Collaboration Processes: Inside the Black Box

Abstract

Social science research contains a wealth of knowledge for people seeking to understand collaboration processes. The authors argue that public managers should look inside the “black box” of collaboration processes. Inside, they will find a complex construct of five variable dimensions: governance, administration, organizational autonomy, mutuality, and norms. Public managers must know these five dimensions and manage them intentionally in order to collaborate effectively.

Culturally diverse collaborations: a focus on communication and shared understanding

“…It recognizes that in any cross-national, inter-organizational collaboration, cultural diversity is manifest in multiple interacting 'communities of belonging'. Furthermore, as collaborative units tend to be dynamic in nature, with members and purpose changing perpetually (Huxham and Vangen, 2000;Cropper and Palmer, 2008;Thomson and Perry, 2006), the cultures that feature within them will be too. Hence, the various 'communities of belongings' within which individuals will have recognizably different ways of 'being, interacting and working' will be in a constant state of flux.…”

Policy forums: Why do they exist and what are they used for?

“…Resource dependence theory predicts that organizations need to exchange resources with others (Pfeffer and Salancik 1978;Thomson and Perry 2006) to achieve their goals. Whether actors participate in a policy forum depends on (1) what resources they require and whether others can satisfy their demand, and (2) what resources they have to offer and whether their offer satisfies other actors' demands (Thomson and Perry 2006).…”

Alliance strategy: context, process, and requirements

“…Inter-organizational cooperation has become a prominent mode of value creation, yet researchers have repeatedly stressed ambiguity, difficulty to interact across organizational boundaries, and risk of failure Thomson and Perry, 2006). Hence, new challenges have emerged for performance management which have not been adequately addressed (Bititci et al, 2012).…”

“…Rhetoric is the evolving process of connecting two or more parties; they both protect their own identity (differentiation 23 ) and seek convergence when interacting with counterparts (integration) (Sillince et al, 2012;Sillince, 2005). The paradoxical tension of autonomy and collectiveness has permeated inter-organizational cooperation theorizing (Galaskiewicz, 1985;Thomson and Perry, 2006;Ring and Van de Ven, 1992), and becomes palpable with for instance coopetition (Gnyawali and Park, 2011;Van Fenema and Loebbecke, 23 Differentiation and integration originate in literature on the relationship between organizations and their environment Lawrence, P.R. and Lorsch, J.W.…”

“…Inter-organizational cooperation involves ambiguity with respect to process (Thomson and Perry, 2006) and outcomes (Provan et al, 2007). As each organizations operates in its own evolving environment, the collective risk is likely to be substantial and multifaceted (Dekker, 2004).…”