culture-based conceptualization of digital readiness grounded in cultural ambidexterity, arguing that digital success does not require replacing relational cultures, but integrating selective hierarchical structures to convert exploratory capacity into enterprise-level capability.