Team-Based Knowledge Integration

1. Team-BasedKnowledge Integration Cecilia Enberg Department of Management and Engineering

2. ONCE UPON A TIME THERE WERE COMMUNITIES… Community (gemeinschaft) as opposed to association (gesellschaft). Characterised by enduring social relations of intimacy and solidarity and care for eachother and trustedeachother. Affect-laden relations among a group of individuals. Requires a commitment to a set of sharedvalues, norms and meanings, shared history and identity – a sharedculture.

3. AND PEOPLE WERE SOCIALISED IN A COMMUNITY OF PRACTICE A social structurecharacterised by dense relations of mutuality. A sharedcognitivestructurecharacterised by a sharedrepertoirewhichincludesroutines, words, tools, ways of doingthings, stories, gestures, symbols, genres, actions, concepts… and probably a lotmore. For such social and cognitivestructures to form individualshave to performtogether in the CmP for an extended period of time. Presupposesface-to-faceinteraction and communication. Is the concept of community of practice relevant to understand organisations of today?

4. THAT WAS BEFORE SOCIETY BECAME PROJECTIFIED AND FIRMS BECAME PROJECT-BASED Projects abound in organisations today • project-based organisations. • projectification of society (Ekstedt et al., 1999). Projects teams and project tasks are temporaryand directedtowardtransition. Task/goalorientationratherthan social or emotional ties are favoured. People have to actbased on swift trust as traditionalsources of trust do not prevail in projectified contexts.

5. NOW, PEOPLE HAVE TO COLLABORATE ACROSS COMMUNITIES IN WHAT CAN BE DESCRIBED AS COLLECTIVITIES OF PRACTICE… Interdisciplinary (heterogeneous) – different knowledge, experience, background etc. Coordinationwithouth a strong, sharedtask-relevantknowledge. Undeveloped group – but with an ability to act with a developed mind

6. KNOWLEDGE COMMUNITIES AND KNOWLEDGE COLLECTIVITIES

7. COLLABORATING IN COLLECTIVITIES OF PRACTICE IS DIFFICULT BECAUSE… “The organizational problem that firms face is the utilization of knowledge which is not, and cannot be, known by a single agent. Even more importantly, no single agent can fully specify in advance what kind of practical knowledge is going to be relevant, when and where. Firms, therefore, are distributed knowledge systems in a strong sense: they are decentered systems, lacking an overseeing mind”. (Tsoukas, 1996:11) Different specialists, who represent different communities of practicesif you want, are involved. Distributedknowledge- the knowledgeneeded is dispersedthroughout the organisation

8. COLLABORATING IN COLLECTIVITIES OF PRACTICE IS DIFFICULT BECAUSE… Knowledge is specialised and differentiated • Differentiation – differences in cognitiveorientation and differences in attitude and behaviour. (Lawrence & Lorsch, 1967) • Thoughtworlds – different funds of knowledge and different systems of meaning. (Dougherty, 1992) • Different cognitive representations and different mental models. (von Meier, 1999)

9. SO IN PRACTICE, THAT MEANS THAT COMMUNICATION IMPASSES ARE CREATED • I didn’tknow that, butnow I realise/understandwhat you mean (funds of knowledge). • I hearwhat you saybut I don’tunderstandwhat you mean(systems of meanings). I understandwhat you saybut I don’tagree(different goals, competinginterests, conflictingvalues).

10. SUMMARISING; WHY DID WE END UP WITH THIS SWING?

11. KNOWLEDGE INTEGRATION YOU SAID – WHAT’S THAT? - WELL, IT DEPENDS ON WHO YOU ASK.. Let’sseewhatOkhuysen and Eisenhardt (2002) suggest. Knowledge integration as an outcome; ”…consisting of both the sharedknowledgeof individuals and the combinedknowledgethat emerges from theirinteractions” (371). Knowledge integration as a process; ”…involves the actions of groupsmembers by whichtheysharetheirindividualknowledgewithin the group and combine it to create new knowledge” (371).

12. KNOWLEDGE INTEGRATION YOU SAID – WHAT’S THAT? - WELL, IT DEPENDS ON WHO YOU ASK.. Okhuysen and Eisenhardt (2002:384) further suggest; ”…knowledge integration is not simply a matter of assemblingdiscretepieces of knowledge, like Lego blocks, as the knowledge as resourceviewimplies. Rather, knowledge integration depends on howmembersknow and integratetheirindividuallyheldknowledge(…) in otherword, the same knowledgecan be known in multiple ways”.

13. KNOWLEDGE INTEGRATION YOU SAID – WHAT’S THAT? - WELL, IT DEPENDS ON WHO YOU ASK.. Enberg (2007:10) wouldrather suggest that; ”Knowledge integration is the processes of goal-orientedinterrelating with the purpose of benefiting from knowledgecomplementaritiesexistingbetweenindividuals with differentiatedknowledgebases” The primaryoutcome of this knowledge integration process is the new product etc. that was to be developed as part of the project (or research, change). Knowledge integration is both and outcome and a process – but different perspectivesopen up for different ways of managing the process of knowledge integration.

14. KNOWLEDGE INTEGRATION CAN BE ENABLED IN DIFFERENT WAYS / BY THE USE OF DIFFERENT MECHANISMS • Somefavor the cross-learning approach and suggest that specialists have to intensivelylearn from eachother to integrateknowledge. This occursthrough; • close interaction • frequentcommunication • Others (e.g. Enberg) suggest that cross-learning is not needed and then you canrely on impersonal and standardisedmechanismssuch as; • modularisation • transactive memory systems • mechanismswhich are not communication and interaction intensive.

15. DIFFERENT CONTINGENCIES CREATE DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES Degree of knowledgedifferentiation; low – high Task frequency; low – high Task heterogeneity; low – high Complexity (causalambiguity); low – high Uncertainty; low – high Howdostacker and turbinedevelopmentrespectivelyscore on the abovecontingencies? (you will get the answer for stackerdevelopment, the turbinecase you have to solve by yourself).

16. KNOWLEDGE INTEGRATION IN THE STACKER CASE Did not rely on; Clearlyspecifiedgoal Sharedknowledge Network memory Rather it wasdescribed as; Individual to itscharacter Routine The stacker (moregenerally the artefact) wasimportant

17. KNOWLEDGE INTEGRATION IN THE STACKER CASE

18. ONE ITERATIVE MODEL OF KNOWLEDGE INTEGRATION – OR MANY? INTERACTING ACTING Collectiveprocesses Artefacts Individual work

19. CAN WE TALK ABOUT TEAMWORK IN THE STACKER CASE?

20. WHAT IS A TEAM? A social system of three or morepeopleworkingtogether in an organizationalcontext who perceivethemselves, and are perceived by others, as members of this social system. Does this mean that they are teamworking? Teamwork quality (TWQ) construct to measure the quality of interactionswithin the team and to suggest that TWQ is positivelyrelated to the success of innovative projectswheresuccess is measured as regards ”team performance” and ”personal success”.

21. THE TWQ CONSTRUCT COMMUNICATION - The possibility for all members to communicate with all othermembers. COORDINATION - The need to agree on work schedules, budgets, deliverables etc. BALANCE OF MEMBER CONTRIBUTIONS - All memberscanbring in theirviews/ideas, unrestrained by hierarchy. MUTUAL SUPPORT - The existence of cooperativeframes of mind and mutualrespect. EFFORT - Everyoneknowing and accepting the work norms concerningsufficienteffort. COHESION - Team members’ sense of togetherness, beloning, and desire to remain on the team.

22. OK, SO DID THE TQW EXPLAIN VARIANCES IN SUCCESS? It depends on who you ask. Team members – 41% of the variance in performance explained by TWQ. Team leaders – 11% of the variance in performance explained by TWQ. Managers – 7% of the variance in performance explained by TWQ.

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