Abstract

This study investigates user acceptance of a Citizen Development tool within a German energy company using the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). As digital transformation accelerates across industries, empowering non-technical employees to create digital solutions through no-code platforms becomes increasingly relevant. The research applies TAM to analyze how perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and usage intention influence actual user acceptance of the tool. A quantitative survey was conducted with 177 employees, and data analysis was performed using SPSS and R Studio. The findings reveal that usage intention is the strongest predictor of user acceptance, explaining over 55% of the variance. Furthermore, both perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use significantly influence intention to use, with perceived usefulness having a greater impact. Perceived ease of use also has a moderate influence on perceived usefulness. These results confirm TAM’s applicability in the energy sector and underline the importance of user-centered design and training. The study concludes with practical recommendations for enhancing digital adoption and highlights the potential for expanding the TAM framework to include additional variables. Limitations include a cross-sectional design, and a single-company focus, suggesting avenues for future longitudinal and cross-industry research.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.