Communities of Practice - one size fits all? 9781846633119, 9781846633102

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ISSN 0969-6474

Volume 14 Number 1 2007

The Learning Organization The international journal of knowledge and organizational learning management Communities of practice – one size fits all? Guest Editors: Jon Pemberton and Sharon Mavin

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The Electronic Library

ISSN 0264-0473 Volume 25 Number 1 2007

Editor Dr David Raitt

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Editorial advisory board ________________________________

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Editor’s note ______________________________________________

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Editor’s page _____________________________________________

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Federal Science eLibrary Pilot: seamless, equitable desktop access for Canadian government researchers Beverly Brown, Cynthia Found and Merle McConnell _________________

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A socio-technical perspective of museum practitioners’ image-using behaviors Hsin-Liang Chen _______________________________________________

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An exploration of the potential of WWW current awareness services for oncology nurses Ina Fourie and Retha Claasen-Veldsman ___________________________

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RFID implementation and benefits in libraries Shien-Chiang Yu _______________________________________________

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CONTENTS

CONTENTS

Electronic journals collections in Argentine private academic libraries

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Adina Gonza´lez Bonorino and Valeria E. Molteni ____________________

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E-learning model for Polish libraries: BIBWEB

. Bozena Bednarek-Michalska and Anna Wol/ odko _____________________

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Methodological approaches in web search research Yazdan Mansourian and Andrew D. Madden _______________________

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The effects of electronic access to scientific literature in the consortium of Turkish university libraries Melih Kirlidog and Didar Bayir ___________________________________

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Book reviews _____________________________________________

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Developing Strategic Marketing Plans That Really Work: A Toolkit for Public Libraries Terry Kendrick Reviewed by Philip Calvert Encyclopedia of Human-Computer Interaction Edited by Claude Ghaoui Reviewed by Philip Calvert Essential Law for Information Professionals (2nd ed.) Paul Pedley Reviewed by Frank Parry Scenarios and Information Design: A User-Oriented Practical Guide Mary Lynn Rice-Lively and Hsin-Liang Chen Reviewed by Madely du Preez Harnessing Knowledge Dynamics: Principled Organizational Knowing & Learning Mark E. Nissen Reviewed by Madely du Preez Advances in Web-Based Education: Personalized Learning Environments Edited by George D. Magoulas and Sherry Y. Chen Reviewed by Philip Barker

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EL 25,1

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD

Dr Esharenana E. Adomi Lecturer, Department of Library and Information Science, Delta State University, Nigeria

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Cokie Anderson Assistant Professor, Electronic Publishing Center, Edmon Low Library, Oklahoma State University, USA Chris Armstrong Information Automation Limited, Wales, UK Stephen E. Arnold Arnold Information Technology (AIT), USA Dr (Mrs) Asefeh Asemi Department of Library and Information Science, Isfahan University, Iran Philip Barker Professor of Applied Computing, University of Teesside, UK Frank Cervone Assistant University Librarian for IT, Northwestern University, IL, USA Professor Ina Fourie Department of Information Science, University of Pretoria, South Africa Dr Donald T. Hawkins Information Technology and Database Consultant, Information Today Inc., Medford, NJ, USA Nancy K. Herther Bibliographer for Sociology, Anthropology and American Indian Studies, University of Minnesota Libraries, USA Monica Landoni Department of Computer and Information Sciences, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK Derek Law Head of the Information Resources Directorate, University of Strathclyde and Professor in the Department of Computing and Head of the Centre for Digital Library Research, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland, UK Anne Morris Reader in Information Processing and Director of Teaching, Department of Information Science, Loughborough University, UK Lesley Moyo Director for Library Research and Instructional Services, University Libraries, Virginia Tech, VA, USA

The Electronic Library Vol. 25 No. 1, 2007 p. 4 # Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0264-0473

Professor Zainab Awang Ngah Department of Information Science, Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology, University of Malaya, Malaysia Mary Peterson Deputy, Library & Educational Information Service, Royal Adelaide Hospital/Institute of Medical and Veterinary Science, Adelaide, Australia David Reid Application Support Specialist, National Library of New Zealand, Wellington, New Zealand Loriene Roy Professor, Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Texas at Austin, TX, USA Dr (Mrs) S.P. Singh Head, Department of Library & Information Science, University of Delhi, India Dr Mary M. Somerville Associate Dean, Dr Martin Luther King, Jr Library, San Jose State University, CA, USA Shiao-Feng Su Assistant Professor, Graduate Institute of Library and Information Science, National Chung-Hsing University, Taiwan, ROC Professor Pieter A. van Brakel Head: Postgraduate Programmes. c/o e-Innovation Academy, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Cape Town, South Africa Hong Xu Head, East Asian Library, University of Pittsburgh, PA, USA Professor Chyan Yang Institute of Business and Management & Institute of Information Management, National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan Associate Professor Songhui Zheng Director, Acquisitions & Cataloging Department of Overseas Journals Library, Medical College of Shantou University, Guangdong, China

Guest editorial CoPs: one size fits all? It is over 15 years since the publication of the seminal text, Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation by Jean Lave and EtienneWenger, as well as Brown and Duguid’s 1991 influential paper in Organisational Science titled “Organisational learning and communities of practice”. In that time, interest in communities of practice (CoPs) have grown immensely, with many published articles and texts paying homage to the pioneering ideas espoused in these works. Indeed, it is probably fair to say that today, Wenger has now emerged as the acknowledged CoP “guru”, his expertise in demand from organisations and academics alike. His recent single and jointly authored works have formed the backdrop for much of the discussion and reporting of CoPs in the literature, and act as a benchmark against which developments in this arena are assessed. There is evidence, however, that the conventional view of CoPs, defined usually in terms of their community, domain and practice, may no longer capture what passes for a CoP in today’s organisations. At the very least, an evolutionary change is occurring which may force us to re-examine and re-visit the ideas and notions of CoPs. At this juncture, therefore, it is perhaps timely and appropriate that this special issue seeks to generate further debate and present cutting edge ideas, examples and experiences of CoPs in the eyes of management practitioners and educators. Six papers are presented here, drawing on a range of organisations across international boundaries and designed to showcase new ideas, the operation and practicalities of today’s work-based CoPs, and highlight issues of relevance in the emergence, development and processes associated with them. Throughout the reviewing of papers for this special issue, it became clear that the notion of “One size fits all”, certainly in terms of our understanding of what constitutes a CoP, is somewhat of a misnomer. For many, CoPs are knowledge or learning communities, but for others, the term has been adopted to describe work-based groups and project teams existing as part of a formal organisational structure. Or perhaps, the acceptance and use of the term “community of practice”, irrespective of whether it conforms to a strict definition, is irrelevant? The bottom line is, however, in whatever capacity CoPs function, the reality is such that organisations are striving towards, and evolving new ways of managing different ways of developing shared understandings, better/best practice and improved performance. CoPs have traditionally arisen as the voluntary participation of a group of like-minded individuals keen to share their ideas and practice with a view to self-development and perform more effectively in their roles. These CoPs have often been invisible, or at least only tacitly acknowledged by their host organisations. The literature does, however, highlight particular organisations, e.g. Daimler Chrysler that have embraced the notion of CoPs to a make a very real difference to practice and performance. Wenger et al. (2002) make reference to the degree of acceptance and institutionalisation of CoPs, but the debate now appears to be centring on whether organisation-designed and facilitated CoPs which are “mandatory” and “managed”

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really are fulfilling the roles, or are indeed reflect the perceived academic view of what constitutes a CoP. Two of the papers in this issue by Florian Kohlbacher and Kazuo Mukai, and Katja Pastoors, respectively, give extraordinary insight into how two large organisations deal with CoPs in practice. In the former, the authors discuss community-based knowledge sharing in Hewlett Packard focussing on Japanese learning communities. They examine how knowledge transfer takes place and detail a number of approaches to CoPs, even in a single organisation. Katja Pastoors discusses another large IT organisation specialising in international consultancy and makes the distinction between “top-down” and underground CoPs. Using data provided by a number of consultants, she concludes that where tacit knowledge transfer is involved, the nature of consultants’ work suggests a greater affinity towards self-organising and informal CoPs rather than those officially sanctioned by the organisation’s management. Thomas Garavan, Ronan Carbery and Eamonn Murphy’s paper continues the debate on the management of CoPs by looking at four visible top-down created CoPs designed to show how knowledge sourcing is managed across organisational boundaries in Ireland. The authors suggest that in these types of CoPs, certain managerial competences are critical to the success of managing and sourcing knowledge from external sources and, as in the first two papers, acknowledge that the characteristics of CoPs differ enormously dependent on organisational context and purpose. In contrast, Rein Juriado and Niklas Gustafsson’s paper looks at a novel case study based on the Swedish Melodifestivalen, the mechanism by which the Swedish entry is selected for the Eurovision Song Contest. It demonstrates how complex organisations with collaborating private and public partners develop “emergent” CoPs, arguably not even seen or recognised by the participants as CoPs, but operating in a way that facilities knowledge transfer through a combination of trust, competence identification and social cohesion. In the penultimate paper, Jon Pemberton, Sharon Mavin and Brenda Stalker, while acknowledging the benefits of CoPs, detail the potentially negative consequences of CoPS both for individuals and organisations by drawing on their experiences of a research-based CoP in higher education. Management/stewardship, power-distance relationships, ill-perceived importance of CoP and the perpetuation of narrow and constraining attitudes are some of the issues identified, corroborating and extending themes discussed in other papers in this special issue. Finally, Elayne Coakes and Peter Smith build on the notion of CoPs to present a conceptual paper focussing on innovation and creativity with Communities of Innovation (CoInv) providing a safe haven and outlet for entrepreneurial ideas to flourish as organisations continue to develop news ways of remaining distinctive and competitive. In essence, a CoInv is a specialised form of a CoP, and may be informal or formalised within organisations confirming, yet again, that CoPs are diverse in purpose, and varied in structure. The six papers in this special issue, while exhibiting commonality in their overall theme, demonstrate that CoPs are alive and well, but more importantly, that they are used to harness expertise, disseminate knowledge, improve performance and bring individuals together in all manner of ways. Purists, adhering to rigid definitions of

CoPs, may raise an eyebrow when reading about the CoPs detailed in this special issue, but judging by their applications in the real world, assembled here is a snap shot of developments taking place globally. On the evidence presented, one size does not fit all. It is therefore important to keep an open mind and remember that CoPs are not theoretical constructs – like many valuable management techniques and tools - they exist, they evolve and they work! On a housekeeping note, The Learning Organization: The International Journal of Knowledge and Organizational Learning Management will be publishing a number of special issues each year, showcasing particular topics of relevance to both practitioners and academics. Please contact Peter Smith, Special Issues Editor, for further information or to discuss potential special issues themes. Jon Pemberton and Sharon Mavin Editor’s note I have decided that special issues are means for presenting a set of focused research from a particular community within the learning organisation research and practice community. The idea of a special issue is to examine multiple facets of a specific topic to inform both fellow researchers and practitioners within the area as well as others who may just be interested in learning more about the topic. To that end, I have decided to revive the TLO custom of publishing special issues more than once per year. However, general issues that are not focused on a specific topic are also of merit to address the broad concerns of the international learning organisation community and as such also need to be kept in the publication. To that end, a minimum of three general issues with openly submitted papers will be published per volume, which leaves up to threeadditional issues per volume available as potential special issues. I am inviting academic and professional researchers to consider editing a special issue for TLO. Special issue topics, call for papers, and editor and reviewer lists should be submitted to Peter Smith as indicated previously by Sharon and Jon. The call for special issue topics is available from TLO’s web site. I personally wanted to welcome our first special issue in the new extended focus towards special issues. Congratulations, Sharon and Jon! Dr Steven Walczak

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The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at www.emeraldinsight.com/0969-6474.htm

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Japan’s learning communities in Hewlett-Packard Consulting and Integration Challenging one-size fits all solutions Florian Kohlbacher Department of Change Management and Management Development, Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration, Vienna, Austria and Graduate School of Commerce and Management, Hitotsubashi University, Tokyo, Japan, and

Kazuo Mukai Department of Management Information Systems, Hamamatsu University, Hamamatsu, Japan Abstract Purpose – This paper aims to explain and analyze community-based corporate knowledge sharing and organizational learning, the actual use of communities in Hewlett Packard (HP) Consulting and Integration (CI) and their role in leveraging and exploiting existing and creating new knowledge. Design/methodology/approach – The paper presents an explanatory case study research design, qualitative interviews with top executives, middle managers and employees conducted in 2005 and 2006. Explanatory case studies were used to analyze, illustrate and exemplify major findings. Findings – The paper identified an effective approach to community-based knowledge sharing and organizational learning at HP CI Japan’s learning communities (LCs). The case study illustrates the main characteristics, features and mechanisms of communities within the framework of HP’s global and local knowledge management (KM) structure and resulting activities, and illuminates effective adaptation to the Japanese working and business context. Research limitations/implications – General limitations of case studies and generalizability of such field research apply. Practical implications – The research has important implications for firms and business practitioners by highlighting how HP’s Japanese-style LCs facilitate intra-organizational knowledge sharing and creation. Originality/value – This paper presents a real-life example of an effective community at HP CI Japan, its mechanism and practical value for companies. Even though HP’s KM activities have frequently been researched, HP CI’s learning communities are discussed for the first time and illuminate that even within one single company there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Keywords Communities, Knowledge sharing, Knowledge creation, Multinational companies, Japan Paper type Research paper The Learning Organization: The International Journal of Knowledge and Organizational Learning Management Vol. 14 No. 1, 2007 pp. 8-20 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0969-6474 DOI 10.1108/09696470710718311

The authors would like to thank Gita Haghi and Birgit Gotthart, HP CI Austria, and Chiho Nakase from HP CI Japan for their kind help and support. All mistakes or possible misconceptions are solely our own responsibility. Kazuo Mukai was the head of the knowledge management department at Hewlett-Packard Japan, Consulting and Integration from November 2003 to February 2006.

Introduction Based on a comprehensive empirical research project on knowledge management (KM) and the transfer of knowledge within multinational companies (MNCs) in Japan, we set out to explain and analyze community-based corporate knowledge sharing and organizational learning (OL); the communities’ actual use in business organizations and their role in leveraging and exploiting existing knowledge as well as in the process of creating new knowledge. The objective of this paper is to present an efficient approach to community-based knowledge sharing and OL identified at Hewlett-Packard (HP) Consulting and Integration (CI) Japan’s learning communities (LCs) and to show that for communities of practice (CoP) there is no single one-size-fits-all solution. The paper is structured as follows: first, the theoretical background on CoPs and knowledge communities in firms is briefly introduced. After discussing methodology, a case study of HP CI Japan’s LCs illustrates the communities’ main characteristics, features and mechanisms within the framework of HP’s global and local KM structure and resulting activities. It also demonstrates its effective adaptation to the Japanese working and business context. Subsequently, the case study is analyzed and discussed and main conclusions are drawn. Finally, we take a look at limitations of our empirical study as well as the need for further research. Theoretical background The field of CoPs has been developed and significantly shaped by the works of Etienne Wenger and fellow researchers (e.g. Lave and Wenger, 1991; Wenger, 1998; Wenger et al., 2002; Wenger and Snyder, 2000). In fact, CoPs have recently become “key components in an organizational learning toolkit” (Plaskoff, 2003, p. 161), and can be seen as “the cornerstones of knowledge management” (Wenger, 2004, p. 2). As a result, they have achieved prominence in the context of KM and OL both with scholars and practitioners (see, for example, Brown and Duguid, 2001; Buckman, 2004; Saint-Onge and Wallace, 2003; Swan et al., 2002). In their seminal Harvard Business Review article, Wenger and Synder (2000, p. 139) speak of CoPs as “a new organizational form” that promises to complement existing structures of KM and radically galvanize knowledge sharing, learning and change. CoPs can be defined as: “groups of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic, and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interacting on an ongoing basis” (Wenger et al., 2002, p. 4), or more generally as “an activity system about which participants share understandings concerning what they are doing and what that means in their lives and for their community” (Lave and Wenger, 1991, p. 98). Thus, they are united in both action and in the meaning that the action has, both for themselves, and for the larger collective and can be defined by disciplines, by problems, or by situations (Wenger, 2004, p. 2). “In brief, they’re groups of people informally bound together by shared expertise and passion for a joint enterprise” (Wenger and Snyder, 2000, p.139). Finally, CoPs “appear to be an effective way for organizations to handle unstructured problems and to share knowledge outside of traditional structural boundaries” and serve as “a means of developing and maintaining long-term organizational memory” (Lesser and Storck, 2001, p. 832). As a result, community building “can be viewed as learning how to learn organizationally” (Plaskoff, 2003, p. 166).

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In their Harvard Business Review article Wenger and Snyder (2000, p. 142) stress that CoPs are “informal – they organize themselves, meaning they set their own agendas and establish their own leadership” and that “membership in a community of practice is self-selected”. However, two years later in their Harvard Business School Press book together with McDermott (Wenger et al., 2002, pp. 24-7) they also acknowledge more intentional and institutionalized forms of CoPs. In fact, LCs at HP CI Japan are both intentional and institutionalized and therefore can also be called “sponsored” CoPs. According to Wenger et al. (2002, p. 24), CoPs “vary widely in both name and style in different organizations”. Another term that can frequently be found from the extant literature and which seems to be even more general than CoP is “knowledge community” (KC) – sometimes also referred to as “strategic community” – (see, for example, Barrett et al., 2004; Botkin, 1999; Storck and Hill, 2000), but there does not seem to exist a common definition of the term. Below, drawing from empirical research, we will introduce a real-life example of one kind of CoP or alternatively KC. Research methodology The case study and the findings presented in this paper are derived from a comprehensive empirical research project on KM, knowledge creation, sharing and OL within MNCs. In order to analyze the process of knowledge creation and transfer in MNCs, our study adopted an exploratory research strategy. Indeed, qualitative research, rather than traditional quantitative empirical tools, is particularly useful for exploring implicit assumptions and examining new relationships, abstract concepts, operational definitions, and organizational processes, as well as outcomes (see, for example, Bettis, 1991; Cassell and Symon, 1994; Weick, 1996). One important objective of the empirical study was to identify and analyze firms and cases that seemed to be most appropriate to provide insights into KM processes and OL. Therefore, we opted for purposive sampling (purposeful sampling) which is essentially strategic and entails an attempt to establish a good correspondence between research questions and sampling, as the researcher samples on the basis of wanting to interview people who are relevant to the research questions (Bryman, 2004; Patton, 2002). According to Patton (2002, p. 230, original emphasis), the “logic and power of purposeful sampling lie in selecting information-rich cases for study in depth”, with information-rich cases being “those from which one can learn a great deal about issues of central importance to the purpose of the inquiry”. In fact, “[s]tudying information-rich cases yields insights and in-depth understanding rather than empirical generalizations” (Patton, 2002). We purposefully identified and selected our informant companies through a review of the relevant literature and widely recognized KM studies such as the Most Admired Knowledge Enterprise (MAKE) award[1] for example. Indeed, HP has frequently been featured as a role model in numerous books and articles on KM and has also been a recipient of the MAKE award several times. Consequently, we chose HP CI as a critical case for an analysis of KM and community-based knowledge creation and sharing. Another goal was to conduct an analysis of different patterns and ways of knowledge creation, sharing and OL within MNCs that helps to develop new hypotheses and build theory on how companies can efficiently and successfully do so and thus contribute to the theory of knowledge creation in an international context and

to develop constructs that facilitate future hypothesis testing. The fact that case studies have an important function in generating hypotheses and building theory (see, for example, Eisenhardt, 1989; Hartley, 2004; Yin, 2003) was thus another reason for choosing a case study research strategy. According to Yin (2003, p. 2) “the distinctive need for case studies arises out of the desire to understand complex social phenomena” because “the case study method allows investigators to retain the holistic and meaningful characteristics of real-life events,” such as organizational and managerial processes, for example. In fact, “[o]rganizations constitute an enormously complex arena for human behavior” (Dubin, 1982, p. 379) and case studies seem to be the preferred strategy when “how” or “why” questions are being posed when the investigator has little control over events, and when the focus is on a contemporary phenomenon within some real-life context. In such a setting, case studies are explanatory ones, i.e. they present data on cause-effect relationships, explain how events happened and extend theoretical understandings (Yin, 2003). Indeed, using the “force of example” (Flyvbjerg, 2006), HP CI Japan’s LCs serve as such an explanatory case study in order to illustrate and analyze the essential mechanism of this highly effective KM approach. The research was conducted over a period of more than one year and involved triangulation among a variety of different sources of data, including both formal and informal on- and off-site interviews with manager as well as scholars and other experts in the field; analysis of archival materials such company internal documents as well as articles in the business media, and an evaluation of existing case studies and other relevant literature (Yin, 2003). In total, qualitative interviews with more than 100 top executives, middle managers and selected employees in more than 30 different MNCs, Japanese, European and US American, have been conducted in 2005 and 2006 mainly in Japan. As for the HP case study, the second named author was the head of the KM department at HP CI Japan from November 2003 to February 2006, and, based on his deep insider knowledge, he provided the source of most of the rich and thick description and analysis of the case study. Additionally, we conducted interviews with his subordinate and knowledge managers at HP CI’s Vienna office responsible for the EMEA region. This not only helped to gain additional insights, but also included different points of view. In the course of these qualitative interviews, semi-structured questions in accordance with the theory of organizational knowledge creation and enabling were employed, but the interview partners could nevertheless answer openly and lead the interview mostly. All interviews were recorded and authentically transcribed. HP CI Japan’s LCs: a case study HP and HP Japan HP consists of four global business groups with 150,000 employees in more than 170 countries, and a total revenue of approximately USD 87 billions in FY 2005. HP’s corporate activities in Japan go back to 1963 and HP Japan is HP’s legal corporate entity in Japan with 5,600 employees and a turnover of almost 412 billion yen (approximately USD 3.5 billion) as of November 2005. HP CI is part of HP Services (Technology Solutions Group), which has 65,000 IT professionals in 160 countries around the world encompassing four geographical regions (Americas, Asia Pacific, EMEA, Japan). Its main business is the system

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Figure 1. KM components at HP CI

integration (SI) of corporate computer systems, which includes the development of system software for customers, IT consulting, sales and distribution of software developed by HP and other developers. KM at HP CI At HP CI, KM is a systematic approach to help information and knowledge flow to the right people at the right time so they can act more efficiently and effectively in their daily job (see also Davenport and Prusak, 2000; Leonard, 1998). The KM program relies on three main components: people who are the producers and consumers of knowledge, processes that guide the management of the knowledge and technology/tools to facilitate access to knowledge assets (see Figure 1). HP CI’s KM activities can be divided into three different levels. On level 1, the @hp employee portal can be accessed by all HP employees worldwide and across all business groups. It is integrated into HP’s intranet and used for general communication and information sharing. Level 2 consists of different global repositories and communities. The latter will be discussed below. On level 3, different collaboration tools and team workspaces for virtual collaboration of teams and team members from different locations can be found. HP CI’s KM activities are managed and controlled by its KM departments and their knowledge managers and knowledge advisors. While the knowledge managers’ task is to implement the worldwide strategy and tools through communication and marketing, training and consulting, building interfaces (HR, IT, Marketing, Project Management Office) and reward and recognition programs, knowledge advisors give

assistance on KM processes and tools, direct people to the right knowledge sources, based on their specific needs, and solicit feedback and utilize it for system improvements. Community-based knowledge sharing and OL at HP CI Community-based approaches to knowledge sharing and OL are a key feature of HP CI’s KM activities. Offering not only hard and software products but also a variety of IT and consulting services, HP CI’s consultants and system engineers often work on different teams and different locations and thus need a location-independent and flexible solution for sharing their knowledge. In fact, as 75 percent of the users are mobile, and many teams geographically distributed, the web browser is the lowest common denominator for access for them. Generally at HP and in consistence with CoP theory, a CoP is a natural grouping of people who share and focus on a specific knowledge domain or topic, with the objective to create, expand and exchange knowledge, and to develop individual and organizational capabilities. CoPs have no regional or organizational boundaries, live from their members’ active participation and contributions, offer a collaborative environment, discussion forums on topics of interest, as well as community building events (e.g. HP Virtual Classroom). This results in the fact that no HP CoP is exactly the same and that various styles can be found. However, we found that there are two types of CoPs and both focus on a certain area of knowledge. The first one is for employees with the same or similar business practices, i.e. in most cases they work within the same business unit, e.g. Enterprise Application Services, Enterprise Infrastructure, Financial Services Industries, Government, Healthcare and Education, Manufacturing, Telecom/Network and Service Provider but maybe in different locations. The second type of CoP provides a common virtual space for employees of the same kind of profession and business solutions. They aim at generating new knowledge and sharing existing knowledge among the same type of professionals, e.g. all system engineers and solutions worldwide. Finally, CoPs at HP are frequently referred to as LCs especially those that meet at regular teleconferences (see also Wenger et al., 2002, p. 24) and recently this term has more and more been replaced by profession community (PC). HP CI Japan’s LCs Japan is one of the four regions, along with Americas, Asia Pacific and EMEA. According to which HP CI is geographically divided shows Japan’s special position within HP. In fact, Japan’s peculiar ways of doing business and the particularities of the market and customers prompt for a special approach in the land of the rising sun. This is also true for the way people are working and interacting in organizations and the way they create, share and disseminate knowledge. Indeed, research has shown that community building is also culture-dependent (Plaskoff, 2003). As a result, HP CI Japan has applied HP’s standard KM activities only to some extent, and has adapted certain aspects, tools and activities to their particular needs, ways of working and sharing knowledge in Japan. Based on Nonaka’s (1994) SECI model, HP CI engages in KM activities for capturing and leveraging its rich tacit knowledge base and encourages and supports the externalization and consequent re-use of this knowledge (the three main people-based activities). Additionally there are also IT and tool-based KM activities which not only foster the sharing of highly tacit

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Figure 2. HP CI Japan’s SECI model

knowledge, but also help to make it become explicit and thus easier for sharing and re-use. Figure 2 shows HP CI Japan’s version of the SECI model. The Best Practice Forum is an annual meeting for presenting, exchanging and discussing success stories and best practices that have been achieved. It is held in the form of a competition and presentations, with material made available for all employees on the intranet. The Service Delivery Kit (SDK) is a collection of successful methods from experienced consultants with the aim of helping less experienced colleagues to learn and replicate approved practices to deliver superior service to HP’s customers. HP CI Japan’s LCs officially emerged in November 2001 from special interest groups (SIGS) that had independently formed and worked in different departments. The SG business done by HP CI depends and thrives on the knowledge of individual employees. As all forms of consulting, are people-based and people-centered, hence, sharing of tacit knowledge, externalizing and disseminating it, then the resulting explicit knowledge is essential for building and sustaining competitive advantage in the industry. In 2005, HP announced its education and career agenda, Profession Program, and as a result, LCs became part of the PC, which requires mandatory participation for all employees. However, even within this new framework, the essence of LCs has basically remained the same. The main purpose of the LCs is twofold. First, the tacit knowledge of the individual consultants and system engineers is (partly) to be made explicit and shared, which is mostly done through discussions and professional interaction. Second, the LC is to provide a context and opportunity for executing HP’s mentoring system, which is an important part of its internal employee education program. All junior consultants and engineers have a senior counterpart assigned as their mentor who helps and supports them by giving advice and guidance. All in all, a LC’s goal is to share knowledge and information about highly relevant and important issues, discuss these and exchange opinions about them. It is a gathering of all employees that own such expert knowledge or who are simply interested in participating, learning and discussing these topics.

Therefore, topics and issues for discussion are various and may also change quickly. Besides, all employees are welcome to participate, regardless of their affiliation or position. LCs might center on certain business areas, technological issues or solution aspects. In fact, CoPs are not primarily about a product, function, or tasks, but rather center on a specific knowledge domain (Soekijad et al., 2004; see also Wenger et al., 2002). Having experts and people with the same interests and the same need for solutions gathered to discuss matters in groups and face-to-face has proven very beneficial for leveraging and exchanging tacit knowledge and finally making it explicit, thus adding to the organization’s common knowledge base and reducing its dependency on the individual (see also Nonaka, 1994). Especially in heated discussions, people will end up making their points very clearly and expressing their opinion, thoughts, worries and even complaints, quite straight-forwardly. In this context, it is important to consider some key concepts in Japanese sociology, The concepts of uchi-soto and honne-tatemae, for instance, are essential for an understanding of the Japanese relationship within the group (see, for example, Doi, 1985). The term uchi designates the insider, a member of the group, while soto refers to the outside, somebody not of the group, and honne can be explained as the true feelings and tatemae as the outward appearance or front face. In fact, Japanese people clearly distinguish between their uchi and soto and will treat and talk to other people accordingly, usually using tatemae for soto people and honne mostly for themselves and sometimes also for uchi people (Hall and Hall, 1987). Therefore, in the course of the development of the LC, its members will become uchi for each other, which will finally enable people to directly express their honne in LC discussions, etc., an occurrence very unlikely to happen in the anonymity of formal meetings with large numbers of participants. LC meetings usually start with a presentation on interesting or urgent topics and issues and will be followed by discussions afterwards. The presentations as well as other materials are made available on the intranet not only to the LC members but to all CI employees. The same is true for summaries of the discussions and meeting minutes of the LC. Examples of LCs at HP CI Japan are communities about certain types of products such as Linux, databases or security software, about certain methods like IT Service Management, Project Management, etc, and also about certain fields of business like financial services, networks, etc. HP CI Japan’s LCs are guided and coordinated by the KM department whose staff also serve as facilitators and advisors for the communities as well as all other KM relevant topics and questions. The KM department is also responsible for the handling and organization of the registration to the community, usually on an annual basis, training and administrative work resulting from the execution and maintenance of the LC. LCs mostly meet once every two weeks or once a month and participation varies between five and 40 people. Besides the face-to-face meetings, LCs also employ mailing lists and LC forums on the intranet for quick and easy access and exchange of information and explicit knowledge. The regular meetings and discussions of the LCs help employees to share current information, news on important issues and their expert know-how on certain topics, as well as their experiences, success and failure stories and best practices. Thus, LCs also provide a space and a context for education of its members and for the solution of concrete problems as well as their pro-active prevention.

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Finally, the biggest difference between HP CI Japan’s LCs and the worldwide communities lies in the number of participants and the focus on the type of knowledge. While the communities are meetings of a large number of employees and often take the form of seminars or training courses and as such focus rather on explicit knowledge and the combination of sharing and transfer of it, LCs in Japan usually only have a small number of people and focus on the sharing and co-creation of tacit knowledge. In fact, even though the LCs are of course trying to externalize as much tacit knowledge as possible, they acknowledge that not all tacit knowledge can be made explicit and in that case concentrate on the exchange and sharing of this tacit knowledge without formalization and externalization. Discussion Knowledge creation, sharing and OL through LCs HP CI Japan’s case of LCs has shown the following key points. First of all, depending on the context, purpose and location there are different kinds of LCs or CoPs within HP worldwide and there is no single one-size-fits-all solution. Second, at HP CI Japan, face-to-face communication and as a result a focus on sharing rich tacit knowledge predominates. Third, HP’s knowledge-orientation, KM organization and the coordination of the LCs foster knowledge creation, sharing and OL at the communities. One size does not fit all There is a need for adaptation of knowledge creation, sharing and OL styles to fit the particular needs of an organization (see also Davenport and Prusak, 2000; Holden, 2002; Leonard, 1998). Even within one company like HP that tries to standardize and define its business processes across its subunits around the world, different national and corporate cultures have an impact on the way business is done and this has to be considered when building CoPs. As a result, under the umbrella of the global community, there are various LCs which share certain common characteristics but at the same time differ from each other. Indeed CoPs, like HP’s LCs for instance, have different meanings and connotations dependent on their context and individual and organizational agendas, even within the same MNC. In fact, as noted above, CoPs “vary widely in both name and style in different organizations” (Wenger et al., 2002, pp. 24-7), and we identified HP CI Japan’s LCs as one particular type of community. All in all, there does not seem to be a silver bullet, and it probably is exactly this flexibility, which make CoPs such a fascinating as well as effective organizational phenomenon. Focus on tacit knowledge According to Lave and Wenger (1991), the sharing of expertise and the creation of new knowledge, often tacit in nature, is a central tenet of a CoP’s existence, whether they exist as a social gathering or technological network. The sharing of tacit knowledge by and through CoPs is by means of story telling, conversation, coaching, and apprenticeship provided by CoPs (Wenger et al., 2002). As a matter of fact, the sharing of tacit knowledge, socialization, as well as its (part) transformation into explicit knowledge, externalization, are at the heart of HP CI Japan’s LCs. This also seems to be in line with Nonaka’s (1994) theory of knowledge-creation and Japanese firms’ particular focus on tacit knowledge[2]. Besides, as managing existing knowledge alone is simply not enough, the creation of new knowledge and OL are also key.

Importance of KM structure and coordination of LCs The theory of organizational knowledge creation has been further developed by adding the concepts of context and place (ba), leadership and by identifying enabling conditions, as well as certain barriers for knowledge creation (e.g. Nonaka and Konno, 1998; von Krogh et al., 2000). This “overall set of organizational activities that positively affect knowledge creation” is called knowledge enabling (Ichijo, 2004, p. 135) and according to Plaskoff (2003, p. 179), “[c]ommunities provide an enabling context for knowledge creation”. Indeed, organization structures and systems that provide a context that coordinates and motivates action are critical elements of the overall knowledge organization (Wenger et al., 2002). At HP, knowledge enabling is one of the main purposes of the KM departments and an essential task for its knowledge managers and advisors. Indeed, the role of coordination and stewardship is a critical issue for CoPs (Wenger et al., 2002), and this rather managed membership of HP’s LCs shows similarities to “strategic communities” described by Storck and Hill (2000) for instance. Moreover, Vera and Crossan (2003, p. 137) conclude that “learning and the accumulation of knowledge only lead to better performance, when they support and are aligned with the firm’s strategy”, a fact that is taken very seriously at HP. As they view ba as “an existential place where participants share their contexts and create new meanings through interactions”, Nonaka and Toyama (2003, p. 7) acknowledge similarities of the concept of ba to the concept of CoP, but also stress important differences[3]. Nevertheless, it is probably safe to say that CoPs are, or at least can constitute and provide, a certain type of ba, an enabling context for knowledge creation, sharing and OL in organizations. Indeed according to Mavin and Cavaleri (2004, p. 286), learning is “embedded in and mediated through particular social and cultural contexts” and such social learning in context enhances the performance and capability of organizations[4]. Conclusions Our finding from the HP CI case study is that there is not one single approach to CoPs in corporations and that even within the same firm one size does not fit all. There are different varieties of CoPs and they are “as diverse as the situations that give rise to them” (Wenger and Snyder, 2000, p. 141). Hence we view both HP’s LCs and PCs as derivates of CoPs, or to use the broader term, KCs. Indeed, through our explanatory case study of HP CI Japan’s LCs we identified a “black swan” that helped us, through the “force of example” to challenge the applicability of a one-size-fits-all solution for CoPs[5]. Moreover, the case also shows the important role of face-to-face communication for sharing tacit knowledge (socialization) and explicating it (externalization) (see also Nonaka, 1994). Indeed, IT-based KM tools cannot substitute the rich human interaction, which underlines the vital role of CoPs like HP CI Japan’s LCs for the creation of new knowledge and the sharing of tacit knowledge. However, this also implies that communities should not become too big (. 20 members) because face-to-face communication between all members will barely be possible. In this context, HP offers a quite sophisticated solution for intensive knowledge creation and sharing on a local level through LCs and regular large scale exchange on a global level through its communities. In fact, “[a]s organizations grow in size, geographical scope,

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and complexity, it is increasingly apparent that sponsorship and support of groups such as [CoPs] is a strategy to improve organizational performance” (Lesser and Storck, 2001, p. 831) and “[s]uccess in global markets depends on communities sharing knowledge across the globe” (Wenger et al., 2002, p. 7). Therefore, CoPs “can be particularly useful in helping to build a global organization out of a lot of individual operating companies in separate countries” (Buckman, 2004, p. 164). Wenger and fellow researchers (Wenger et al. (2002)) speak of “distributed” CoPs and thus foster the sharing of knowledge horizontally and across intra-organizational boundaries. Finally, CoPs help us to learn about who knows what and their member lists can serve as a ‘know-who-list’, expert directory or yellow pages of experts and their areas of expertise. CoPs like HP CI Japan’s LCs also play a vital role for the education and mentoring of employees and help to foster human relations and communication within the organization. Although carefully researched, documented and analyzed, our study is subject to some limitations. First of all, the insights gained were derived and concluded from one single, probably rather unique, case, even if this is exactly what case study research is basically about (Stake, 2000). Indeed, the common limitations of generalizability of such field research are well documented (see, for example, Eisenhardt, 1989; Hartley, 2004; Yin, 2003), although analytic generalization, in contrast to statistical generalization, is possible (Hartley, 2004; Yin, 2003). Therefore, it maybe helpful to conduct further case studies of community-based knowledge sharing and OL not only at at HP (CI). The results from our research into other case studies of KCs and CoPs in Japan and other countries is beyond the scope of this paper. Finally, follow-up investigations of HP CI Japan’s LCs in the next couple of years to develop longitudinal case studies (Yin, 2003), would explore the LCs’ development and long-term impact and thus provide additional insights into success factors for intra-organizational knowledge creation and community-based knowledge sharing and OL. Notes 1. For detailed information on the MAKE award see the homepage of Teleos and the KNOW Network: www.knowledgebusiness.com/ 2. With the majority of employees being Japanese, Japanese-style management and business practices are prevalent at HP Japan. This obviously has an impact on knowledge creation and sharing (see, for example, Hedlund and Nonaka, 1993; Holden, 2002), but a detailed discussion would go beyond the scope of this paper. 3. Interestingly, the Japanese translation of Wenger and Snyder’s (2000) Harvard Business Review article, published in the Diamond Harvard Business Review, August, 2001, pp. 120-9, has the title “The innovation power of ba”. The translator mentions in a short note that CoPs are the same as the concept of “ba” and uses them term “ba” as a translation of CoP throughout the article. 4. This kind of social learning in context has been termed “situated learning” by Lave and Wenger (1991). 5. According to Flyvbjerg (2006, pp. 228, 235), the case study is well suited for identifying such “black swans” because of its in-depth approach and it is falsification, not verification, that characterizes the case study.

References Barrett, M., Cappleman, S., Shoib, G. and Walsham, G. (2004), “Learning in knowledge communities: managing technology and context”, European Management Journal, Vol. 22 No. 1, pp. 1-11. Bettis, R.A. (1991), “Strategic management and the straightjacket: an editorial essay”, Organization Science, Vol. 2 No. 3, pp. 315-9. Botkin, J. (1999), Smart Business: How Knowledge Communities Can Revolutionize Your Company, The Free Press, New York, NY. Brown, J.S. and Duguid, P. (2001), “Knowledge and organizations: a social-practice perspective”, Organization Science, Vol. 12 No. 2, pp. 198-213. Bryman, A. (2004), Social Research Methods, 2nd ed., Oxford University Press, New York, NY. Buckman, R.H. (2004), Building a Knowledge-driven Organization, McGraw-Hill, New York, NY. Cassell, C. and Symon, G. (1994), “Qualitative research in work contexts”, in Cassell, C. and Symon, G. (Eds), Qualitative Methods in Organizational Research: A Practical Guide, Sage, London, pp. 1-13. Davenport, T.H. and Prusak, L. (2000), Working Knowledge: How Organizations Manage What They Know, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Doi, T. (1985), The Anatomy of Self: The Individual Versus Society, trans. by Harbison, M.A., Kodansha International, Tokyo, New York, NY and London. Dubin, R. (1982), “Management: meaning, methods, and moxie”, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 7 No. 3, pp. 372-9. Eisenhardt, K.M. (1989), “Building theories from case study research”, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 14 No. 4, pp. 532-50. Flyvbjerg, B. (2006), “Five misunderstandings about case-study research”, Qualitative Inquiry, Vol. 12 No. 2, pp. 219-45. Hall, E.T. and Hall, M.R. (1987), Hidden Differences: Doing Business with the Japanese, 1st ed., Anchor Books, Doubleday, New York, NY. Hartley, J. (2004), “Case study research”, in Cassell, C. and Symon, G. (Eds), Essential Guide to Qualitative Methods in Organizational Research, Sage Publications, London, Thousand Oaks, New Delhi, pp. 323-33. Hedlund, G. and Nonaka, I. (1993), “Models of knowledge management in the West and Japan”, in Lorange, P., Chakravarthy, B., Roos, J. and Van de Ven, A. (Eds), Implementing Strategic Processes: Change, Learning and Co-operation, Basil Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 117-44. Holden, N.J. (2002), Cross-cultural Management: A Knowledge Management Perspective, Financial Times/Prentice-Hall. Ichijo, K. (2004), “From managing to enabling knowledge”, in Takeuchi, H. and Nonaka, I. (Eds), Hitotsubashi on Knowledge Management, John Wiley & Sons (Asia), Singapore, pp. 125-52. Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991), Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Cambridge University Press, New York, NY. Leonard, D. (1998), Wellsprings of Knowledge: Building and Sustaining the Sources of Innovation, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Lesser, E.L. and Storck, J. (2001), “Communities of practice and organizational performance”, IBM Systems Journal, Vol. 40 No. 4, pp. 831-41. Mavin, S. and Cavaleri, S. (2004), “Viewing learning organizations through a social learning lens”, The Learning Organization, Vol. 11 Nos 2/3, pp. 285-9.

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Nonaka, I. (1994), “A dynamic theory of organizational knowledge creation”, Organization Science, Vol. 5 No. 1, pp. 14-34. Nonaka, I. and Konno, N. (1998), “The concept of ba: building a foundation for knowledge creation”, California Management Review, Vol. 40 No. 3, pp. 40-54. Nonaka, I. and Toyama, R. (2003), “The knowledge-creating theory revisited: knowledge creation as a synthesizing process”, Knowledge Management Research & Practice, Vol. 1 No. 1, pp. 2-10. Patton, M.Q. (2002), Qualitative Research and Evaluation Methods, 3rd ed., Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA. Plaskoff, J. (2003), “Intersubjectivity and community building: learning to learn organizationally”, in Easterby-Smith, M. and Lyles, M.A. (Eds), The Blackwell Handbook of Organizational Learning and Knowledge Management, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, pp. 161-84. Saint-Onge, H. and Wallace, D. (2003), Leveraging Communities of Practice for Strategic Advantage, Butterworth-Heinemann, Boston, MA. Soekijad, M., Huis in’t Veld, M.A.A. and Enserink, B. (2004), “Learning and knowledge processes in inter-organizational communities of practice”, Knowledge and Process Management, Vol. 11 No. 1, pp. 3-12. Stake, R.E. (2000), “Case studies”, in Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. (Eds), Handbook of Qualitative Research, Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA, pp. 435-53. Storck, J. and Hill, P.A. (2000), “Knowledge diffusion through strategic communities”, Sloan Management Review, Vol. 41 No. 2, pp. 63-4. Swan, J., Scarbrough, H. and Robertson, M. (2002), “The construction of ‘communities of practice’ in the management of innovation”, Management Learning, Vol. 33 No. 4, pp. 477-96. Vera, D. and Crossan, M. (2003), “Organizational learning and knowledge management: toward an integrative framework”, in Easterby-Smith, M. and Lyles, M.A. (Eds), The Blackwell Handbook of Organizational Learning and Knowledge Management, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, pp. 122-41. von Krogh, G., Ichijo, K. and Nonaka, I. (2000), Enabling Knowledge Creation, How to Unlock the Mystery of Tacit Knowledge and Release the Power of Innovation, Oxford University Press, New York, NY. Weick, K.E. (1996), “Drop your tools: allegory for organizational studies”, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 41 No. 2, pp. 301-13. Wenger, E. (1998), Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity, Cambridge University Press, New York, NY. Wenger, E. (2004), “Knowledge management as a doughnut: shaping your knowledge strategy through communities of practice”, Ivey Business Journal, Vol. 68 No. 3, pp. 1-8. Wenger, E., McDermott, R. and Snyder, W.M. (2002), Cultivating Communities of Practice, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Wenger, E.C. and Snyder, W.M. (2000), “Communities of practice: the organizational frontier”, Harvard Business Review, Vol. 78 No. 1, pp. 139-45. Yin, R.K. (2003), Case Study Research, Design and Methods, 3rd ed., Vol. 5, Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA. Corresponding author Florian Kohlbacher can be contacted at: [email protected] To purchase reprints of this article please e-mail: [email protected] Or visit our web site for further details: www.emeraldinsight.com/reprints

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at www.emeraldinsight.com/0969-6474.htm

Consultants: love-hate relationships with communities of practice Katja Pastoors

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Hamburg, Germany Abstract Purpose – This paper aims to explores consultants’ experiences of communities of practice (CoPs) in one of the world’s largest information technology companies against organisational strategies. The research focus concerns experiences of formal top-down and underground CoPs. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is an exploratory case study. Following a subjective approach the it draws on individual experiences of ten consultants. Semi-structured interviews were conducted alongside documentary analysis to gain understanding of the organisation’s approach to CoPs. Findings – The paper finds that the one size fits all organisational approach to CoPs does not address the specific knowledge requirements of the consultancy unit where the majority of consultants work widely dispersed from clients’ sites. The consultants report mistrust of top-down CoPs and remain committed to underground CoPs. Since the skills and knowledge of the consultants are the unit’s only asset, the top-down approach to CoPs should be revisited in order to enable knowledge creation and continuous improvement of these assets, vital for future success of the consultancy business. Research limitations/implications – The research focuses on the consultancy unit; wider research exploring experiences of top-down CoPs elsewhere in the organisation is an area of future research, as is exploring membership of bootlegged CoPs as resistance to organisational change. Practical implications – This research is useful for practitioners, especially the management of consultancies, whose business success is reliant on their employees’ skills and knowledge. Originality/value – The researcher is a member of the organisation under exploration and is therefore able to include an inside view. The research was undertaken following the acquisition of an international consultancy by the information technology organisation. Keywords Communities, Knowledge sharing, Management consultancy, Individual perception Paper type Research paper

Introduction The concept of communities of practice (CoPs) has not only become the object of study in academia but has also captured the attention of large international organisations, who have introduced and supported the work of CoPs as mechanisms to support strategy. However, the success of CoPs does not only depend on the organisation’s strategy, but also equally on the motivation and willingness of employees to participate in and to contribute to communities. CoPs are widely regarded as valuable to efficient sharing and creation of knowledge, the integration of new employees, the ability to respond rapidly to customer needs and inquiries, the reduction of time spend on “reinventing the wheel”, The author would like to thank Sharon Mavin, Jon Pemberton and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable suggestions and comments.

The Learning Organization: The International Journal of Knowledge and Organizational Learning Management Vol. 14 No. 1, 2007 pp. 21-33 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0969-6474 DOI 10.1108/09696470710718320

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and the sharing of new ideas which could lead to innovative products or services (Lesser and Storck, 2001). This is of utmost importance in large and flexible organisations such as consultancy companies where knowledge is the only asset, mostly bound to knowing subjects, who are widely dispersed (Alvesson, 2004). Wenger and Snyder (2000, p. 145) assign to CoPs the meaning of a “hidden fountainhead of knowledge development” and describe them as “the key to the challenge of the knowledge economy”. In the following paper I explore one of the largest international information technology business consultancies to provide an insight into organisational strategy with regard to CoPs. As a practitioner-researcher, I aim to illustrate experiences of consultants within CoPs in order to highlight the implications of the organisation’s one-size fits all CoP strategy. The consultancy unit had recently “merged” with the larger organisation and the empirical work focuses on consultants from this unit. Particular emphasis is placed on experiences of the organisation’s top-down strategy of CoPs versus underground bottom-up CoPs. Previous research has explored experiences within CoPs from an outsider research position. This paper presents a view from the inside, as I am both the researcher and the researched, as a consultant within the organisation under exploration. The paper begins with a brief introduction of appropriate research and then presents the case study organisation and research approach. I then discuss analysis of data from ten consultants to highlight how the organisation’s one size fits all, top-down approach to CoPs has not been experienced positively and why consultants engage in underground CoPs. Theoretical framework CoPs Many researchers as well as managers have recognised the necessity to pay more attention to social factors supporting learning and knowledge creation in organisation (see Easterby-Smith et al., 2000; Garvey and Williamson, 2002). The concept of CoPs has its origins in the context of the social theory of learning, developed in opposition to the cognitive approach that learning takes place on an individual basis (Elkjaer, 1999). While the cognitive approach to learning views knowledge as a commodity, as something people have, the social theory of learning regards knowledge as something people do. Learning in this context is not conceived to take place in the mind of the individual and as a way of knowing the world, but as being dependent on context and social interaction and as a way of being in the world (Chiva and Alegre, 2005; Elkjaer, 1999; Gherardi, 1999). In accordance with the social learning theory Lave and Wenger (1991) put forward the concept of situated learning where learning is placed in social relationships. Learning can only be achieved through active participation and engagement in the process of performance which mostly takes place in CoPs (Lave and Wenger, 1991; Elkjaer, 1999; Wenger, 1998). Because of the importance of CoPs as a space for learning between individuals, it is helpful to provide an understanding of the concept. According to Lave and Wenger (1991, p. 98) a CoP is “a system of relationships between people, activities, and the world; developing with time, and in relation to other tangential and overlapping communities of practice”. Brown and Duguid (1991) add that CoPs emerge among people who have a mutual engagement in a joint practice around which they share a common repertoire of knowledge. CoPs are places where problem identification,

learning and knowledge creation can take place (Brown and Duguid, 2001). The mutual sharing of experiences and knowledge in unrestricted ways can foster new approaches to problems and, as consequence, create new knowledge (Wenger and Snyder, 2000). Wenger et al. (2002) argue that the qualities that make a community an ideal structure for learning include a shared perspective on a domain, trust, a communal identity, long standing relationships and an established practice. Both the organisation as well as individuals can benefit from CoPs. On the one hand, individuals are provided with a sense of identity and a social context in which they can extend, share and utilise their knowledge. On the other, organisations can draw creative ideas from CoPs which can possibly result in innovations (Hislop, 2005). There is debate concerning what constitutes a CoP. In informal networks friends and people connected through business are loosely bound together and collect and exchange information relevant to their business (Wenger and Snyder, 2000). These networks stay alive as long as people benefit from it. Often informal networks exist as a preliminary form of CoPs. When the network grows and a more intensive exchange emerges than it can transform into a CoP (Fontaine, 2001). Whereas informal networks are less organised than CoPs, work groups and project teams are characterised by being more organised than CoPs. Work groups exist in order to deliver a product or service. Members of these work groups report to the manager in charge and stay together for an undefined period of time. Project teams are also controlled by management, but differ from work groups because they only last until their project tasks have been accomplished. Here employees are assigned to the project teams by management (Wenger and Snyder, 2000). While it is often argued that CoPs distinguish themselves from informal networks, work groups and project teams in a number of ways, such boundaries are now blurring as organisations implement CoPs as tools to achieve business strategies. CoPs are not stable or static entities (Roberts, 2006), not all CoPs are the same and may experience a different status within an organisation. While Lave and Wenger (1991) argue that CoPs cannot be “formed” and therefore management cannot establish a CoP, Saint-Onge and Wallace (2003) and Wenger et al. (2002) suggest that CoPs can be cultivated and leveraged for strategic advantage. Roberts (2006) argues that the assumption that CoPs can be created by management is a contested view. As a consultant practitioner working within the organisation under study, my own experiences of organisationally created top-down CoPs, conceptualised as organisational tools with institutional value enables me to legitimately reflect upon my own and to explore others’ experiences of these CoPs. Wenger et al. (2002) set up five degrees of acceptance of CoPs by organisations, providing a useful framework for this research. First, there are invisible CoPs within organisation, unrecognised in any form. Even people belonging to these CoPs are not aware that they are part of a CoP. CoPs can also be “bootlegged”; only visible to members and people close to the CoP who know about its existence. The degree of organisational acceptance of “visible” CoPs can differ; some CoPs may not be accepted or be officially sanctioned by the organisation, whereas others might experience a high degree of acceptance and support. Institutionalised CoPs gain the highest degree of acceptance, often given official status and functions in the organisation (Wenger et al., 2002).

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It is the experiences of bootlegged CoPs versus institutionalised CoPs as organisational tools within a case study organisation which is the focus of this research. Membership in CoPs Historically membership in CoPs has been seen as voluntary and CoP objectives as constantly changing dependent on the development of the topic of interest as well as the knowledge of its members. Lesser and Storck (2001) argue that the life span of CoPs is undefined and depends on the commitment of its members. External control is very often limited or non-existent since the CoP is self-managed by its members (Wenger and Snyder, 2000). However, the extent of independence and flexibility of CoPs is dependent on how the CoP came into existence. Although it is widely acknowledged that CoPs are most effective and successful when emerging bottom-up, some organisations also introduce top-down CoPs (Brown and Duguid, 1991). While top-down CoPs can be highly accepted by people within the organisation and often enjoy an official status, some experience difficulties in being fully supported by employees. The enthusiasm for a specific topic and an already existing network which often lead to the creation of a bottom-up CoP can be missing in top-down CoPs (Fontaine, 2001). Bottom-up CoPs emerge from informal networks between subject matter experts for a particular topic or employees seeking to learn more about a new topic within a group of colleagues with similar interests. When an informal network like this continually attracts more people and takes a structured approach then the network transforms into a CoP (Fontaine, 2001). As a consequence of the natural development of bottom-up CoPs, members feel in control and participate out of passion and this kind of CoP is often felt as more authentic and successful in its outcomes. Bottom-up CoPs are those which exist because of people’s interest and enthusiasm for a particular topic area. A sense of ownership develops and makes members take on roles and responsibilities (Brown and Duguid, 1991). However, there is also a danger that bottom-up CoPs can experience a lack of organisational support while top-down CoPs are highly accepted by the organisation when they are in line with business interests and strategy. The downside of CoPs Much of the literature on CoPs is positive about the impacts of CoPs. However, there is a growing literature critiquing issues of power, trust, predispositions, size and spatial reach, fast versus slow communities and limits of communities (see Fox, 2000; Contu and Willmott, 2003; Swan et al., 2002; Roberts, 2006). Pemberton and Stalker (2005) argue in their work on “communities of malpractice” that while CoPs are by definition groups of like-minded people keen to share knowledge and practice, and create new knowledge, for CoPs to function effectively there has to be a level of internal leadership and coordination. However, when this is provided by management seeking to ensure cultural conformity to a specific organisational identity this may be at variance with the self-regulation enjoyed by members. As such the potential energy generated in CoPs is often dissipated by members’ excursions into the chaotic and political milieu of organisational life, with emotional containment being fundamental to CoPs, allowing members to stand back from the pressures of their working environment (Pemberton and Stalker, 2005).

Wenger et al. (2002) discuss the “downside” of CoPs and Lave and Wenger (1991, p. 58) emphasise the “contradictory nature of collective social practice” as the dilemma that while CoP members work together for the benefit of the CoP and most likely seek to achieve a common goal, they also compete with each other for visibility and promotion opportunities. Further, the strong feeling of identity of members belonging to a CoP is mostly regarded as a positive aspect however this identity can also lead to a sense of exclusiveness and ignorance towards people who are not part of the CoP and resulting knowledge (Alvesson, 2000). Brown and Duguid (2001, p. 203) argue that CoPs “can be warm and cold, sometimes coercive rather than persuasive and occasionally even explosive.” However, their advantage lies in the fact that they mediate between individuals and large, and very often formal, organisations and contribute to organisational learning and knowledge creation. The case study and the organisation’s approach to CoPs The organisation is a large international consultancy - information technology organisation which has recently acquired an international consultancy operation. The organisation has a commitment to innovation and knowledge development. On launching an organisation-wide marketing and communications initiative to position the organisation as the innovation partner for clients all over the world in March 2006, the Chairman and CEO communicated to employees via the organisation’s intranet: “Innovation matters now more than ever. Get ready. The nature of innovation — the inherent definition of innovation — has changed today from what it was in the past. It’s no longer individuals toiling in a laboratory, coming up with some great invention. It’s not an individual. It’s individuals. It’s multidisciplinary. It’s global. It’s collaborative” (Company material, 2006a). Within this context CoPs are viewed as a crucial framework in which individuals can share ideas and be innovative among and with other individuals. CoPs are viewed as a vital part in transforming the organisation into the innovation partner of choice. The organisation has introduced a global community programme to provide employees with the opportunity to network with colleagues and to develop a culture that offers a safe environment for employees to express their ideas, collaborate with colleagues by sharing knowledge, acquiring new knowledge and to be innovative. Within this strategic context there are two main origins of CoPs; CoPs which emerge naturally from informal networks and top-down “institutionalised” CoPs, “developed as part of the business strategy by senior management” (Company material, 2004a, b). In line with the overall strategic approach, the organisation pursues a formal top-down approach to CoPs and identifies and measures direct and indirect benefits through tools such as “balanced scorecards within a portfolio management approach, to recognise value and drive behaviour so that strategic and operative objectives can be achieved” (Company material, 2004c). There are approximately 95 assigned CoPs sponsored by the global community programme (Company material, 2005) with the organisation’s approach to CoPs based on IT-tools for supporting as well as measuring the work of CoPs (Company material, 2002, 2005). Further, the organisation relies on detailed role descriptions and communications plans within CoPs (Company material, 2006b). CoPs are regarded as performance enablers because of their ability to work as a system across “organisational silos” (Company material, 2004d). This is of crucial

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importance for large international organisations where information might be lost or not communicated at all. The global community programme is designed for all global service lines within the organisation and as such can be viewed as a one-size fits all approach. Research approach The empirical work discussed here is part of a wider research project exploring knowledge creation within the case study organisation. The research concerning CoPs was informed by the questions “How do individual consultants working for the international consultancy unit experience membership in CoPs and what is their perception of the organisation’s overall strategy in relation to CoPs?” One of my objectives was to explore whether the organisation’s strategy is successful according to the individual’s experiences, therefore I looked for details of interaction between the consultants and the organisational context (Stake, 1995). The research approach was subjective and since I am part of the organisation explored I sought to take into account the social and cultural influences which contribute to individual’s meaning making and ways of dealing with their environment. To explore individual experiences with and perceptions of CoPs I applied a semi-structured interview technique, since it is similar to a conversation which could take place among work colleagues (Rubin and Rubin, 1995). I selected ten consultants as participants for semi-structured interviews, chosen with regards to accessibility, access and manageability of the resulting narrative data. The interviews took place at different work venues in various locations in Germany, Vienna and London. The interviews were conducted four years after the information technology organisation acquired the consultancy organisation. During the course of this time many consultants had left the organisation. The type of participants’ engagement in CoPs was diverse, with some face-to-face CoPs and others facilitated virtually. To analyse the co-produced narratives I followed several steps suggested by Czarniawska (2004, p. 15): I provoked story telling and watched how stories were made in the interviews. I then interpreted these stories by asking what my interview partners said, how they said it and what they wanted to achieve by saying it, before unmaking those stories, putting them together again and comparing them to other stories. In line with the approach of Mavin (2001) my main emphasis was not to explore “the one truth” about CoPs in the organisation but the exploration of individual subjective experiences, feelings and perceptions of the research participants. Because of the constraints of publication, I am unable to provide individual narratives but have highlighted pertinent themes. I also completed a documentary analysis enabling me to further understand the organisation’s approach to CoPs. Main sources have been the organisation’s Intranet, internal company documents and presentations, electronic mails sent out to the employees and publications of members of the organisation. Experiences of consultants In the following section I illustrate the main issues which emerged through interpreting the narrative data and my own sense-making as researcher-practitioner (see Table I). Before the acquisition the consultants were engaged in bottom-up CoPs and were now working in an environment of strategic institutionalised CoPs. The narratives of

Themes

Experiences

Organisational culture

Culture within new organisation dramatically differed from previous organisation before the acquisition. Consultancy organisation had to subordinate its culture and way of doing business The opportunity to learn from the acquired organisation had not been utilised Consultants felt unappreciated and like strangers in their new organisational environment Classroom training dramatically reduced post acquisition due to shrinking business results. Some had not been on a training course for over two years. Consultants felt the need to learn new things and to remain up-to date Participating in CoPs had become of even higher significance for them Organisation did not support the consultants in their ambition they felt disappointed in two ways: they were not allowed to update their knowledge and were not able to deliver projects as well as possible Amount of resources allocated to CoPs by the organisation dependent on top-down or emerged Top-down CoPs called “assigned CoPs” (Company material, 2004d) given value. These are institutionalised CoPs (Wenger et al. (2002) equipped with resources and status by the organisation “Emerged CoPs” (Company material, 2004d) often developed from informal networks which existed outside of the organisational structure to unrecognised or bootlegged CoPs Consultants said they were enrolled for existing CoPs by their managers, convinced that membership in a institutionalised CoP, would be beneficial for development Consultants wanted to develop in a different direction but were not supported Organisation “forced” consultants to become members of CoPs hampered “natural” interest in topics Consultants believed organisation expected them to work on CoPs outside regular working hours Consultants believed being an active member of a CoP meant more workload Previous organisation CoP membership was rewarded through career opportunities, pay increases and bonuses but no more due to economic situation. Consultants unwilling to spend their own time on CoP activities. Particularly consultants assigned to institutionalised CoPs Consultants willing and motivated to spend extra time and effort on bootlegged CoPs Consultants work in institutionalised CoPs was controlled through strict communication plans, community roles, tools for measuring effectiveness, uniform virtual team rooms and platforms Frameworks were not able to respond to individual needs of CoPs and even hampered the CoP members in their creative thinking Consultants did not want to maintain those tools or fill CoP roles in “forced” membership CoP activities are intangible and cannot be “pressed” into rigid frameworks, e.g. inflexible role, communication prescriptions and rigid measurement tools Consultants in institutionalised CoPs did not establish ownership. (continued)

Communities and training activities

Origins of communities – from unrecognised to institutionalised

Membership in CoPs – voluntary or “forced”?

Contribution to CoPs – rhetoric versus reality

Organisationally “controlled” CoPs

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Table I. Consultant’s views

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Table I.

Themes

Experiences

Organisation’s CoPs strategy

Consultants saw global community programme as successful in “old” part of the organisation Global programme ignored “consultants” needs and felt disadvantaged regarding promotion and career opportunities where membership of institutionalised CoPs, for which they did not have time available as other staff, were crucial Felt that neither their experience nor their creative ideas were appreciated Some had given up and refused to put any more effort into institutionalised CoPs They were still very active collaborating in informal networks and unrecognised or bootlegged CoPs with colleagues from the former consultancy

participants highlight that institutionalised CoPs introduced top-down by the organisation are not highly appreciated by the consultants and are therefore in danger of failing. By “forcing” certain topics as well as procedures on consultants, the organisation rather hampers the desired learning as well as the sharing and creation of knowledge. In the narratives the consultants expressed feelings of being controlled and patronised. The organisational strategy and culture did not positively encourage or support the natural emergence of CoPs by providing an environment which allowed consultants to be spontaneous and experimental. The consultants involved in this research are highly educated and motivated and can do their job without much guidance or instruction. However they felt that they were unsettled by a loss of autonomy and trust replaced by tight control. The organisation assigns consultants to specific institutionalised CoPs without members being overly enthusiastic about it. One of the success factors of a CoP is that people are passionate about the topic and the hope that all members can benefit from it. The narratives highlight some consultants describing how they were enrolled for existing CoPs by their managers because they were convinced that membership in a particular institutionalised CoP would be beneficial for their development. Some consultants wanted to develop in a different direction but were not supported. The way the organisation “forced” consultants to become members of CoPs consultants appeared to be hampering the “natural” interest in topics and the development of consultants. Consultant A commented: Someone told me that I am a member of a community, but I don’t even know which one it is. I am certainly not attending any meetings or conference calls in the current situation. That would mean even more hours on top I am not getting paid for. And I can’t see the benefit of it. This is only another tool to tap knowledge from employees to bring it back into the market without acknowledging what the individual has contributed.

Another consultant discussed not putting much effort into a process to discuss a topic they were not interested in. CoPs draw upon social interaction and learning, however, a person cannot be forced to engage socially. The outcomes of CoPs in this context are highly questionable. Allowing the emergence of bottom-up CoPs and allocating time for working within these CoPs might be a first step to a more fruitful approach.

Currently most of the CoPs in place are formal and restrictive. Even when part of an institutionalised CoP consultants were still frustrated by the formal processes. Consultant B comments: Something that doesn’t work very well within the oil community is the harvesting of knowledge and the maintaining of knowledge databases. There are only a few people who are actively involved in this topic. Mostly, we have one person per project who is responsible for the harvesting. But they often just copy the project drive and this is not sufficient. We need each sub team to decide what is useful and important on a more detailed level. Unfortunately, people are too busy or don’t see the benefit of it.

Importantly motivation to engage in CoPs is not an issue for the research participants rather it is engagement in top-down CoPs where motivation is lacking. Because of our intrinsic motivation most of the consultant research participants are members of unrecognised, bootlegged (Wenger et al., 2002) CoPs which almost completely consist of consultants from the former consultancy company. In order to deliver projects on time and in budget we feel the need to engage with colleagues we trust. These CoPs which emerged bottom-up are of great importance to the participants but should also be of value to the wider organisation since the knowledge developed is of tacit nature and it is hardly possible, if at all, to make it explicit. These CoPs are discussed by participants as almost “underground” CoPs as they are not part of the global community programme. An avenue for further research concerns whether this process by the consultants is part of organisational resistance to the acquisition. Knowledge transfer between different groups of employees after an acquisition or acquisition often proves to be difficult. The overvaluing of one’s own knowledge and the disrespect of the knowledge from other groups is quite common (Empson, 2001). However the consultants’ narratives highlight how bootlegged CoPs provide a platform in which tacit knowledge can be shared through interaction and joint performance. The research participants became members of these “underground” CoPs voluntarily, because they shared a common interest and passion for certain topics. However these CoPs also provide emotional containment (Pemberton and Stalker, 2005) for groups of consultants who are “new” to the wider organisation. Here we find some stability in times where we are afraid of losing our place as well as our identity in the organisation. At the same time we confine ourselves from other institutionalised top-down CoPs. According to Alvesson (2000) and Hislop (2005) this behaviour can lead to ignorance towards colleagues who are not included in these CoPs and exclusion of their knowledge which can result in a standstill in terms of knowledge creation in the organisation. However, while these CoPs are not actively supported by the organisation, their significance continues to be undervalued. The narratives of participants tell how the organisation restrains CoP activities, which take place outside of the prescribed management CoP approach and are therefore not controllable, by denying the CoPs resources. A desire for organisational control can be related to the immense size of the organisation where activities outside management “control tools” are discouraged. This leads to a central dilemma; the organisation has a significant reputation for using CoPs as a management strategy but these are controlled and as such alienate those who are used to operating in bottom-up CoPs. The current management approach where procedures, roles and quantitative tools play a major role in CoP operation can lead to two major disadvantages. First, the formal approach alienates the consultants and pushes their knowledge underground.

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The knowledge exchanged in these CoPs is only available to a limited number of consultants and therefore benefits remain unutilised. Second, consultants belonging to these CoPs who subsequently leave the organisation are taking knowledge with them. This results in a considerable loss of potential and knowledge creation. Because of the nature of a consultant’s service and product; their knowledge, CoPs are of significant importance for consultancy organisations in order to be able to continually improve their only asset, knowledge. The organisation’s one-size fits all approach of top-down CoPs ignores the particular needs of the consultant group. In order to support knowledge creation and effective performance, the organisation should pass ownership of CoPs to consultants in order to enable successful outcomes. Some participant consultants expressed that they are not looking for financial rewards from the organisation. They gained reward and satisfaction from engaging in their underground CoPs and from the outcomes of these CoPs, where they share a passion for the topic we work on. What the participants want is time and freedom to participate actively in these CoPs. Consultants face a stark choice in relation to the organisation’s one-size fits all approach to CoPs as the role a consultant occupies within an institutionalised top-down CoP is of crucial importance for his or her career. Consequently, consultants feel that they must “perform” when they do engage in top-down Cops as they fear that these are not places where we feel free to express and test ideas in an informal, risk-free environment. Some participants discussed feeling anxious about compromising themselves or that they may suffer negative consequences as a result of performing badly in a top-down CoP and find themselves as CoP members competing with each other over visibility and promotion opportunities (Lave and Wenger, 1991, p. 58). The consultants have provided feedback to the organisation on their experiences of CoPs but this was rarely responded to. If the organisation and, in particular, the consultancy unit is to be successful in the future, the organisation has to recognise and listen to the only asset it has: the consultants. The consultants are the ones facing the client, knowing which approach went well and which was not that successful, and, most important – what the client needs. Currently, the organisation is limiting community work in non-institutionalised or underground CoPs as they present additional costs and are not “measurable” within a context of unstable business results. This may make sense in the short-run, as cost cutting seems to be of the highest priority but in the long run the consultancy unit will only be able to stimulate demand and stay competitive in the market by offering excellent services at a reasonable price. This is only possible when the consultants’ skills and knowledge constantly improve. The restriction of CoP activities puts the organisation at risk as it endangers the up-to-date knowledge of consultants. Hence, even more attention and resources should be allocated to CoPs where consultants are provided with a platform on which they can share, learn and be innovative. The views of the participant consultants from the consultancy unit highlight that the one-size fits all global community programme of CoPs appears to be successful in other parts of the organisation. The organisation has put considerable effort into setting up a framework that enables and supports top-down CoPs. However, one size does not seem to fit all in this case. As argued, the consultancy unit has particular knowledge requirements which the CoP approach should respond to. Despite the organisation’s effort it appears not to have made the step from knowledge management

to a more social learning approach which pays more attention to the social factors strongly influencing activities and success. Easterby-Smith et al. (2000) and Garvey and Williamson (2002) argue that organisations have to move away from knowledge management strategies to a more open approach where control is loosened in favour of space; flexibility is encouraged and more attention is given to social factors in order to enable employees to learn and share and create knowledge. In this particular organisation strict procedures, control mechanisms and a strong emphasis on IT tools are still in place. However there are mitigating factors including the pace of cultural change in the context of acquisition. The consultants joined the wider organisation in 2002 and a large multinational organisation needs time to align business activities internally as well as externally. Still, support functions for knowledge sharing and knowledge creation are of supreme strategic importance and should therefore be aligned as soon as possible. Conclusion Having analysed participant’s narratives, the one-size fits all approach to top-down institutionalised CoPs through the global community programme does not address consultants requirements for learning and knowledge. By the very nature of the work of consultants, based on their individual knowledge, CoPs are an extremely valuable way of creating knowledge. However, the complexity of the organisational context, with consultants “joining” the wider organisation and joining with existing experience of successful bottom-up CoPs has led to consultants engaging in bootlegged, underground CoPs, only visible to members and people close to members of the CoP (Wenger et al., 2002). The power and political dimensions of acquisition situations appear to be played out in these underground CoPs as consultants mistrust the role of top-down institutionalised CoPs. While there is internal leadership and coordination in the institutionalised CoPs, there appears to be variance with the self-regulation (Pemberton and Stalker, 2005) of those consultants used to contributing to bottom-up CoPs. As a member of the organisation I understand the main benefit of the consultancy acquisition was the knowledge gained from the consultants from the former consultancy. Yet, it seems that the organisation is unsure as to how to maximise and develop this knowledge since there has been a lack of proactivity in this regard, evidenced by the lack of knowledge exchange between the organisation and the consultancy unit. The organisation has not yet taken advantage of these experiences, rather imposed a culture which is too restrictive to develop consultants to respond to fast-changing clients’ needs. The organisation has a strategy of control, including our work in CoPs. Continued control may result in high turnover of valuable knowledge to competitors. CoPs are at the heart of consultancies where the only asset, knowledge bound to consultants, can be shared and created. A change of strategy away from a one-size fits all approach to CoPs to one which recognises emergent CoPs as valuable to knowledge creation for consultants would be a positive enabler to performance and organisational commitment. Future research concerns exploring experiences of individuals in the wider organisation who have been socialised into the one-size fits all global community programme to highlight how successful this controlled process has been. Also of interest is exploring further how membership of bootlegged CoPs may be a process of

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organisational resistance with individuals from the consultancy unit. A positive way forward for the organisation would be to provide us with the space and time to practice knowledge sharing and creation within the social contexts and bottom-up CoPs deserve special attention as a mechanism to facilitate this. References Alvesson, M. (2000), “Social identity and the problem of loyalty in knowledge-intensive firms”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 37 No. 8, pp. 1101-23. Alvesson, M. (2004), Knowledge Work and Knowledge-intensive Firms, Oxford University Press, New York, NY. Blackler, F. (1995), “Knowledge, knowledge work and organizations: an overview and interpretation”, Organization Studies, Vol. 16 No. 6, pp. 1021-46. Brown, J. and Duguid, P. (1991), “Organizational learning and communities-of-practice: toward a unified view of working, learning and innovation”, Organization Science, Vol. 2 No. 1, pp. 40-57. Brown, J. and Duguid, P. (2001), “Knowledge and organization: a social-practice perspective”, Organization Science, Vol. 12 No. 2, pp. 198-213. Charmaz, K. (2000), “Grounded theory: objectivist and constructivist methods”, in Denzin, N. and Lincoln, Y. (Eds), Handbook of Qualitative Research, 2nd ed., Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, CA. Chiva, R. and Alegre, J. (2005), “Organizational learning and organizational knowledge”, Management Learning, Vol. 36 No. 1, pp. 49-68. Company material (2002), “Knowledge partnering: building better performance capabilities in the global organization change community: overview”, internal company material. Company material (2004a), “GS community mission program”, internal company material. Company material (2004b), “Community program governance”, internal company material. Company material (2004c), “balanced scorecard for communities”, internal company material. Company material (2004d), “GS communities: program overview, community model, community value and benefits”, internal company material. Company material (2005), “Communities of practice: continuously enabling a strategic, competitive and transformative future”, internal company material. Company material (2006a), “The innovators’ innovator”, company intranet, 15 February. Company material (2006b), “MfP community on a page”, company intranet, 15 February. Contu, A. and Willmott, H. (2003), “Re-embedding situatedness: the importance of power relations in learning theory”, Organization Science, Vol. 14 No. 3, pp. 283-96. Crotty, M. (1998), The Foundations of Social Research: Meaning and Perspective in the Research Process, Sage Publications, London. Czarniawska, B. (2004), Narratives in Social Science Research, Sage Publications, London. Denzin, N. (1989), Interpretive Interactionism, Sage Publications, Newbury Park, CA. Dodgson, M. (1993), “Organizational learning: a review of some literature”, Organization Studies, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 375-94. Easterby-Smith, M., Crossan, M. and Nicolini, D. (2000), “Organizational learning: debates past, present and future”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 37 No. 6, pp. 783-96. Elkjaer, B. (1999), “In search of social learning theory”, in Easterby-Smith, M., Araujo, L. and Burgoyne, J. (Eds), Organizational Learning and the Learning Organization, Sage, London.

Empson, L. (2001), “Fear of exploitation and fear of contamination: impediments of knowledge transfer in acquisitions between professional service firms”, Human Relations, Vol. 54 No. 7, pp. 839-62. Fontaine, M. (2001), “Keeping communities of practice afloat: understanding and fostering roles in communities”, Knowledge Management Review, Vol. 4 No. 4, pp. 16-21. Fox, S. (2000), “Communities of practice, Foucault and actor-network theory”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 37 No. 6, pp. 853-67. Garvey, B. and Williamson, B. (2002), Beyond Knowledge Management: Dialogue, Creativity and the Corporate Curriculum, Pearson Education, Harlow. Gherardi, S. (1999), “Learning as problem-driven or learning in the face of mystery?”, Organization Studies, Vol. 20 No. 1, pp. 101-24. Hislop, D. (2005), Knowledge Management in Organizations: A Critical Introduction, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991), Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Cambridge University Press, New York, NY. Lesser, E. and Storck, J. (2001), “Communities of practice and organizational performance”, IBM Systems Journal, Vol. 40 No. 4, pp. 831-41. Mavin, S. (2001), “The gender culture kaleidoscope: images of women’s identity and place in organization”, unpublished PhD thesis, University of Northumbria at Newcastle, Newcastle upon Tyne. Pemberton, J. and Stalker, B. (2005), “Communities of malpractice?”, in Coakes, E. and Clarke, S. (Eds), Encyclopaedia of Communities of Practice in Information and Knowledge Management, Idea Publishing, Hershey, PA, pp. 6-11, July. Roberts, J. (2006), “Limits to communities of practice”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 43 No. 3, pp. 623-39. Rubin, H. and Rubin, I. (1995), Qualitative Interviewing – The Art of Hearing Data, Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, CA. Saint-Onge, H. and Wallace, D. (2003), Leveraging Communities of Practice for Strategic Advantage, Butterworth-Heinemann, Boston, MA. Stake, E. (1995), The Art of Case Study Research, Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, CA. Swan, J., Scarbrough, H. and Robertson, M. (2002), “The construction of communities of practice in the management of innovation”, Management Learning, Vol. 33 No. 4, pp. 477-96. Wenger, E. (1998), Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning and Identity, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Wenger, E. and Snyder, W. (2000), “Communities of practice: the organizational frontier”, Harvard Business Review, Vol. 78 No. 1, pp. 139-45. Wenger, E., McDermott, R. and Snyder, W. (2002), Cultivating Communities of Practice: A Guide to Managing Knowledge, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Corresponding author Katja Pastoors can be contacted at: [email protected]

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Managing intentionally created communities of practice for knowledge sourcing across organisational boundaries Insights on the role of the CoP manager Thomas N. Garavan and Ronan Carbery Department of Personnel and Employment Relations, Kemmy Business School, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland, and

Eamonn Murphy Enterprise Research Centre, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this article is to explore strategies used by communities of practice (CoPs) managers when managing intentionally created CoPs. Design/methodology/approach – Four intentionally created CoPs in Ireland are explored, using a qualitative research design with data from observation, interviews and analysis of documents. Findings – The study identified a number of specific strategies CoP managers use to develop trust, facilitate collaboration, facilitate the negotiation of shared meaning and manage power issues within the CoP. These strategies were shared by the four managers who participated in the study. Research limitations/implications – The study is based on a small sample of managers in Ireland. The context and process imposed constraints and the findings are context specific which implications for the application of findings to other CoPs. Originality/value – The study highlights the concept of CoP is not confined to traditional understandings but includes intentionally created highly structured time-bound groupings of individuals who work in a collaborative manner to share knowledge. The paper offers learning from CoP managers and highlights the practical implications of their experiences. Keywords Communities, Knowledge sharing, Managers, Strategic management, Ireland Paper type Research paper

Introduction Communities of practice (CoPs) have become increasingly influential within management literature and practice. In recent years they have emerged as a potential theory of knowledge creation (Roberts, 2006; Pan and Leidner, 2003). Knowledge is increasingly highlighted in the strategy literature as a source of competitive advantage (Eisenhardt and Santos, 2002; Davenport and Prusak, 1998). The Learning Organization: The International Journal of Knowledge and Organizational Learning Management Vol. 14 No. 1, 2007 pp. 34-49 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0969-6474 DOI 10.1108/09696470710718339

Note: The Programme for University Industry Interface (PUII) was set up by the University of Limerick (the sponsoring organisation) and Forfa´s to specifically address the issues surrounding next generation employability within the manufacturing and service sectors. It is funded by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment. The authors would like to thank PUII for their assistance in writing this paper.

Grant (1996) suggests that knowledge can be integrated externally through relational networks that span organisational boundaries. These networks provide effective mechanisms for accessing and integrating new knowledge, however they may not do so quickly enough to keep up with competitive changes. A particular challenge for organisations that operate in uncertain and complex environments concerns knowledge sourcing. Leibeskind et al. (1996) argue that in a knowledge environment characterised by complexity and rapid change, boundary-spanning networks represent opportunities for knowledge sourcing. Brown and Eisenhardt (1998) suggest that a diverse portfolio of external network activities facilitate knowledge sourcing. These activities are important when the objective is to achieve a broad insight into the direction of change, rather than some specific piece of cutting-edge knowledge. Organisations possess the potential to manage knowledge through collaborative activity (Brown and Duguid, 1991; Wenger et al., 2002). CoPs are advocated as an innovative collaborative strategy for combining working, learning and innovation (Gongla and Rizzuto, 2001; Palinscar and Herrenkohl, 2002). Lesser and Starck (2001) suggest that CoPs may be used by organisations to counteract slow-moving hierarchies and potentially provide significant benefits to the organisation in managing change. CoPs provide organisations with easier access to knowledge, quicker responses to problems, and decreased learning curves. They help generate ideas for new products and services and contribute to the development of the organisation’s long-term memory (Lesser and Everest, 2001; Dube et al., 2005). This paper considers the role of a CoP manager in the context of four intentionally created CoPs which were established to work across organisational boundaries in Ireland. They focused on the sourcing of knowledge in the external environment. The CoPs had a temporary life span; they were formally created and had a clearly defined structure. The CoPs specifically focused on understanding how education providers could support the learning of mature adults who have a third level education particularly in ICT and related disciplines; issues addressed by each CoP had high relevance and salience to members. Each CoP consisted of a diverse range of stakeholders drawn from different sectors of the economy with closed membership reflecting primarily ideological and organisation culture differences. They brought together members from different and sometimes competing organisations that had not previously collaborated in such a formal way or shared knowledge. Organisations were invited to participate and each nominated one or more members to participate in the CoP. Each CoP had a formally assigned manager. We use the term “manager” rather than “leader” in this paper because we focused on understanding the types of microprocesses and competencies that CoP managers used to manage intentionally created CoPs. Intentionally created CoPs provide organisations with particular challenges which are less frequently highlighted in the literature; they are usually established to focus on a specific agenda with a specified duration. They generally have a formal manager whose role is to facilitate and enable CoP members to reach agreement on relevant problems or issues (Gongla and Rizzuto, 2001). Handley et al. (2006) suggest that important challenges to a CoP manager include the facilitation of interaction, interpretation of contributions, and the management of the ongoing process of sensemaking, story telling and representation that lie at the heart of the CoP process.

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We focus in this paper on understanding the micro processes used by managers to achieve CoP objectives. Theoretical context CoPs are composed of three elements: people, places and things (Lesser et al., 2000). They focus on several interactive dimensions of situated learning. Wenger (1998) suggests that meaning is negotiated through a process of negotiation and reification. He defines reification as “a process of giving form to experience by producing objects” (Wenger, 1998, p. 58). He suggests that “any community of practice produces abstractions, tools, symbols, stories, terms and concepts that reify something of that practice in a congealed form” (Wenger, 1998, p. 59). CoPs are conceptualised as arenas of negotiation, learning, meaning and identity. Wenger (1998) suggests three dimensions: members engage in interaction with each other and establish norms and relationships based on mutual engagement; members are bound together by a sense of joint enterprise; and over time members produce a shared repertoire of communal resources. CoPs differ from networks in that they are about something and not just a set of relationships. CoPs were initially understood as emergent, informal, with no organisational regulation (von Krogh, 2002). However there is an increased awareness that they need to be managed. The literature is clear in highlighting that organisational intervention in CoPs represents a delicate course of action (Dove, 1999). CoPs require considerable autonomy and independence if they are to break free from conventional organisational wisdom and produce something of value (McDermott, 1999). Recently we have seen contributions which suggest that CoPs can be cultivated and leveraged for strategic advantage (Saint-Onge and Wallace, 2003). Organisations create CoPs as part of their knowledge management strategies and are often viewed as a supplementary organisational form (Swan et al., 2002). Intentionally created CoPs have unique demographics, memberships, characteristics and topic relevancy to members. They usually have an official launch which includes activities focused on determining purposes and activities. Members meet formally to discuss priorities, perceptions and agree on an agenda. Interaction strategies will also be defined at the initial stages and over its relatively short duration members will seek to find commonalities on the issues. An intentionally created CoP will most likely be managed in a structured fashion. Lindkvist (2005) distinguishes between “communities of practice” and “collectivities of practice”. He suggests that the latter are more akin to project-based teams whose knowledge is more abstract and distributed. He does acknowledge that these more structured entities will comprise of members who have a more shared understanding of issues. The idea of having a manager to coordinate and facilitate the work of a CoP does on the face of it conflict with our traditional understanding of CoPs. In a sense, the manager is seeking to structure spontaneity and bring together what may be fragmented practice into a coherent whole. The manager will perform both management and leadership activities. Brown and Duguid (1991) suggest that a manager can support the development of the CoP; they may have ultimate authority and responsibility for the outputs of the CoP and may perform both action and enabling functions. These include bringing drive, vision and enthusiasm to the CoP

task, the distribution of tasks to CoP members and the provision of advice and facilitation. .

Trust and collaboration Trust and collaboration are important dimensions of effective CoP functioning. It is arguable that given the relatively short duration of intentionally created CoPs that trust and collaboration are more difficult to establish. Roberts (2000) suggests that trust is a necessary precondition for sharing and mutual understanding. It is also necessary for the transfer of knowledge. Wathne et al. (1996) posit that high trust leads to greater openness between CoP members. Therefore the management style of the CoP manager has the potential to undermine the basis on which trust is built. Coopey (1998), for example, suggests that a CoP will likely flourish where conditions are created in which the manager gives CoP members a high degree of autonomy. The task of the CoP manager is to create conditions where a sense of joint enterprise, mutual engagement and a shared repertoire of actions are possible (Wenger, 1998). Intentionally created CoPs can be described as a “playful community”, characterised by a strong work ethic around collective knowledge sharing, mutual challenging and ongoing learning. The CoP manager therefore needs to focus on enabling this collaborative learning to occur. Digenti (1999) suggests that in order to facilitate and embed collaborative learning within the CoP, the CoP manager should facilitate a discussion of attitudes towards collaboration. He/she should uncover any tacit knowledge about collaboration and highlight where there is a lack of alignment around collaborative goals. The manager must take steps to develop a collaborative climate, including activities such as the dissemination of information, the adoption of a collaborative leadership style and the design of collaborative team routines. Senge (1990) suggests that the creation of collaborative space is important, allowing CoP members to propose and develop their representations and models of their ideas. The manager should encourage development through voicing insights, shedding previously held assumptions and shaping the direction, energy and involvement of CoP members. This space should also be considered as a mechanism to allow CoP members to think outside the box and combine linear and random insights. Negotiating meaning Wenger (1998) argues that meaning is negotiated. Collaboration will not occur unless shared meaning is constructed. In practice this suggests that thinking should be distributed among all members of the CoP, they should work in the same aspect of the task at the same time and share cognitive responsibility for the CoP objective. CoP members should be encouraged by the manager to share their thinking as they work together. Chin and Carroll (2000) offer some pragmatic advice in this context. They identify steps in which collaboration can be implemented by the CoP manage, including group formation; the derivation of goals, objectives and hypotheses; the definition of tasks; their negotiation and allocation among the members; the identification of resources; detailed analysis and discussion and dissemination of findings. Brown (2000) suggests that context must be added to data and information in order to produce meaning and comments that the best way forward is to paradoxically not to

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look ahead, but to look around. This suggests that learning occurs when members of the CoP socially construct their understanding of issues or events and then share this understanding with others. The effective operation of the CoP is facilitated through gaining access to shared community understanding and the design of opportunities to enable members to engage in demanding “real world” tasks. Lave and Wenger (1991) suggest that a manager’s role is secondary to the role of the community as a whole in creating learning opportunities for co-participation. The CoP manager has a role to play in identifying and clarifying the domain of the CoP, representing the discipline that creates common value and a sense of common identity. The CoP manager has an important role to play in creating the social structure for learning, fostering interactions and building relationships based on trust and respect. The CoP needs to be able to develop a shared practice or socially defined ways of doing things in the specific domain. An effective approach then evolves as a collective product of the community and is integrated into member’s actions. When these various elements are in place they allow for the creation of a social structure within the CoP this enables the sharing of meaning. However, Mutch (2003) suggests that CoPs may use restricted and elaborate codes; restrictive codes lack flexibility and range of use, whereas elaborate codes enable the CoP to be more open to learning and knowledge creation. This analysis suggests that intentionally created CoPs may not be effective mechanisms for radical innovation in thinking. Power dynamics within the CoP Power emerges as an important concept in explaining how intentionally created CoPs are managed. This suggests that the CoP manager may have to use influence. It is likely that because such CoPs are intentionally created, membership will consist of people with different amounts of experience, authority within their respective organisations, expertise and personality. It can arise that the meanings derived may be a reflection of the CoP manager. The majority of the CoP literature portrays the CoP process as consensual and win-win, whereas in reality it may be characterised by misunderstandings and conflict. Pressures from stakeholders around the CoP can inhibit the motivation and ability of members to negotiate shared meaning. Fox (2000) suggests that learning, which occurs within CoPs is “the outcome of a process of local struggle and the struggle is many faceted involving the self acting upon itself, as well as upon others and upon the material world”. While commentators such as Roberts (2006) highlight that it may be possible to construct CoPs that have the potential to provide space free from power and which enable experimentation and creativity to occur. The study context The CoPs were established as a strategy to source knowledge, to enable a group of stakeholders (education, training institutions, employers, worker representatives and development agencies) to understand the next generation skills and competencies required by individuals to ensure future employability. Each CoP focused on a specific component of the overall aim. CoP aims and objectives were established by the CoP itself, while the researchers were part of a steering group who integrated the outputs of the four CoPs. Each CoP was made up of seven to ten members, supported by a CoP manager, an academic consultant, a research consultant, and a patron from the sponsoring

organisation. Members focused on the key concerns of the CoP. The academic consultant sourced and distributed relevant research materials appropriate to CoP objectives. The research consultant reflected on the CoP, advised on directions for consideration and integrated work into the overall agenda. The role of the patron was to communicate the work and findings of the CoP. The CoP manager was responsible for coordinating the work, communicating the progress of the CoP and ensuring the timely delivery of a final report and other outputs. Each CoP was given a timeframe of approximately 30 weeks to produce a report. This consisted of a series of meetings and site visits. One CoP progressed for a significantly longer period of time. The first meeting of each CoP examined barriers and impediments companies face as they strive to compete in a knowledge economy. Academic literature was distributed to CoP members for review and context for the purpose of the CoP. The second (and all subsequent meetings) involved a site visit to an organisation that had successfully managed the transition from a traditional manufacturing operation to a higher value added operation. The formation of each CoP is described below: (1) Stage 1 – CoP formation. This is focused on defining the aims and objectives of the CoP, the establishment of the ground rules and the identification of the role of the CoP manager. Majority of CoP members were unfamiliar with each other so key role of initial meetings was to develop a sense of purpose and cohesion. (2) Stage 2 – developing shared meaning and boundary spanning skills. Each CoP focused on the development of a shared vocabulary, meaning and development of boundary spanning skills, fostered through agreement on a series of key definitions and terms. Development of boundary spanning competences encouraged through allocating specific work to sub-groups between meetings. Members were mentored before they participated. Each CoP had a patron who led introductory sessions to activate and stimulate dialogue and then took a step back allowing members to initiate discussion and debate themselves. (3) Stage 3 – practising collaboration. Methodology employed in CoPs was similar to wisdom council where members come together to achieve consensus. The CoP represented a structured time limited period of reflection to achieve agreements on the outputs. Various strategies were utilised to practice collaboration; brainstorming sessions, group discussions, discussion of case studies and presentations. (4) Stage 4 – capturing and disseminating knowledge. A challenging aspect of the CoP concerned how to package CoP learning into a form for dissemination, ultimately achieved through a consensus report identifying key learning and the proposed model of practice for adoption by education and industry, disseminated to all relevant stakeholders. Table I provides an illustration of how each CoP managed its process and achieved its objective. Characteristics of the CoPs The four CoPs shared a number of common characteristics; they were formal, had a temporary life-span, were created through a top-down approach and followed a

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Outputs

Process

Problem definition Discussion and meanings of problem definition Agreement on key priorities CoP manager expectations for CoP Preparation of work plan Case studies Case studies Identification of issues for report content

Presentation Brainstorming Distribution of reading material Discussion Presentation from expert Presentations from experts Team discussion Discussion of drafting of report

Sub-groups set up to concentrate on specific topics Meeting 4

Review of case studies Preliminary evaluation of CoP process Overview of progress to date

Meeting 5

Analysis of case studies Analysis of priorities and review of work plan Identification of structure of report Key insights, conclusions and recommendations

Presentation of findings from each sub-group. Discussion and continued drafting of report.

Further research tasks assigned to the sub-groups

Table I. A model of the operation of each CoP

Presentation of research findings from each sub-group Brainstorming Group work Discussion Drafting of CoP report

prescribed leadership and management structure. They varied little on boundary spanning and geographic dispersion and their environments were similar and both the culture and management style of the participating organisations provided support for the CoP process. The CoPs brought together people from different and sometimes competing organisations unused to collaborating or sharing knowledge. The four CoPs had significant slack in terms of resources allocated. All were pilot projects but were not formally integrated into organisation structures; they received significant visibility in the participating organisations. Membership was restricted to selected individuals. A core group of members were first selected on a voluntary basis but the four CoPs were subsequently closed to additional members. Each CoP had representation from stakeholders relevant to education, training and employment of graduates and in most cases was restricted to one member from each participating organisation with members generally having significant decision making authority in their organisation. Membership reflected some organisational and professional differences but relatively few national culture differences. Members had different educational and occupational backgrounds, occupied different positions and worked in different organisations that had particular modes of operation, goals and cultures. Members had never worked together and, in the main, had not known each other prior to the formation of the CoPs. They had varying expectations of the CoP objectives.

The topic of each CoP had high relevance and salience to the members and their daily work and future concerns. The issues addressed were controversial and core to what many members did in their respective organisation. Each CoP had at least one leader and a core group of members who focused on a specific topic over the duration of the CoP.

Managing intentionally created CoPs

Research method The research study focused on the perspective of the CoP manager. We specifically investigated the strategies and microprocesses that managers utilised to negotiate meaning, build trust and facilitate collaboration, and manage power dynamics. The question was exploratory in nature. The research approach was an adaptation of contextual design and was broadly ethnographic. In terms of data collection we explored the literature to analyse the characteristics of each CoP and conducted observation of the workings of each CoP at their various meetings. We conducted interviews with the CoP managers who were encouraged to tell the story of the operation of the CoP in a subjective, reflexive manner with a strong emphasis on description. Additionally a large volume of documents were analysed including internal memoranda, the various drafts of the CoP report, other internal communications and briefing documents included as part of the process. We transcribed each interview and identified appropriate extracts from documents related to each CoP to develop emerging themes.

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Emergent findings We present our findings using the following themes and weave in various data sources to provide meaning-rich descriptions. Negotiating meaning The intentionally created CoPs were not static or stable. They continually evolved over their duration. The four CoPs were not characterised by a common understanding but by differences in perspective and priorities. They possessed a competitive dynamic where particular CoP members wished their perspectives to be the dominant one. The CoPs we studied were relatively small in scale and as a result they were amenable to “manipulation” by the CoP manager. This task was not an easy one. The CoP manager had to make sense of the collective effort, achieved through the crafting of a situated collective understanding of what the CoP was about. Managers took steps to translate the collective enactment of the CoP into a shared meaning, asserted through the formal meeting process and informal interaction with members. CoP managers engaged in both internal and external networking; they interacted with CoP members, the patron, and external resource persons belonging to their networks. CoP managers used a personal patron or friend to act as a sounding board or to vent feeling about the dynamics of the CoP and used discursive, symbolic and cognitive processes to help make sense of the CoP and negotiate meaning. We observed specific strategies that CoP managers used to facilitate the process of sense-making and negotiation of meaning; learning by doing; interpreting the situation and context; articulating vision, goals, objectives and activities; unearthing and challenging assumptions and beliefs on action; building shared meaning and preparing the final CoP Report.

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Learning by doing. CoP managers relied on learning by doing, learning as they go, learning from mistakes and learning through talking and listening. These following comments provide insights on how this process worked. CoP 1 manager highlighted that: As the CoP manager I was new to this process. I had to make sense of it. I spent a lot of time talking and listening . . . holding back and on occasions confronting issues.

CoP 3 manager highlighted that learning by doing was particularly intensive at the CoP start-up phase: We initially had only a broad idea of what we were about. We had a lack of consensus concerning how to proceed. We sought to define and redefine our thinking. Two of the CoP members made lots of mistakes at this phase but it was valuable for the rest of the CoP.

A hands-on learning approach was essential in the early stages and facilitated an emergence of the big picture, the need to restate focus and the facilitation of members in situating activities. For example, CoP 1 decided to change its focus during at an early point in the process as its original scope of was too broad and a solution was prescribed before the nature and parameters of the problem were explored by CoP members. Interpreting the situation and context. CoP managers played a key role in enabling members to interpret the situation and context. Managers were concerned not to impose a specific understanding or view of the issues faced by the CoP but instead highlighted micro-issues and facilitated members to place issues in the wider perspectives of the goals of the CoP. Managers highlighted that they frequently had to “think out loud”, seek input from CoP members, solicit feedback and facilitate members to achieve an understanding of their role in the bigger picture. As a result CoP members sought to engage in a co-construction of meaning. Articulating vision, goals, objectives and activities. Each CoP was given a high level statement of purpose. The CoP composition resulted in a multiplicity of perspectives about what the CoP should strive to achieve as well as significant divergence about how the broad goal should be interpreted. Within this context CoP managers translated the general statement of purpose into specific objectives and tasks and allocated tasks to sub-groups according to talents and perspectives. CoP managers had very quickly to develop personal knowledge of CoP members and to balance the big and small picture aspects of the CoP. Unearthing and challenging assumptions and beliefs on action. Due to the diversity of CoP membership it was inevitable that organisational differences in perspectives would occur. A key role for CoP managers involved unveiling sources of misunderstandings and reframing if necessary. Managers continually engaged in this process and were on occasions required to place themselves in the “shoes” of the members. CoP managers usually brought divergent views together with the goals of the CoP. Managers were required to make reference to the formally accepted understanding of the purpose of the CoP. Building shared meaning. CoP managers were constantly engaged in articulating where the CoP was going. They were frequently reminding members of the CoP purpose and terms of reference. CoP managers spent a considerable period of time focusing on building “shared meaning”. This occurred at the formal meetings, in

written documentation and through interpersonal interaction. One manager highlighted: I was constantly highlighting what the CoP was about. Once CoP members achieved an understanding of the overall purpose they achieved a more insightful understanding of their individual contribution.

Another manager admitted that he found it a struggle to achieve a strong shared meaning: I made lots of mistakes. I underestimated the complexity of the project. This resulted in a lack of success. I was unsuccessful in getting buy in for my vision.

Preparing the CoP report. The preparation of the CoP report represented an important part of the CoPs repertoire of communal resources and a shared artefact. Members viewed it as a medium of communication, a stimulus for discussion and a catalyst for collaboration. As members’ knowledge was embedded in the report, it may be viewed as the reification of the knowledge of the CoP; their expertise was reflected in the quality of the document. It allowed members to share their knowledge through participation and interaction with other CoP members. The preparation of the report stimulated discussions, problem solving, innovation, continued participation and was used to drive CoP meetings. Discussions around the report triggered ideas which formed the basis for further participation. The report served as a means of communication across organisational boundaries. Participation was important to CoP members as it enabled the development of identity and shared meaning; it involved elements of action and reflection and enabled members to negotiate meaning. At a higher level the shared meaning is not simply about developing knowledge and practices but also a process though which members achieved greater self-understanding. Building trust and enabling collaboration The traditional concept of a CoP suggests trust and mutual understanding; both are difficult to develop and are very much dependent on time. The CoPs had very specific tasks which when completed made them obsolete. CoP members did not necessarily share a joint enterprise; each member came with a specific aim and set of priorities. It is arguable that the CoPs we studied could be, to use Myerson et al.’s (1996) term, “fast communities”. Such communities pose difficulties for the development of trust and collaboration as they are dependant on the initial stages in individual knowledge, agency and goal-directed interaction. The development of trust and collaboration demanded particular skills of the CoP manager shown through integration and networking. The integration task focused on combing knowledge, individual talents, ideas and linking resources to people through managing the communication process. CoP managers highlighted that they lacked role models due to the innovative nature of the process. However, they did utilise specific strategies to develop trust and collaboration; identification of individual members’ skills, talents and knowledge; creating synergies within the CoP; developing relational resources; focus on intrinsic motivation; setting challenges for individuals and balancing constraints and freedoms.

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Identification of individual CoP members’ skills, talents and knowledge. CoP managers were unfamiliar with CoP members due to the way in which they were formed. This process was difficult to achieve but vital given the relatively short duration of each CoP. Activities had to be allocated quickly and CoP members were required to carry out specific tasks which fed into later team activities. The CoP manager had to work with the talent pool in place, which sometimes involved negotiation skills. Creating synergies within the CoP. A key challenge for CoP managers focused on creating synergy within the CoP so that both learning and knowledge sharing were maximised. This required careful facilitation and some managers were less effective; they ignored cohesion issues, did not articulate expectations sufficiently and ignored relationships that were counter-productive to the CoP. One particular CoP manager spent a great deal of time on networking issues rather than driving the task. He assumed that the task would develop momentum once the CoP members had gelled as a team. Developing relational resources. CoP managers had major resource investigation in identifying knowledge and developing relationships within the CoP structure. Developing relational resources was intense during site visits and formal meetings. Networking activities focused on managing the social-political environment of the CoP and were manifest at each meeting. Typically CoP managers began each meeting with statements of objectives and strategic relevance. The manager adopted a number of interpersonal strategies; stimulating questions, seeking reactions, encouraging debate, acting as a moderator, setting agendas and seeking closure. These activities were intense at the early stages in the evolution of the CoP. Once behaviours were agreed communication and knowledge sharing flowed more freely. Focus on intrinsic motivation. The more CoP managers trusted and knew members, the more they got to understand their motivations. Managers needed to recognise that different types of challenges motivated individual CoP members. If members chose to participate in sub-group activities they had to assume that it was because they had a particular interest in the issue. This required significant knowledge concerning the talents and knowledge of CoP members Setting challenges for individuals. CoP managers set the pace for effectiveness and on occasions required the priorities of the CoP to be framed in a way that could motivate members. CoP managers frequently had to choose language carefully and sell the vision of the CoP in an inspirational way. One CoP manager indicated that he had to reframe the task taking into account the world views and perspectives of the members. One CoP manager did not successfully get all members on board and the manager did not do enough to get to know the members and understand their preferred styles and priorities. Balancing constraints and freedoms. Effective CoP managers demonstrated a sound understanding of context, constraints, possibilities and the changing dynamics of the CoP. They had to keep control in order to meet the deadline while also engaging with members, knowing when to exert pressure and when to let the members breathe. This was a delicate balancing act and challenged CoP managers. It sometimes led to conflicts, disagreements, lack of progress and on some occasions, movement towards a solution.

Managing the power dynamics CoP managers spent considerable time on issues of power, including setting the goals, negotiating the rules, allowing norms to emerge, energising the team so that resource capabilities and the expert knowledge of members was utilised and encouraging members to build on others contributions. We observed managers’ strategies in operation across the four CoPs; setting the rules; managing conflicts; managing boundaries; coach and role models and face to face meetings and personal relationships. Setting the rules. CoP managers focused on setting the agenda and the rules. This involved articulating that the effort was team focused. The agreement of rules focused on micro and macro aspects such as the timing of meetings, commitment to meeting and preparing work in advance of the meeting. Managing conflicts. On occasions the various CoPs hit roadblocks and obstacles. This required intervention by CoP managers to re-inspire the team and get members moving again. CoP managers frequently used humour, reasserted the value of the CoP and praised the inputs of CoP members. The symbolic reassertion of the goals of the CoP was important so that members could get back to the task with renewed energy and focus. Managing boundaries. CoP managers had a key role to play in fusing the various individual contributions and providing learning space for difference and divergence to emerge and be managed. The metaphor of a playground is useful here. It suggests that CoP managers had to provide space for fun but on occasions had to set limits. Similarly, CoP managers had to highlight that the behaviour demonstrated at times was inappropriate and that CoP members needed to be reintegrated into the team effort. Coach and role model. The theme of coaching emerged in discussions with CoP managers. Managers used coaching techniques to develop cohesiveness, contribute to the atmosphere of the team and manage conflict issues. One-to-one coaching involved the sharing of ideas, asking questions, and listening a lot. It involved words of appreciation or conversations about personal issues. CoP managers acted as role models; they had a major role to play in setting the standards for the team, determining the work ethic, the community ethos, and the unique culture of the CoP. CoP managers exerted a strong influence on the behaviour of members and on their attitudes towards the CoP. They motivated the team through setting the scene and ensuring that the collective effort was kept in focus. Face-to-face meetings and personal relationships. CoP managers placed strong emphasis on the role of face-to-face meetings. These were perceived as vital in building teamwork as a basis to manage issues of power. Managers expressed a strong belief in the importance of personal relationships and teamwork. The development of strong relationships, nearer to friendships, was dependent on trust. One manager commented: For me personally strengthening relationships was most important. Face to face meetings don’t develop trust in themselves but they did facilitate a more rapid development of relationships which allowed trust to emerge.

Discussion We studied the role of the manager of an intentionally created CoP and the types of micro strategies and processes that are used to develop trust, encourage collaboration,

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create shared meaning and manage the power dynamics of the CoP. Some may argue that our four CoPs can be described as temporary groups or project teams concerned with knowledge creation and exchange. They were established quickly and may not, in the view of some commentators, qualify as CoPs. However, they were named as such throughout the process. They did require that members embrace a collective goal, share knowledge, develop a pattern of interaction and achieve some shared enterprise. They relied on both the individual and collective knowledge of members. They operated relatively independent of the organisation that created them and once their task was over they dispersed. They proved to be an effective knowledge management tool. They enabled the educational organisations who established them to gain a deeper understanding of the dynamics of external environments and achieved a greater understanding of employability. They were used by the educational institution (the sponsoring organisation) to leverage their access to key external stakeholders and build internal knowledge assets. Intentionally created CoPs represent an evolving approach to knowledge management tools and here, were effective in capturing tacit knowledge in the context studied. Our research highlighted that CoP managers play an important role in facilitating participation and in creating meaning in intentionally created CoPs. On the face of it, the notion of having a manager to manage a CoP process contradicts traditional understandings of CoPs. We argue, however, that the concept of a CoP is contested and somewhat problematic. In a contemporary business environment which is characterised by rapid change, it is possible to visualise more structured and fast moving CoPs which enable organisations to create and transfer knowledge. Intentionally created CoPs are likely to be more successful where the organisation has a strong sense of collaboration and where the cultural context promotes teamwork. Roberts (2006) suggests that intentionally created CoPs have value both within and beyond organisational boundaries and that they require careful cultivation. They will not flourish where the organisation has an inappropriate culture and the precise purpose of the CoP is poorly defined. Our study revealed that intentionally created CoPs have the potential to disrupt the status quo by questioning social, cultural and political systems found in organisations and they enable work across organisational boundaries. CoP managers enabled the CoP to achieve shared meaning, share knowledge, develop learning space, challenge and support members, provide motivational inputs and foster creativity. They played a major role in building the context, trusting the expertise of the members and providing a clear focus for the CoP. Sometimes they imposed rules, on other occasions they negotiated, however they always ensured that there was a sufficient space for discussion, experimentation and trial and error. CoP managers achieved trust and collaboration utilising strategies such as clarity in objectives, careful task assignment, alignment of task with members’ interests, recognition of achievement and continuous sense making. We grounded our descriptions in the actions and words of the CoP managers. The CoP managers’ efforts were vital to integrating the CoP and ensuring that they were successful. We did not focus on whether each CoP fulfilled its aims. However, the CoPs we studied completed their task: to produce a CoP report which then informed other downstream policies and practices.

Conclusion Our study is not without limitations. It is based on a small sample of managers. The context and process imposed constraints on our sample size however we had access to a significant volume of documentary evidence and opportunities for observation. The study findings highlight important implications for the selection of CoP managers to manage intentionally created CoPs. In particular they must possess strong interpersonal, team building, conflict management and consensus seeking skills. They must adopt the role of facilitator and coach. This requires understandings of context, process and content. Exploring these issues is central and requires the CoP manager to structure the conversation, create an open atmosphere that enables members to feel free to contribute and to propose models or courses of action when necessary. The manager’s role focuses on creating conditions for mutual learning and shared meaning. This requires the suspension of judgement by allowing different perspectives to emerge, encouraging the asking of follow up questions, summarising regularly and asking others to do so. As sense maker CoP managers must have a detailed understanding of the cultural and political context of the CoP, the expectations of key stakeholders and the task requirements. Intentionally created CoPs have specific time lines and significant resource commitments, from which the organisation expects value and return. References Brown, J.S. (2000), “Leveraging the social life of information in the e-age: idea sparkers”, available at: http://cml.indstate.edu/ , libard/ASIST2000x/brjsbsrh.html Brown, J.S. and Duguid, P. (1991), “Organizational learning and communities of practice: toward a unified view of working, learning, and innovation”, Organizational Science, Vol. 2 No. 1, pp. 40-57. Brown, L. and Eisenhardt, K. (1998), Competing on the Edge: Strategy as Structured Chaos, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Chin, G. Jr and Carroll, J.M. (2000), “Articulating collaboration in a learning community”, Behaviour and Information Technology, Vol. 19 No. 4, pp. 233-45. Coopey, J. (1998), “Learning to trust and trusting to learn”, Management Learning, Vol. 29 No. 3, pp. 365-82. Davenport, T. and Prusak, L. (1998), Working Knowledge: How Organisations Manage What They Know, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Digenti, D. (1999), “Collaborative learning: a core capability for organizations in the new economy”, Reflections, Vol. 1 No. 2, pp. 45-57. Dove, R. (1999), “Knowledge management, response ability, and the agile enterprise”, Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. 3 No. 1, pp. 18-35. Dube, L., Bourhis, A. and Jacob, R. (2005), “The impact of structuring characteristics on the launching of virtual communities of practice”, Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 18 No. 2, pp. 145-66. Eisenhardt, K.M. and Santos, F.M. (2002), “Knowledge-based view: a new theory of strategy”, in Pettigrew, A., Thomas, H. and Whittington, R. (Eds), Handbook of Strategic Management, Sage, London. Fox, S. (2000), “Communities of practice, Foucault and actor-network theory”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 37 No. 6, pp. 853-67.

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Gongla, P. and Rizzuto, C.R. (2001), “Evolving communities of practice: IBM Global Services experience”, IBM Systems Journal, Vol. 40 No. 4, pp. 842-62. Grant, R.M. (1996), “Towards a knowledge based theory of the firm”, Strategic Management Journal, Vol. 17, Winter, special issue, pp. 109-22. Handley, K., Sturdy, A., Fincham, R. and Clark, T. (2006), “Within and beyond communities of practice: making sense of learning through participation, identity and practice”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 43 No. 3, pp. 641-53. Lave, J. and Wenger, E.C. (1991), Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Leibeskind, J.P., Oliver, A.L., Zucker, L. and Brewer, M. (1996), “Social relations, learning and flexibility: sourcing scientific knowledge in new biotechnology firms”, Organisational Science, Vol. 7 No. 4, pp. 428-43. Lesser, E. and Everest, K. (2001), “Using communities of practice to manage intellectual capital”, Ivey Business Journal, March-April, pp. 37-41. Lesser, E.L. and Starck, J. (2001), “Communities of practice and organizational performance”, IBM Systems Journal, Vol. 40 No. 4, pp. 831-41. Lesser, E.L., Fontaine, M.A. and Slusher, J.A. (2000), Knowledge and Communities, Butterworth-Heinemann, Woburn, MA. Lindkvist, L. (2005), “Knowledge communities and knowledge collectivities: a typology of knowledge work in groups”, Journal of Management Review, Vol. 42 No. 6, pp. 1189-210. McDermott, R. (1999), “Why information technology inspired but cannot deliver knowledge management”, California Management Review, Vol. 41 No. 4, pp. 103-17. Myerson, D., Weick, K.E. and Kramer, R.M. (1996), “Swift trust and temporary groups”, in Kramer, R.M. and Tyler, T.R. (Eds), Trust in Organizations, Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA. Mutch, A. (2003), “Communities of practice and habitus: a critique”, Organization Studies, Vol. 24 No. 3, pp. 383-401. Palinscar, A.S. and Herrenkohl, L.R. (2002), “Designing collaborative learning contexts”, Theory into Practice, Vol. 41 No. 1, pp. 26-32. Pan, S.L. and Leidner, D.E. (2003), “Bridging communities of practice with information technology in pursuit of global knowledge sharing”, Journal of Strategic Information Systems, Vol. 12 No. 1, pp. 71-88. Roberts, J. (2000), “From know-how to show-how: the role of information and communications technology in the transfer of knowledge”, Technology Analysis and Strategic Management, Vol. 12 No. 4, pp. 429-43. Roberts, J. (2006), “Limits to communities of practice”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 43 No. 3, pp. 623-39. Saint-Onge, H. and Wallace, D. (2003), Leveraging Communities of Practice for Strategic Advantage, Butterworth Heinemann, London and New York, NY. Senge, P.M. (1990), The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization, Doubleday, New York, NY. Swan, J., Scarbrough, H. and Robertson, M. (2002), “The construction of communities of practice in the management of innovation”, Management Learning, Vol. 33 No. 4, pp. 477-96. von Krogh, G. (2002), “The communal resource and information systems”, Journal of Strategic Information Systems, Vol. 11, pp. 85-107.

Wathne, K., Roos, J. and von Krogh, G. (1996), “Towards a theory of knowledge transfer in a cooperative context”, in von Krogh, G. and Roos, J. (Eds), Managing Knowledge: Perpectives on Cooperation and Competition, Sage, London. Wenger, E. (1998), Communities of Practice: Learning Meaning and Identity, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Wenger, E.C., McDermott, R. and Snyder, W.M. (2002), Cultivating Communities of Practice, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Further reading Bourdieu, P. (1990), The Logic of Practice, Polity Press, Cambridge. Dillenbourg, P. and Schneider, D. (1995), “Collaborative learning and the internet”, paper presented at the International Conference on Computer Assisted Instruction, February. Corresponding author Thomas N. Garavan can be contacted at: [email protected]

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Rein Juriado and Niklas Gustafsson Stockholm University School of Business, Stockholm, Sweden Abstract Purpose – The paper aims to discuss the emergence of communities of practice in a temporary event organisation involving public and private partners. Design/methodology/approach – The study employs qualitative methods in the form of 31 semi-structured interviews, a five-week period of participant observations and archive research in a Swedish public-private partnership, focused on large-scale media and entertainment event. Findings – In the temporary event-driven project-based organisational structure studied, communities of practice emerged by themselves because of the complexity of the task at hand. These are called “emergent communities of practice”. Four built-in organisational mechanisms that cultivated the emergent communities of practice were identified: trust building stability; competence contributors; competence shadows; and social glue of informal events. Surprisingly, the public/private dimension was found not to affect the emergence of the community negatively. Research limitations/implications – Given that conclusions are based on the Swedish data, the paper recommends that similar studies be carried out in other countries. Originality/value – The paper extends the framework of communities of practice beyond the boundaries of a single or few stable organisations by analysing communities of practice within a temporary project organisation; it introduces the concept emergent communities of practice; and it proposes four ways to cultivate communities of practice. Keywords Communities, Knowledge sharing, Public sector organizations, Private sector organizations, Partnership, Sweden Paper type Research paper

The Learning Organization: The International Journal of Knowledge and Organizational Learning Management Vol. 14 No. 1, 2007 pp. 50-61 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0969-6474 DOI 10.1108/09696470710718348

Introduction The ever-increasing recognition that knowledge is central to the competitive advantage of an organisation is perhaps most evident in cultural or creative industries whose products are intangible and provide aesthetic (Hirsch, 1972) or hedonic value to consumers. The non-material character of the products makes it difficult to grasp how knowledge is transformed into marketable offerings, but some companies are more successful than others in learning how to produce memorable events, music or film experiences. The role of learning through communities of practice (Lave and Wenger, 1991) seems of critical importance for organisations in creative or experience industries. Wenger and Snyder (2000) argue that wherever communities of practice occur, they add value to organisation(s) through the ability of such groups to solve problems fast and effectively, stimulating the transfer of best practice and development of personal skills, as well as helping to recruit and retain talent. Furthermore they serve as knowledge banks, contribute to strategic development, and stimulate innovation and new business development.

The conventional view presupposes that organisations whose members voluntarily create communities of practice with permeable borders are stable structures. Therefore, most research to date has focused on a single organisation, either public or private. Studies that analyse how learning in such communities occurs across organisational boundaries – either through inter-organisational partnerships or external communities of practices, are few (Dewhurst and Cegarra Navarro, 2004) despite the growing popularity of project-based organisations and networks. Our paper seeks to contribute to a better understanding of the issues that may occur in inter-organisational partnerships involving the public and private sectors. This paper considers organisational constellations that are temporary and are built around a large-scale media and entertainment event. Formal documents and work tasks are clearly important but are not enough to explain why such a complex organisation succeeds. No doubt the personal experience of the crew from the different companies involved and their tacit knowledge is substantial. During the observational study, it was clear that much of the transfer of knowledge occurred in unofficial constellations of collegial groupings, both on individual and organisational levels, as communities of practice. Based on the above-mentioned observations, we aim to discuss the emergence of communities of practice in a temporary event organisation involving public and private partners. We pose two questions: (1) Does the fluidity of the organisation itself affect the establishment and development of communities of practice, and if so, how? (2) How does the public/private dimension affect the development of communities of practice within the event studied? To illustrate how communities of practice emerge in such an organisational setting, we present data from Melodifestivalen, the Swedish national final to select the entry for the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC). Until recently, Melodifestivalen was simply a regular television show, aired once a year. Following criticism about the show’s set-up, Swedish television (SVT) introduced a new format in 2002 – consisting of four qualifying rounds held in different venues around Sweden, a semi-final and the final, which were both held in Stockholm. Today it is Sweden’s largest regular media and entertainment event, with five different arena events and six television broadcasts. The changed format has been very successful. The number of entries to the competition as well as that of viewers increased. Since 2003, Melodifestivalen is produced in partnership with EMA Telstar and Eventum. EMA – the leading concert and entertainment promoter in the Nordic region – takes care of logistics and arena arrangements. Eventum, a major Swedish sponsorship and marketing company, handles the commercial side of the event. SVT continues to assume responsibility for the television show. Their respective roles are very clear but this leads to a paradox with regard to SVT’s non-commercial role. Melodifestivalen is actually a highly commercial event, yet no commercials are shown on air. Although we focus on core actors, readers should note that the total number of links between all collaborating partners in the network (suppliers, arenas, artists, local authorities, etc.) is counted in the hundreds, making the number of links between individuals uncountable and uncontrollable. In Figure 1, we collapse all actors in the

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Figure 1. A simplified overview of communication links between partners and other related organisations or groups of organisations (strength of the links was determined based on interviews)

network into ten main categories consisting of three nodal partners and seven categories of organisational groups. We argue that this effectively constitutes a community rather than a project team because a team does not capture the diversity of the group of people in terms of composition, process and objectives (Kavanagh and Kelly, 2002). Hundreds of individuals representing different professions are involved in this community brought together by the Melodifestivalen event. Contact and communication between them are intense only for a limited period of time. The paper is structured as follows. Based on a literature review, we first outline some of the prerequisites for communities of practice to emerge from temporary partnerships involving public and private organisations. Then we explain our problem approach, followed by our main findings and conclusions. Complex organisations and communities of practice Learning in a company is traditionally seen as occurring on three inter-related levels: individual, group and organisational (Huber, 1991). Learning also occurs on a fourth level; inter-organisational or network (Keka¨le and Viitala, 2003), as companies link together in value chains or networks, learn from each other. With few noticeable exceptions (Hamel, 1991), research on learning to date has tended to focus on one organisation. Yet, the mutual and shared experiential learning between employees is a prerequisite to learning by companies, as well as networks of organisations. Individual knowledge of the employees is gradually transformed into organisational knowledge (Pemberton and Stonehouse, 2000) in a number of ways, not all of which are easily traceable. In the case of communities of practice, groups of people bound together by shared expertise and passion may informally learn from each other and organise themselves to undertake a joint enterprise through a self-selection process (Wenger and

Snyder, 2000). Communities of practice are often found within a business unit, but they may also stretch across divisional or organisational boundaries. Communities of practice are often contrasted with formal work groups and/or project teams (Wenger and Snyder, 2000): communities are driven by shared interests or practice while project teams are guided by shared goals and results. The boundaries of a community of practice are permeable, as opposed to a team, where interdependent tasks are performed according to the clear division of labour between the team members. Learning within teams is often shaped by the successes and failures of the past. Within communities of practice, learning is viewed as a reflexive engagement through dialogue in an attempt to make sense of, and create meaning from, experience (Cunliffe, 2002). Nevertheless, formal teams and communities of practice coexist within profit and non-profit organisations, but as O’Donnell et al. (2003) argue, the two kinds of groups need to be managed differently – communities of practice cannot be “managed” in the traditional control-oriented manner but can only be cultivated (Kavanagh and Kelly, 2002). The empirical case study discussed in this paper represents such an organisational setting: formal teams exist as well as a community of practice and it is up to managers to ensure that both are taken care of. The emergence of virtual, temporary and network-based organisations has led to the blurring of organisational boundaries and to the creation of communities of practice that become active only temporarily in network-based organisations. Lundin and So¨derholm (1995) suggest that temporary organisations are almost always motivated by a need to perform specific actions in order to achieve immediate goals. This points to the need for a clearly structured project team. It is not self evident that network-based organisations facilitate communities of practice and their ultimate goal – the drive for knowledge sharing and learning. Rather, on the contrary, managers of small organisations joined together in an inter-organisational partnership may try to hinder learning, as it is associated with the risk of disclosing too much information to other partners that may become competitors instead (Barney, 1986, Pemberton and Stonehouse, 2000). On the other hand, activities within the partnership need to be coordinated and it has been argued that formal cross-company teams could easily carry this out without the employees becoming “insiders”, acquiring that particular community’s subjective viewpoint or learning, to speak its language (Brown and Duguid, 1991). Public/private partnerships (PPP) add a further layer of complexity to the problem. Although there are many types of PPPs, they always include an enduring relationship between at least one public and one private organisation, each of which is a principal that brings some kind of resource to the partnership (Peters, 1998). PPPs are becoming the norm for activities touching public interests and requiring good and cost-efficient management of public services (Shanin and Weizsa¨cker, 2005). Quinn (1992) has suggested that organisational networks are perhaps the most appropriate structure for supporting a learning culture, with fewer hierarchical features and a variety of possible forms. It may be difficult, however, to create a learning culture between the actors in a PPP. Although PPPs are often structured as networks, public organisations have traditionally been managed differently from private organisations (Hood, 1995). Furthermore, due process constrains public organisations because they are not allowed to move financial resources as easily as private organisations can and furthermore subjects them to political control (Pierre and Peters, 2000). Our research focuses on

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public service television where requirements for the public organisation involved (SVT) are related to the prohibition of advertisements and regulations about programme content. While profit orientation is vital for the survival of private organisations, public organisations do not operate to make a profit. The differences in profit orientation cause dissimilarities in the working cultures of public and private organisations and may affect how learning occurs in PPPs. Finally, the applicability of union agreements and the resulting work practices vary in the public and private sectors. Data collection and analysis approach Our research approach is subjective, with most of the qualitative empirical data collected during February and March 2005 when one of the authors followed the Melodifestivalen five-week tour through five Swedish cities – living with the event crew 24 hours a day – observing preparations, set-up, execution, disassembly and general life around the events. We were given access to otherwise restricted parts of the arenas, to the centre of operations, and to all managers and personnel, allowing us to make participant observations of working practices, styles of communication, formal and informal meetings etc. Observational data were recorded with a voice memory recorder, camera and notepads throughout the tour. In addition, 31 (45 to 90 minutes) semi-structured interviews with representatives of the main actors sought to identify the roles, working practices and relations of the staff members. The interviews were recorded for later analysis. Archive materials were also used to complement the empirical data set with historic background information (see Table I). Processes of data analysis and interpretation are fundamental in qualitative research. The data were analysed through seven operations suggested by Spiggle (1994): categorisation, abstraction, comparison, dimensionalisation, integration, iteration and refutation. These are not to be seen as stages in our research process but as operations that we used in the various stages of analysis. Through these operations we organised the data and extracted meaning, conceptual schemas and conclusions. In the categorisation process we identified and labelled segments of data as “belonging to, representing, or being an example of some more general phenomenon” (Spiggle, 1994, p. 493). In the abstraction process we went beyond the identification of patterns in the data and grouped previously identified categories into more general conceptual classes. Then, through comparisons, we explored differences and similarities across occurrences within the data. The dimensionalisation process Organisation

Table I. Distribution of interviews

Public partners SVT Local authorities Private partners EMA Telstar Eventum Others

No of interviews 10 5 8 3 5

involved identifying properties, attributes, and characteristics of categories and constructs. The process seeks to clarify and enrich the conceptual meaning as well as explore and define relationships across categories. The goal of the integration process was to make the analysis move beyond the identification of themes or propositions and identify and build theory that is grounded in data (see also Strauss and Corbin, 1998). Our analysis has been iterative letting prior operations shape the following ones. According to Spiggle (1994, p. 495) the advantage of iteration is that “it permits the development of provisional categories, constructs, and conceptual connections for subsequent exploration”, and thus aids inductive processes developing concepts and constructs. Finally, refutation involves adopting a general scepticism – exposing one’s emerging categories, constructs, propositions or conceptual framework to empirical scrutiny. In our case the conclusions of this paper were reviewed for authenticity and resonance by two of the interviewees from the Melodifestivalen crew. Regarding the interpretation process it is important to notice that from the beginning the data was not analysed with a predefined scheme or template that had been identified prior to the in-depth analysis. Rather the understanding of the connections between our empirical findings and the theory of communities of practice grew out of the collected evidence through an analysis of texts and observations. Moving between the data collected and our interpretations of what actually occurred, we looked for recurring themes on knowledge creation and exchange between the partnering organisations. The findings suggested that community-of-practice-like processes (Wenger and Snyder, 2000) seem to emerge because of the complexity of the task at hand. These processes arose in parallel to the formal structure of the event team organisation. Ignoring organisational borders and formal structures they make up a parallel dimension of organisational practice that was not apparent for the participants themselves. Emergent communities of practice We find the way in which members of the studied event develop and build capabilities and exchange knowledge emerge as a type of community of practice. Although the individuals and organisations do not outspokenly consider themselves to be part of a community, our findings indicate that a large part of knowledge sharing takes place in emerging non-hierarchical and non-linear groupings. These people are casually tied together by shared expertise and enthusiasm for the task that goes beyond their formal work description or obligation. This can only be characterised as functional – although non-recognised – communities of practice. We have identified these phenomena as “emergent communities of practice”. “Emergence” denotes the process of complex pattern formation stemming from simpler rules. The term signifies a dynamic process (occurring over time). Phenomena deemed as emergent are generally unpredictable from a lower-level description and therefore often difficult to control. In our case study the complex pattern formation we identify as emergent communities of practice are created by the complexity arising from diversity, the number and the fluidity of the individuals and organisations involved. The emergent informal organisational formations were not (and could probably not have been) detected at the planning stage of the events. On several occasions we observed how these emerging formations handled rapid problem solving, worked with efficiency details and transferred best practice.

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Furthermore they served as knowledge reservoirs for other parts of the network, contributing to strategic development and innovation. Through the emerging communities of practice personal, group, organisational and industry abilities developed further. Cultivators of the emergent communities of practice The knowledge-sharing process is nurtured by different perspectives, an atmosphere of relative trust and collective memories. Expertise is also shared through storytelling about previous events and happenings. We identify four mechanisms that stimulate interaction and create the environment in which communities of practice form: (1) The move towards the formation of an inter-organisation “project” group creates trust building stability, (2) Competence contributors – a clear division of labour creates different points of view. (3) Competence shadows are used in order to transfer key tacit knowledge. (4) The social glue of informal events contributes to a sense of community that is fun and exciting. Each mechanism will be explained in more detail below. Trust building stability As mentioned in the introduction, the largest part of the interactions between Melodifestivalen crew members mainly occurs during the five weeks of the event itself. Still, the emergence of communities of practice across organisational boundaries is facilitated by the relative stability of the “project” group who meet up annually. It’s becoming more and more of the same gang who’s travelling with the show every year. We are doing this together for the third year and I would say that about 90 per cent of the people are the same every year. Both sides must get used to each other and the organisational complexity that we have. But I do not know exactly how SVT works. It’s fairly complex . . . (site manager, EMA Telstar).

This relative stability builds trust. Almost everyone interviewed mentioned that the work milieu around Melodifestivalen has a feeling of shared responsibility and passion for the task at hand. Succinctly expressed by the general manager of the event from SVT: We own this together.

Trust and a shared focus on the outcome of the event also contribute to ongoing conversations about best practice. This “trust building stability” is crucial, for without it a community could not thrive with members from such diverse businesses. Trust between partners has also allowed for some formalisation of learning mechanisms even in the inter-organisational setting (common intranet server is an example of that). Competence contributors A second built-in mechanism that nurtures communities is a clear division of labour and specialised roles at the same time that everyone is devoted to a common task or “domain”. During the first year of the tour, there were some collaboration problems due to differences in understandings of the event. One such example was given to us as a

story about a dispute that occurred when SVT wanted to move seats on the arena floor to make room for a television camera in order to get better pictures. But this section of chairs had already been sold by EMA, which was not looking forward to the dissatisfied customers they had to handle in the arena because the seats were moved. In this particular instance, the two organisations did not understand each other’s role and function. Although differences may still exist between the respective positions of the two actors, mutual understanding has improved, collaboration seems to work well, and there is a constant dialogue. All of these factors indicate that learning might be occurring. Another noteworthy aspect about Melodifestivalen is how the different organisations through learning about each others businesses, skills and strategies have created a shared understanding of problem solving, which points to the emergence of communities-of-practice-like traits in parallel with the more formal work teams: If I make a mistake then this will affect fifty other people who will move in the same wrong direction. [. . .] We have built up an understanding of the issues, which means that all the pieces in the puzzle fall into their places, no-one feels overrun and everyone knows what everyone else is doing (project assistant, SVT).

The amount of technical detail in the production of the television show in parallel with the concert tour is enormous. This is perhaps one of the reasons why for example the fear of revealing too much information to other partners in the project is not perceived as a problem. Rather the opposite is true. The clear division of labour enables experiential learning through the different organisational perspectives on the event. Several of our interviewees stressed that they use the knowledge that they gained at Melodifestivalen in other projects in their respective organisations, as Wenger and Snyder (2000) have suggested for conventional communities of practice. We definitely learn a lot from EMA about logistics, arena arrangements, structure etc., but I also know that they learn a lot about TV-production and how the creative side of the production works . . . (assistant manager, SVT).

Competence shadows Each of the key people in the team has a competence shadow – a person who learns the job by following what the key person does. If it should be necessary, the competence shadow can step in and replace the key person in case of sickness, or to take over the job next year. It is somewhat of a sophisticated apprentice system among key personnel that ensures the development of capabilities that are necessary in the community context. During the 2005 Melodifestivalen tour, a competence shadow from the previous year stepped in as project manager assistant for SVT when there was an unexpected gap in the project team. In addition, some of the key people involved in the partnership follow each other’s work in inter-organisational teams: I sit at the production unit of SVT for one and a half months, in the middle of their work. And that’s good. Partially because one can solve problems by just turning around and say, “Hey, what do we do about that?”, and partially because one overhears lots of conversations between SVT personnel. This is terribly important, especially the last month before the tour starts! (production manager, EMA Telstar).

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Social glue The tour is filled with informal gatherings that occur both as a part of the event and outside of it. The different team members bond through sharing new experiences in an atmosphere of fun, games and excitement that functions as social glue that binds different parts of the different organisations together. People from different organisations become more than working partners, they become close colleagues or even friends. This is actively fostered within the “event organisation” itself, where Eventum holds a range of different receptions and parties for actors involved during the tour. All of this creates opportunities to enhance communities of practice and helps to create identity and meaning for group members (Boud and Middleton, 2003). We saw, for example, how some members of the Melodifestivalen community decided to play ice hockey in an arena close to Globen in Stockholm one evening, even though it was close to midnight. Hence, the feeling of community is so strong the crew members’ families (that mostly lived in Stockholm), had to wait, even though the tour was in its fifth week. The social activities also foster innovation and new business opportunities. For example, the telecommunication company Telia, one of the major sponsors of the tour, has managed to find new ways to collaborate with record companies and artists. Also through Melodifestivalen community, the city of Skelleftea˚ obtained connections and ideas to further develop its region through similar events. We have identified four enablers to emergent communities of practice from Melodifestivalen. Part of the explanation also has to do with the popularity of the event. Given the public attention the festival receives, individuals that are associated with it in one way or another gain prestige, irrespective of his or her formal professional role in the Melodifestivalen partnership. All of the people involved share a passion for it. All key personnel in the partnership are personally invited to participate due their professional competences and proven ability to work in cross-functional and cross-organisational teams. Informal relations between SVT personnel and external professionals (musicians, composers, choreographs, designers) guide the recruitment of the crew. For example, every year the producer for the competition orders four “jokers,” songs by well-known artists guaranteed a place in the competition, using his personal network. The public/private dimension As mentioned above, the public/private dimension potentially adds an additional layer of complexity to the emergence of the community. In the second section, several potential obstacles were identified that may hinder experiential learning between public and private organisations. According to our informants, the public/private divide does not negatively affect learning through the communities of practice: I must say that the non-commercial/commercial divide is completely clear to me. We carry out our activities exactly the same way, as we would do if we were sitting in studio 1. We work to get good content in the programme, good entertainment. We don’t think about the sponsors (project manager, SVT).

This supports conventional literature on communities of practice: while theories on public sector management have identified potential problem areas for learning between private and public sectors, the communities of practice literature does not

perceive the private/public divide as an issue. In a similar fashion, Keka¨le and Viitala (2003) point out that learning is fundamentally an individual activity and it makes thus no difference if the individuals involved belong to the same legal entity, be public or private. As long as the inter-organisational partnership is characterised by mutual trust and balanced exchange of information and resources, these kinds of communities of practice are well suited to enable the individuals of different partners to gain the knowledge that they need for their job. Conclusions and limitations This study extends the framework of communities of practice beyond the boundaries of a single organisation. We argue that in a large inter-organisational partnership, such as Melodifestivalen, communities of practice help achieve favourable results. Informal learning, transfer of knowledge, etc. in the community is embedded in the practices and relationships at the studied event. We regard these phenomena as emergent communities of practice. This case study shows how a network-based temporary organisation, aimed at producing events, nurtures learning, builds competences and new capabilities and, hence, in the process effectively creates emergent communities of practice when gathering around a complex task. The nurturing environment in these communities fosters innovation and new business opportunities. Quite contrary to expectations, the public-private dimension of the partnership did not provide significant obstacles to knowledge transfer across organisational boundaries. The following mechanisms for the cultivation of community and knowledge sharing were found in the case study presented above: trust building stability; a stable inter-organisational “project team” developed over time creates an environment of trust and understanding that fosters knowledge sharing: competence contributors; a clear division of competence areas contribute to a melange of different inputs to a particular problem: competence shadows; an way to multiply knowledge and social glue; team members are bound together sharing new experiences in a social atmosphere of fun, games and excitement. We believe that benefits from emergent communities of practice are gained on four levels: individual, group, organisational and industry. Not only do organisations learn through their members involved in the partnership, the knowledge is used in other settings within the industry, such as new projects where similar inter-organisational forms may be present. An implication of this is that the value of these kinds of events could be measured differently. The value of knowledge sharing is overlooked in events and PPP projects that are often driven by the demands for cost-efficient delivery of services. Our evidence suggests that although the interviewees do intuitively realise its existence they lack the tools to quantify and harness the knowledge generated. Future research needs to address how the value of this knowledge could be further harnessed and evaluated. The study is not without limitations. First, the Swedish context may somewhat affect the preconditions for communities of practice to emerge. Second, having established some conclusions about the role of communities of practice in PPP the validity of the findings may benefit from more quantitative analysis. Third, more

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studies should be made into emergent communities of practice across organisations and the identified cultivators in order to further explore our findings. References Barney, J.B. (1986), “Organizational culture: can it be a source of sustained competitive advantage?”, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 11 No. 3, pp. 656-65. Boud, D. and Middleton, H. (2003), “Learning from others at work: communities of practice and informal learning”, Journal of Workplace Learning, Vol. 15 No. 5, pp. 194-202. Brown, J.S. and Duguid, P. (1991), “Organizational learning and communities of practice: toward a unified view of working, learning and innovation”, Organization Science, Vol. 2 No. 1, February. Cunliffe, A.L. (2002), “Reflexive dialogical practice and management learning”, Management Learning, Vol. 33 No. 1, pp. 35-61. Dewhurst, F.W. and Cegarra Navarro, J.G. (2004), “External communities of practice and relational capital”, The Learning Organization, Vol. 11 Nos 4/5, pp. 322-31. Hamel, G. (1991), “Competition for competence and interpartner learning with international strategic alliances”, Strategic Management Journal, Vol. 12, Summer, special issue, pp. 83-103. Hirsch, P. (1972), “Processing fads and fashions: an organization-set analysis of cultural industry system”, American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 77 No. 4, pp. 639-59. Hood, C. (1995), “The new public management in the 1980s: variations on a theme, accounting”, Organizations and Society, Vol. 20 Nos 2/3, pp. 93-109. Huber, G. (1991), “Organizational learning: the contributing processes and the literature”, Organization Science, Vol. 2 No. 1, pp. 88-115. Kavanagh, D. and Kelly, S. (2002), “Sensemaking, safety, and situated communities in (con)temporary networks”, Journal of Business Research, Vol. 55 No. 7, pp. 583-94. ¨ Kekale, T. and Viitala, R. (2003), “Do networks learn?”, Journal of Workplace Learning, Vol. 15 No. 6, pp. 245-7. Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991), Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Lundin, R.A. and So¨derholm, A. (1995), “A theory of the temporary organization”, Scandinavian Journal of Management, Vol. 11 No. 4, pp. 437-55. O’Donnell, D., Porter, G., McGuire, D., Garavan, T.N., Heffernan, M. and Cleary, P. (2003), “Creating intellectual capital: a Habermasian community of practice (CoP) introduction”, Journal of European Industrial Training, Vol. 27 Nos 2/3/4, pp. 80-7. Pemberton, J.D. and Stonehouse, G.H. (2000), “Organisational learning and knowledge assets”, The Learning Organization, Vol. 7 No. 4, pp. 184-93. Peters, B.G. (1998), “‘With a little help from our friends’: public-private partnerships as institutions and instruments”, in Pierre, J. (Ed.), Partnerships in Urban Governance: European and American Experience, Macmillan Press, Basingstoke and London, pp. 11-33. Pierre, J. and Peters, B.G. (2000), Governance, Politics and the State, St Martin’s Press, New York, NY. Quinn, J.B. (1992), The Intelligent Enterprise, Free Press, New York, NY. Shanin, T. and Weizsa¨cker, E.U. (2005), “Escaping pernicious dualism: civil society between the state and the firm”, in Weizsa¨cker, E.U., Young, O.R. and Finger, M. (Eds), Limits to Privatization: How to Avoid too Much of a Good Thing, Earthscan, London, pp. 325-7.

Spiggle, S. (1994), “Analysis and interpretation of qualitative research data in consumer research”, Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 21, December, pp. 491-503. Strauss, A. and Corbin, J. (1998), Basics of Qualitative Research – Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory, Sage Publication, Beverly Hills, CA. Wenger, E.C. and Snyder, W.M. (2000), “Communities of practice: the organizational frontier”, Harvard Business Review, January-February, pp. 139-45.

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Corresponding author Rein Juriado can be contacted at: [email protected]

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Newcastle Business School, Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK

Jon Pemberton, Sharon Mavin and Brenda Stalker Abstract Purpose – This paper seeks to surface less positive aspects of communities of practice (CoPs), regardless of emergent or organisationally managed, grounded in political-power interactions. Examples are provided from the authors’ experiences of a research-based CoP within UK higher education. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is primarily theoretical with empirical examples drawn from a descriptive CoP case study. Findings – The paper discusses the following themes: the impact of timing on CoP development; the impact of CoP leaders and managers in “managed” CoPs; the power-political interrelationship between emergent CoPs and formal organisation; the impact of dominant actors with position power; emotional containment and emotion work within CoPs; power implications of novices and masters and the implications when CoP practices diverge from organisational practices. It finds that to ignore such issues of power within CoPs is to limit the knowledge creation process. Research limitations/implications – Further empirical research is necessary to investigate micro and macro power-political issues of CoPs. In particular, emotional containment and emotion work of CoP members and the impact of this on knowledge creation is worthy of future research. Practical implications – The paper has significant implications for CoPs in practice as the quest for pragmatic mechanisms to develop individual and organisational learning and knowledge creation for competitive advantage. Originality/value – While there is an implicit assumption that CoPs are “good” and benefit individuals and organisations, this paper highlights less positive power-political issues relating to CoPs which are under researched in the extant literature. Keywords Communities, Knowledge sharing, Management power, Working practices, Higher education, United Kingdom Paper type Research paper

The Learning Organization: The International Journal of Knowledge and Organizational Learning Management Vol. 14 No. 1, 2007 pp. 62-73 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0969-6474 DOI 10.1108/09696470710718357

Introduction The concept of a community of practice (CoP) is now common parlance in many organisations, both public and private sector, throughout the world. Indeed, while a CoP can have different meanings, interpretations and implications dependent on context, it is not a new concept. It could be argued that many of the more recent developments in this area are evolutionary rather than cutting-edge innovations. Informal and project team groupings have always existed, but in the quest to harness and develop knowledge and “add value” to organisations, the concept of CoP has been embraced and developed as various strands of management practice have fused and merged. Typically, these incorporate knowledge management, individual and organisational learning, management strategy, complex adaptive systems and, This paper draws on work previously published by Pemberton and Stalker (2006) in the Encyclopedia of Communities of Practice in Information and Knowledge Management (edited by E. Coakes and S. Clarke).

latterly, knowledge ecology, although the list is not exhaustive. Whether CoPs exist as emergent social gatherings or technological networks, or as sponsored, sanctioned or managed CoPs based on work teams, the sharing of expertise and the creation of new knowledge, often tacit in nature, is a central tenet of a CoP’s existence (Lave and Wenger, 1991). Analysis of the literature generally communicates “positive” or even “rose-tinted” views of CoPs, and few would dispute the potential benefits that CoPs can bestow on individuals and the organisations in which CoPs reside (Wenger and Snyder, 2000; McDermott, 2002). This, however, masks the often unspoken and under-researched, more negative aspects of CoPs (Wenger et al., 2002; Pemberton and Stalker, 2006; Roberts, 2006) which threaten to limit the potentialities and positive impact of CoP processes. The following paper examines a range of less positive issues associated with CoPs, initially developed by Pemberton and Stalker (2006), drawing on extant research and the authors’ own experiences and knowledge as members of a research-based CoP within UK higher education. The aim here is not to denigrate the value of CoPs, but to balance the debate by highlighting the associated potential pitfalls and problems often neglected in research and organisational practice. The paper begins by contextualising understandings of CoPs, discusses the research approach and background to the research-based CoP, and identifies key issues that have the potential to impact negatively on CoPs, their members and organisations. More specifically, these issues concern the: . impact of timing on CoP development; . impact of CoP leaders and managers in “managed” CoPs; . power-political interrelationship between emergent CoPs and formal organisation; . impact of dominant actors with position of power; . emotional containment and emotion work within CoPs; . power implications of novices and masters; and . implications when CoP practices diverge from organisational practices. In terms of structure, each issue is examined through a brief discussion of the literature integrated with the authors’ experiences of their research-based CoP. The paper concludes that CoP members and organisations should recognise the less positive aspects of social interaction in CoP settings, recognising the power-political aspects at play and should seek levels of transparency to enable difficult and uncomfortable discussions to take place. In doing so, this will limit and override potential difficulties and negative impact on the possible knowledge creation and learning that takes place within CoPs. Will the “real” CoP please stand up? Lave and Wenger (1991, p. 98) were pivotal in furthering understanding of what constitutes a “community of practice” and define it as “a system of relationships between people, activities and the world; developing with time and in relation to other tangential and overlapping communities of practice” and as “an activity system about

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which participants share understandings concerning what they are doing and what that means in their lives and for their community. Thus they are united in both action and in the meaning that that action has, both for themselves and for the larger collective”. CoP definitions abound in the literature, each emphasising different interpretations of CoP theory and CoPs in practice. Indeed, the CoP literature is evolving and hardly coherent (Lindkvist, 2005, p. 1191). For example, Lindkvist (2005) describes CoPs as tightly knit groups that have been practising long enough to develop into a cohesive community with relationships of mutuality and shared understandings. Handley et al. (2006) argue that CoPs are heterogeneous across several dimensions such as geographic spread, life cycle and pace of evolution, drawing on Roberts’ (2006) slow and fast communities and Wenger’s (1998) die young versus long-term communities as examples. There is current debate concerning the “glue” which holds a CoP together and whether the emphasis of this glue is “community” or “practice,” as well as different positions in terms of whether a CoP should be emergent only or include those communities which are organisationally manufactured and managed. In terms of “to be or to not be” managed, such discussions are often embedded within Lave and Wenger (1991) and Wenger’s (1998) original “emancipatory” understandings of CoPs, where CoPs emerge through informal social interaction. However, Swan et al. (2002, p. 478) argue “attention has shifted to the agentic role of managers in constructing, supporting and aligning communities of practice in order to exploit human capital more fully and to develop innovative capacity”, resulting in a growing tension in the literature around the question of manageability of communities of practice. There are also tensions in relation to emphasis; practice or community or both. Wenger (1998, pp. 72-84) provides three dimensions by which practice is the source of coherence of a community; mutual engagement, joint enterprise and shared repertoire. Thompson (2005) also argues that learning, meaning and identity (belonging to a group) are all aspects of the same participative act (practice) because “learning is not merely a condition for membership, but is itself an evolving form of membership” (Lave and Wenger, 1991, p. 53). Contu and Willmott (2003) see those who focus on CoPs (e.g. Wenger, 1998) as locating “practices” or behaviour, primarily in the context of a unitary, manageable and therefore more appealing conception of “community”. However, rather than focusing upon community as conceptualised to assume coherence and consensus in its practices, Contu and Willmott (2003) agree with Gherardi et al. (1998) who communicate how members of “communities” are differentiated and identified by how their perceptions, thoughts and actions are developed and coloured in distinctive ways, thus introducing individual subjectivities and subjective experiences within social interactions of CoPs. Here “different sets of practices, located in different space-time contexts, are recognised to generate different and competing conceptions of the degree of consensus, diversity or conflict amongst those who identify themselves or are identified by others as “communities”” (Contu and Willmott, 2003, p. 291). Contu and Willmott’s (2003) argument is that an accommodation is contrived by thematising the situation or context of learning in a way that conceives the work group or CoP as unified and consensual, with minimal attention being paid to how learning practices are conditioned by history, power and language. Whether understandings place emphasis on “community” or on “practice”, at the heart of a CoP there is

individual commitment to the group demonstrated by the sharing of their knowledge and expertise in order to create new knowledge and engage in learning processes. Of particular interest to this paper is the impact of political-power interactions between individuals within CoP social processes and the impact these may have on the conditioning and mediation of learning practices within the context of a CoP.

Scratching beneath the surface

Research context The motivation for this paper and issues under analysis arise from the authors” own experiences as members of various research-based CoPs within UK higher education. Shared experiences of one particular CoP are drawn upon as a descriptive case study to illustrate the emerging analysis. The CoP case study in question was formed in 2002 by a chance meeting of two business and management academics with differing subject expertise, but a common interest in research and publication. The ensuing but informal discussion, over a cup of coffee, led them to put out an e-mail call to certain individuals whom they thought might be interested in research learning and knowledge transfer. This meeting heralded the birth of a research based CoP with learning and scholarship at its heart. In a short space of time this became a CoP which in itself shared views, experiences, knowledge and learning about all aspects of CoPs, from both academic and practice standpoints. In summary, it functions as a CoP concerned with learning more about aspects of CoPs! Throughout the CoP’s history, a core of individuals has acted as its bedrock, with other individual members coming, staying or exiting as their interest and commitments allow. In the first year meetings were fairly regular (every two months or so), but have become more sporadic in nature as time has progressed. The CoP aims have been to develop new ideas, attract new researchers and develop publications within CoP-related areas and themes. The CoP has been highly successful in this regard. As noted, reference to particular events and experiences detailed in this paper are drawn from the authors’ individual perceptions and experiences of CoP processes, including social interactions with other individual members in the context of the CoP. For brevity and to preserve anonymity, no comments or examples are attributed to any individuals and generic comments are used to support and corroborate the following themes analysed through the extant literature.

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Getting under the skin of communities of (mal)practice As outlined in the introduction, several less positive aspects of CoPs have been identified as potentially inhibiting or conspiring to limit the value of CoPs to their members and organisations. These are dealt with in turn. Time is of the essence While the debate concerning whether CoPs in their “pure” sense are emergent or can be constructed has been acknowledged, the development of a CoP in any organisation is dependent on a number of factors: the context and focus of the group; the individual initiators of the community; whether it is an offshoot of other formal or informal organisational groupings; whether the technological infrastructure exists to support online discussion boards and real-time meetings; through chance meetings of individuals with similar interests and motivation. Emergent CoPs have been viewed as

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beginning life as a relatively small grouping of individuals or online participants, with membership cascading as word filters through an organisation or additional individuals invited to participate in the group. Several meetings or online forums usually take place before membership achieves equilibrium and the core group is established. The value attached by individuals to these meetings or interactions is a critical success factor and there is evidence to suggest that this value can dissipate over time, leading to the demise of the CoP (Wenger et al., 2002). Regardless of emergent or constructed, the early stages of any CoP are critical, since this is where trust is established between participants to enable the sharing of knowledge and resultant learning and assessments made as to the potential value of these groups by their members (Ardichvilli et al., 2003). Provided this transition is relatively smooth, the CoP may exist for several months or years, but this is highly dependent on the motivation of its members and its internal management. Over time, however, interest can subside and has different implications depending on whether the CoP is a voluntary commitment or formally tied to job enhancement or progression. The departure from an organisation of key participants, typically founders or organisers, may also lead to the disintegration of the community. This is certainly corroborated in our case, where membership of a research-based CoP, established in 2002, started in double figures, over time this has diminished, and meetings now generally consist of a core of five regular participants. Time is also a critical success factor in terms of online communication, as the posting of questions and responses in a written format is a vastly more lengthy process than verbal communication. In this sense, face-to-face CoPs have a distinct advantage over discussion/bulletin board-type communities. Follow the leader As CoPs are groups of like-minded individuals keen to share existing knowledge and practice, and create new knowledge in the process, then internal leadership and co-ordination must also be present (Wenger et al., 2002) for them to function effectively. Leaderless communities seldom survive as groups fragment and momentum is lost. To ensure the issues discussed here have the support of the community, a careful balance between guidance and authority is needed, particularly in terms of power impacts, so that the views of the “leader” are not solely reflected in the group. This issue should not be underestimated where managers act as CoP coordinators or leaders, as this introduces power issues firmly into the process. For CoPs to function effectively it is critical that new skills of brokerage and translation are developed (Brown and Duguid, 1998). An added complication arises where organisations seek to ensure cultural conformity to a specific organisational identity (Moore and Sonsino, 2003). Where CoPs are organisationally manufactured or sponsored, managers may seek to impose conformity on CoPs, which may be at variance with the self-regulation enjoyed by CoP members. In this situation, creativity and innovation may suffer as a consequence. Furthermore, and related to the debate concerning whether CoPs can or cannot be “managed”, CoPs can be viewed as “emancipatory” and motivated by a communicative Habermasian, rather than an instrumental, logic that is driven by deliverables and seeks to alter the traditional perspectives of managerial control within CoPs (O’Donnell et al., 2003). On the other hand, like Thompson (2005), managers can foster the cultural

context for facilitating CoPs, but should step back by allowing members to negotiate their own norms and agree on their own boundaries to enable positive engagement. In the authors’ own CoP, the freedom to explore new ideas and set its own agenda, free from the shackles of organisational missives, has been achieved by the commitment of its members and facilitated by a co-ordinator acting as a “leader” for the purposes of organising meetings. Here, during meetings, equal status is afforded to all participants as a means of dissipating power issues related to experienced knowledge players, masters, and novices, and to move beyond individual position power within hierarchical structures. Additionally, individual personalities of the members are such that the CoP functions effectively by virtue of the creativity and freedom it bestows on its participants. Outside in In terms of emergent CoPs within organisations, these are typically down to the motivation of an individual, or group of individuals and formulation is not a result of management intervention; its existence lies outside the formal organisational structure (Wenger et al., 2002). Depending on the type of organisation, a CoP may emerge without management awareness or, for that matter, the awareness of other employees who are not part of this community. Gradually, over time, awareness of the CoP emerges, often through members feeding solutions to problems into the formal problem-solving processes of the organisation (Wenger, 1998) or disseminating new knowledge resulting from the CoP process. Whether these solutions are perceived as beneficial, as soon as attention is drawn to the CoP, then greater scrutiny of the CoP sometimes ensues. Managers and employees may question why they themselves are not part of the group; whether it is consuming organisational resources that other employees do not enjoy and whether members of the group appear to have an advantage, in some sense, over non-members. In many cases, these concerns do not surface and the CoP is seen as adding value to the organisation’s performance. Where there are concerns, resentment can arise via jealousy or a misplaced mistrust, as well as the fact that certain organisational members were not invited to participate in the group (Wenger et al., 2002). Where this happens with individuals at management level, covert or explicit actions may be taken to limit the ability of the group to exist by making physical and organisational resources less available for the CoP. From experience, these concerns and resulting punitive managerial actions are more likely to result when the CoP is seen to be “exclusive” and in some way threatening to the informal power bases or formal structures of the organisation. A particular example was membership of a different research based CoP, which spanned four universities and focused on qualitative methods, grounded in gender organisation research, which was unfavourably received by colleagues and management in one university. The negative effects described here are a consequence of the CoP itself, within context, the perceptions of it from non-members and the associated power interactions and implications. For this reason, it is important that the processes governing the setting up of an emergent CoP, and its subsequent existence, are both transparent and inclusive. Throughout the existence of the authors’ own research-based CoP, new members, both internal and external to the organisation, have joined the group and,

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intermittently, attended meetings, appearing and disappearing accordingly. Where a particular issue is felt to be of value to members outside the group, for example a new writing opportunity or the emergence of a conference that might have a wider appeal, this information has been communicated to non-CoP members. However, to whom this is communicated and how, is still a political act which can exclude rather than include colleagues. This operation of power to foster or impede access to, and continuing membership of, CoPs is distilled in the phrase “legitimate peripheral participation” (Contu and Willmott, 2003; Lave and Wenger, 1991). Dominant forces Bringing together a variety of individuals, often with different organisational status and professional expertise, in not without problems and Fox (2000) argues that power conflicts within CoPs are possible because of the agency of the members as ways of working are changed. What is sacrosanct to one generation may be changed by the next. Different masters may compete with one another in leading the way to the future. Also power-distance relationships are potentially divisive within CoPs, especially where members do not feel free to express themselves or are inhibited by the presence of more senior organisational members. This is even more important in organisationally constructed or sponsored CoPs where there may be a CoP manager or when engagement in the CoP impacts upon future career prospects. Issues of power are highly relevant since full participation may be denied to novices by powerful practitioners. It is here where conflicts can arise and members may engage in emotion work. Handley et al. (2006) argue that the dynamics between identity-development and forms of participation are critical to ways in which individuals internalise, challenge or reject the existing practices of their community. An interesting comparison also exists with executive judgement or expert juries, where planning takes place at the highest level within an organisation. It is well documented that individuals who are perceived to carry weight in terms of status and authority, often dominate the discussion and other colleagues merely agree with them, despite there own personal beliefs and experience (Madridakis and Wheelwright, 1989). This “political” situation can be mirrored in CoPs where members have different roles and status in an organisation. In certain situations, this manifests itself in poor decision making and, in extreme cases, the break up of these groups where participants feel their contribution is marginalised or simply ignored. Evidence for such statements arises from the research-based CoP to which the authors belong. A senior member of staff with a position of power within the organisational hierarchy and an interest in research asked to attend one of the CoP meetings. When the meeting opened the individual effectively “hijacked” the discussion with their own opinions. These opinions were clearly at variance with the core beliefs of the group. On their departure, it transpired that the existing members felt very uncomfortable with the ideas put forward and there was widespread consensus that this was not a direction the CoP wanted to explore. In this instance, no confrontation was needed, as the member of staff in question did not attend any further meetings. However, managing the position power issues in terms of how and when CoP members engage in discussions and dialogue when their line managers and/or senior managers are involved and what priority resultant ideas and suggestions are given by

the CoP, can be tricky. Such position power conflicts are often neglected discussions in CoP research. Port in a storm Emergent CoPs can act as a welcome refuge for their members without organisational constraints influencing behaviours to any great extent. Such localised empowerment is an attractive feature of these groupings. Yet, the potential energy generated in these innovative communities is often drained and dissipated by members’ excursions into the chaotic and political milieu of organisational life. In extreme cases, this refuge is both a source and container of anxiety, creating organisational spaces that are dysfunctional for both individuals and organisations alike. Emotional containment is also fundamental to the functioning of the group and often allows people to stand back from the daily pressure of their working environment, permitting reflection and experimentation with new ways of thinking and organising. Nicolini et al. (2003) argue that although a certain amount of insularity is inevitable and necessary, emotional support should be provided, with encouragement to channel energies outwards, particularly in environments of turbulent change The feeling of providing a “protected space” is a feature of the authors’ own research CoP where dialogue and disclosure are subject to the “Chatham House Rule”. Participants have reflected upon the sensation of speaking openly in the group, without the obligatory self-regulation that sanctions their contributions elsewhere. Such dialogue has been identified by one member with having the freedom to express “deviant” thoughts that they would not normally feel comfortable sharing with others in the organisation. Interestingly, this expression of feeling “deviant” has served as a source of light amusement within the group, as if releasing a “safety valve”, rather than a catalyst for descending into a group cathartic moment. However, the emotion work evident within these types of CoPs is a neglected area of research and such emotion work is not always positive. Members join CoPs to share their expertise and knowledge with the aim to develop new knowledge with like-minded people. To then be confronted with more personal interactions and reactions can be a surprise. Members can be initially unaware that they themselves will experience emotional reactions within the CoP and/or are unprepared to provide the emotional support required by fellow members. Future research is required to further investigate emotional containment and emotion work within CoPs and its impact on knowledge creation. Clever devils Wenger et al. (2002) highlight a number of negative issues related to CoPs, including imperialism, narcissism and factionalism. These are interrelated in many ways, stemming from the belief that the CoP, by nature of its specialised expertise, is in some way “superior” to other parts of the organisation. This arrogance can result in dogmatism both from within and outside the community. Internally, this manifests itself by factions developing with particular viewpoints that may produce a volatile setting at variance with the aims of the group. Equally, an imbalance in perceived intellectual status or expertise amongst participants can create tensions and resentment, especially if accompanied by over-confidence. Power relations are conceived to enable and constrain access to positions of (initial) peripherality and

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potential mastery (Contu and Willmott, 2003). As an example, in a research-based CoP, new researchers can feel marginalised by established researchers, depending on the dynamics of the group. Over time, depending on how the CoP supports novice to master development, this may dissipate or intensify, the latter typically leading to departure of members from the community. In this sense, as a political process, grounded in issues of expert power versus non-expert power, Lave and Wenger’s (1991) legitimate peripheral participation highlights the power-invested process of bestowing a degree of legitimacy on novices, as a normal condition of participation in learning processes (Contu and Willmott, 2003). In the authors’ experience, within their CoP, such concerns have been very real and particularly felt by new individuals, joining the group, but initially left unspoken. However, once articulated and discussed, the highlighting of these concerns serves to make the “rules of engagement” explicit within the group and encourages participation from all group members. Over time, these concerns appear to have disappeared as the novice to master development has progressed and more inexperienced researchers have grown in confidence realising that their role is as valid as the “so-called” more experienced researchers. Another often unspoken aspect of CoPs relates to the ownership of intellectual property generated within the community. Unlike codified organisational knowledge in the public domain that has an inherent quality control, often through peer review, there are no such filters for shared personal knowledge. For this reason, O’Donnell et al.(2003) argue that information presented to the group requires scrutiny. Ironically, however, individuals who vigorously interrogate the veracity or validity of other members’ contributions may inhibit the confidence of members to disclose and participate in a critical examination of practice. Once again, the badges of status and interruption of power issues, including experience, organisational standing or recognised expertise, clearly have the potential to impact on relationships and influence knowledge sharing and learning within a CoP. A fine balance is needed, but when the environment is conducive, the theoretical origins of CoPs, drawing on Vygotskian ideas of proximal development, demonstrate how the expert members of CoPs may scaffold the learning of less experienced members (Nicolini et al., 2003). One-way street A typical CoP centres on the interaction process whereby a holistic view of the range of complex problems and situations is developed, facilitating the integration of a diverse body of knowledge within organisations and, as a consequence, developing knowledge and verifying best practices (Bhatt, 2001). The notion of best practice has been embraced throughout sectors of business, commerce and industry, particularly in the context of benchmarking, (for example, Camp, 1995). Benchmarking as an improvement process in which a company measures its performance against that of “best in class” companies, determines how those companies achieved their performance levels and uses the information to improve its own performance. Best practice, as a superior method or innovative practice that contributes to the improved performance of an organisation, usually recognised as “best” by other peer organisations. Much has been written in this area of the benefits of benchmarking best practice, but this process has the potential to stifle imagination, creativity and

vision in the desire to conform to perceived accepted norms of best practice (Pemberton et al., 2001). There are clear parallels between benchmarking and best practice and CoPs, in that both involve groupings of like-minded individuals with common interests who may lose sight of the “bigger picture” by adopting a blinkered and narrow view of life (Wenger et al., 2002). Any consensus of approach agreed on by members of a CoP may then be perceived as best practice, whereupon creativity can be compromised and lead to “bad” practice, possibly at variance with other organisational processes and procedures. This may be a problem in the short-term, but outside influences or a recognition by CoP members when relating their experiences to the organisation are usually enough to ensure that a re-alignment of the CoP’s views and practices takes place. In the authors’ own research CoP, the openness of the group and the willingness of its members to participate fully in the organisation’s activities outside the CoP, has ensured that this has not happened. The benefits of CoP membership has been seen in terms of new collaborations with individuals within and outside the CoP, enhanced publication possibilities and a better understanding of inter-subject research within the organisation. In extreme cases, where CoP practice deviates greatly from organisational practice, individuals can become unsettled and begin to question their role in the CoP, or in the worst-case scenario, question their value to and role within, the organisation. There are clearly strong links to individual personalities within the group, internal leadership and the longevity of the CoP in terms of the direction and development of shared “good” or “bad” practice. Conclusions As outlined, much of the CoP literature often focuses upon the positive aspects and outcomes of CoPs. The aim of this paper was to balance this by raising some less positive aspects of CoPs, mainly those embedded within individual interaction. This may make uncomfortable reading for established supporters and advocates of CoPs, but, to others, most likely to be those who use CoPs in practice, will strike accord. Explanations for this can be drawn from the diverse nature of CoPs in practice. CoPs exist in many forms; there is no one-size fits all approach to an effective or “best practice” CoP and, while there is varying commonality of issues, the nature of some CoPs will make some of the themes discussed here highly relevant. What is important to the development of CoPs in practice is that the often unspoken and under researched issues raised in this paper do not continue to be hidden beneath the surface of CoPs. As authors, we acknowledge the limitations of our assumptions and analysis. Further empirical research is necessary to investigate the power-political issues embedded within CoP social interaction processes. Processes of emotional containment, internal regulation and emotion work of individual CoP members and the impact of this on knowledge creation and learning is also an area of worthy of future research which would be valuable for practitioners. As noted by Handley et al. (2006), individuals maintain a sense of agency through the adoption and adaptation of different forms of participation and identity construction within different communities. However, like any grouping of individuals, be they physical or virtual, there is an implicit assumption that CoP members are themselves responsible for ensuring that

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their input, and the subsequent knowledge, learning and sometimes consensus that emerges, supports not only their own ends, but also complements the organisation’s operations and strategy. On this score, CoPs have made, and will continue to make, a valuable contribution to exchange, creation and diffusion of knowledge within public and private sector organisations. That said, any effective mechanism that allows individuals and groupings to prosper in terms of job capabilities and performance should always be reviewed and questioned from time to time. CoPs are no different in this respect. Thus, while the extant literature generally celebrates the undisputable benefits and applications of CoPs in modern society, this paper has significant implications for CoPs in practice, for individuals and organisations, as the quest continues for pragmatic mechanisms to develop individual and organisational learning and knowledge creation for competitive advantage. Keeping sight of some of the issues raised here may help to ensure that the pitfalls are avoided, thereby enabling CoPs to have a beneficial and positive effect on knowledge sharing and creation within organisations. Whilst there is an implicit assumption that CoPs are “good” and benefit individuals and organisations, this paper has raised less positive issues relating to CoPs which impact on both individuals and organisations. Ignoring such issues within CoPs can severely limit knowledge sharing, creation, learning and dissemination. References Ardichvilli, A., Page, V. and Wentling, T. (2003), “Motivation and barriers to participation in virtual knowledge-sharing communities of practice”, Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. 7 No. 1, pp. 64-77. Bhatt, G.D. (2001), “Knowledge management in organizations: examining the interaction between technologies, techniques and the people”, Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. 5 No. 1, pp. 68-75. Brown, J.S. and Duguid, P. (1998), “Organizing knowledge”, California Management Review, Vol. 40 No. 3, pp. 90-111. Camp, R.C. (1995), Business Process Benchmarking: Finding and Implementing Best Practices, ASQC Quality Press, Milwaukee, WI. Contu, A. and Willmott, H. (2003), “Re-embedding situatedness: the importance of power relations in learning theory”, Organization Studies, Vol. 14 No. 3, pp. 283-96. Fox, S. (2000), “Communities of practice, Foucault and actor-network theory”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 37 No. 6, pp. 853-67. Gherardi, S., Nicolini, D. and Odella, F. (1998), “Toward a social understanding of how people learn in organizations”, Management Learning, Vol. 29 No. 3, pp. 273-97. Handley, K., Sturdy, A., Fincham, R. and Clark, T. (2006), “Within and beyond communities of practice: making sense of learning through participation, identity and practice”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 43 No. 3, pp. 641-53. Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991), Situated Learning – Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Lindkvist, L. (2005), “Knowledge communities and knowledge collectivities: a typology of knowledge work in groups”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 42 No. 6, pp. 1189-210. McDermott, R. (2002), “Measuring the impact of communities: how to draw meaning from measures of communities of practice”, Knowledge Management Review, Vol. 5 2, May/June, pp. 26-9.

Madridakis, S. and Wheelwright, S.C. (1989), Forecasting Methods for Management, Wiley, Chichester. Moore, J. and Sonsino, S. (2003), Leadership Unplugged: The New Renaissance of Value Propositions, Palgrave Macmillan, London. Nicolini, D., Sher, M., Childerstone, S. and Gorli, M. (2003), “In search of the ‘structure that reflects’: promoting organizational reflection in a UK health authority”, paper presented at Organizational Learning and Knowledge, 5th International Conference, Lancaster University, Lancaster, June. O’Donnell, D., Porter, G., McGuire, D., Garavan, T., Heffernan, M. and Cleary, P. (2003), “Creating intellectual capital: a Habermasian community of practice (CoP)”, Journal of European Industrial Training, Vol. 27 Nos 2-4, pp. 80-7. Pemberton, J. and Stalker, B. (2006), “Aspects and issues of communities of (mal)practice”, in Coakes, E. and Clarke, S. (Eds), Encyclopedia of Communities of Practice in Information and Knowledge Management, Idea Publishing, Hershey, PA, pp. 6-11. Pemberton, J., Stonehouse, G. and Yarrow, D. (2001), “Benchmarking and the role of organizational learning in developing competitive advantage”, Knowledge and Process Management, Vol. 8 No. 2, pp. 123-35. Roberts, J. (2006), “Limits to communities of practice”, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 43 No. 3, pp. 623-39. Swan, J., Scarborough, H. and Robertson, M. (2002), “The construction of ‘communities of practice’ in the management of innovation”, Management Learning, Vol. 33 No. 4, pp. 477-96. Thompson, M. (2005), “Structural and epistemic parameters in communities of practice”, Organization Science, Vol. 16 No. 2, pp. 151-64. Wenger, E. (1998), “Communities of practice, learning as a social system”, Systems Thinker, available at: www.co-i-l.com/coil/knowledge-garden/cop/lss.shtml (accessed 25 June 2004). Wenger, E.C. and Snyder, W.M. (2000), “Communities of practice: the organizational frontier”, Harvard Business Review, January/February, pp. 139-45. Wenger, E.C., McDermott, R. and Snyder, W.M. (2002), Cultivating Communities of Practice, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Corresponding author Jon Pemberton can be contacted at: [email protected]

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Elayne Coakes Westminster Business School, London, UK, and

Peter Smith The Leadership Alliance Inc., Holland Landing, Canada Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose that a form of communities of practice (CoP), a community of innovation (CoInv), is the best support for sustainable innovation. It aims to outline a method for identifying champions of innovation in organisation. Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws on extant research to argue that innovation is facilitated and supported by innovation champions, who have most influence outside traditional organisational structures when they are members of a close-knit community – a CoInv. A potential method for identification of champions of innovation is highlighted. Findings – Innovation champions are special people, with particular personality types and psychological profiles. In order to succeed in championing innovations in organisations they need both procedural and resource support, and social and cognitive support. The influence of innovation champions comes through social contacts, multiplied through the communities in which they participate, through the genuine esteem in which they are held. Developing CoInv around such champions makes practical sense for organisations. Originality/value – Identifying champions of innovation will permit a CoInv to form that links social networks and transcends organisational internal boundaries and forming such a community will potentially trigger more successfully supported innovations. Keywords Communities, Knowledge sharing, Innovation Paper type Research paper

The Learning Organization: The International Journal of Knowledge and Organizational Learning Management Vol. 14 No. 1, 2007 pp. 74-85 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0969-6474 DOI 10.1108/09696470710718366

Introduction Why do organisations innovate? The answer seems to lay in the concept of “right to market” (Koudal and Coleman, 2005). This means introducing the right products at the right time in the right markets with the right supply chain, and then continually updating, optimising, and retiring them as necessary. We submit that in today’s turbulent environments the capability for sustainable corporate entrepreneurship and innovation is a critical pre-requisite for successfully achieving “best fit”, near-term competitive advantage, and long-term viability. Based on practical experiences of consultancy and theoretical arguments, this paper proposes that a form of communities of practice (CoPs) that we term communities of innovation (CoInv) are the best support for sustainable innovation, and that the introduction and support of CoInv are a critical element of the corporate entrepreneurship process. Although speculative at present, we believe that the published network visualisation study briefly reviewed here demonstrates practical potential for identifying champions of innovation; the individuals in an organisation

who have the appropriate characteristics and motivation to successfully form a CoInv network and that forming such a community will potentially trigger more innovations. Innovation and the role of entrepreneurship Innovation may be defined as “the process of bringing new problem-solving ideas into use” (Amabile, 1988; Glynn, 1996; Kanter, 1983). The emphasis in this quote is on the phrase “into use”, for Tidd (2001) argues that just the invention of new knowledge is insufficient and Sullivan (1998), and Teece (1998), say that innovation has only occurred if the new knowledge has been implemented or commercialised in some way. A number of authors echo this view (Pinchot, 1985; Thornberry, 2001; Zahra, 1985) asserting that without the presence of some form of entrepreneurial activity to exploit opportunities as they arise within organisations, innovation remains little more than an aspirational destination, rather than a tangible one. Consistent with these views, we follow McFadzean et al. (2005) in defining entrepreneurship as the promotion of innovation in an uncertain environment, and innovation as the process that through its products, services, and processes adds value and novelty to the organisation, its suppliers and customers. McFadzean et al. (2005) quote Amit et al. (1993, p. 816) saying that the two concepts should be linked together, and McFadzean et al. (2005) and Shaw et al. (2005) make a strong case for considering these concepts systemically. These interpretations imply that entrepreneurship and innovation both add value, and that it is the corporate entrepreneur’s role to manage the innovation process such that it will lead to sustained competitive advantage and organisational viability. Authors such as Adaman and Devine (2002) suggest that entrepreneurship is founded in social interaction occurring within and outside the organisation, and Churchman (1971) proposes that knowledge sharing processes may effect the creation of new potentials for action. In this paper we advance the notion that a critical aspect of the entrepreneurial role is the development of knowledge sharing communities where innovation may be incubated and entrepreneurship facilitated. McFadzean et al. (2005, p. 352) define such corporate entrepreneurship as “The effort of promoting innovation from an internal organisational perspective, through the assessment of potential new opportunities, alignment of resources, exploitation and commercialisation of said opportunities”. The characteristics of such communities are discussed in the next section. CoInv Successful organisational innovation must be based (according to innovation theory, see Glynn, 1996) in co-ordination mechanisms that support the problem-solving efforts of the organisation’s human capital, and the dynamic processes of sense making within organisations (Drazin et al., 1999). Leonard-Barton and Sensiper (1998) argue that innovation depends on the individual and collective expertise of employees, and innovation is characterised by an iterative process of people working together building on the creative ideas of one another. Numerous examples are provided by Hargadon (2003) based on ten years of research, demonstrating that revolutionary innovations result from the creative combining of ideas, people and objects rather than flashes of brilliance by lone inventors. Stacey (2001) places self-organising human interaction, with its ability for emergent creativity, at the centre of the knowledge creating process,

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and suggests that organisational knowledge depends on the qualities of the relationships between people. Glynn (1996) proposes that organisational intelligence is context specific and different from the aggregation of individual intelligence (Nahapiet and Ghoshal, 1998). The generation of new ideas that activates innovation is facilitated by diversity and breadth of experience, including experts who have a great deal of contact with other experts in the fields; links to users; and links to “outsiders” (Kanter, 1988). Communities, it is therefore argued, are one of the supporting organisational forms for innovation. Creativity often springs up at the boundaries of disciplines and specialties, so innovative communities will work through collaboration with other communities, organisations, and also communities in other organisations – inter-and intra-organisationally. Communities are the place for developing new practices, new services and new products. In the next section the notion of CoInv is advanced; these CoInv are a special case of the more general CoPs CoPs and CoInvs Given that community socialisation processes are critical to innovation and entrepreneurship, and that it is prudent to treat these processes systemically, CoPs would seem to offer a promising practical vehicle for their eventuation. Brown and Duguid’s (1991) study of CoPs explains how shared learning is entrenched in complex, collaborative social practices, and many current authorities propose that CoPs provide an valuable framework for inter-agent context specific knowledge sharing, sense making, and knowledge creation (Coakes and Clarke, 2005). Wenger et al. (2002, p. 4) have provided a widely accepted definition of CoPs as: Groups of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic, and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interacting on an ongoing basis.

These authors add that: These people don’t necessarily work together every day, but they meet because they find value in their interactions (Wenger et al., 2002, p. 4).

In other words, CoPs are knowledge creation and sharing networks (Cross et al. 2001) and are comprised of members of many social networks naturally (Schenkel et al. 2001). Lesser and Storck (2001) say that we must think of a CoP as an engine for the development of social capital. They argue that the “social capital resident in communities of practice leads to behavioral changes, which in turn positively influence business performance” (Lesser and Storck, 2001). Social capital, in particular, they argue shortens the learning curve, increases responsiveness to customer experiences, reduces rework and prevents reinvention, and also increases innovation. Wenger (1998) indeed argues that a CoP could be considered as the node of strong ties in a social network. As Wenger (1998) says: CoPs are: Focused on a domain of knowledge and over time accumulate expertise in this domain. They develop their shared practice by interacting around problems, solutions, and insights, and building a common store of knowledge.

Assimakopoulos and Yan (2005, p. 475) further argue that the common practice of a community gives them “a knowledge domain, a shared identity and cohesiveness to sustain interactions over time”. Indeed, one of the functions of CoPs may be the

enculturation, or socialisation of its members into a community’s “approved” mindset. Successful membership of a community implies support for the culture of that community – a shared vision – and its over-riding ethical and moral standpoint on particular activities or actions – a belief in their values above all others. Human capital contains the intellectual capability to create and innovate through the mixing of skills with knowledge and this innovation occurs within the context of organisational culture and its shared values, beliefs, expectations and attitudes. CoInvs we propose, are a form of CoPs that are very specifically dedicated to the support of innovation, and their formation and sustainability are the responsibility of those individuals charged with organisational entrepreneurship. CoInvs are an important new concept that this paper theorises can be formed from champions of innovation and their social networks, to provide safe places for the creation and support of innovatory ideas. They are safe because they should be considered by management as subject to the same practices as other CoPs. As an example at Xerox, communities build their own agenda by polling members about what they want to learn, ask members at the end of meetings what they have learnt, and record post-meeting the key messages for the larger community. This ensures that knowledge sharing becomes part of the community’s processes and cultural norms – which may operate outside the formal organisational structure. Indeed Xerox gives communities enough autonomy to operate independently – the community’s facilitator’s prime commitment is to the group rather than Xerox and a “zone of safety” is established for candid (and unwelcome?) discussions (Lehaney et al., 2004). As these CoInvs will be comprised of those that actively champion new ideas and those who wish to be associated with them and to develop innovation, support for new ideas is automatic. Champions of innovation Howell (2005) states that 90 per cent of raw ideas never go beyond the idea-generator’s desk. Only 3 per cent of the remaining 10 per cent obtain sufficient backing to become projects with less than 1 per cent being commercially launched. She argues that one reason for the high failure rate of new ideas is their failure to attract a champion. Dedicated champions, Howell states, are pivotal to innovation success and thus must be supported in their efforts and integrated into the mainstream of organisational activity. Glynn (1996) points to the existence of “innovation champions” who have the social, political or interpersonal knowledge to influence the acceptance of innovative change. Championing innovation must become a norm in organisations and not an episodic event that relies on happenstance and a strong-minded individual expending large amounts of effort. Innovation championship and the development of such champions fall naturally, we would argue, into the activities and remit of CoPs and more especially CoInvs. The primary role of innovation champions in promoting innovation is embodied in the framework for innovation diffusion developed by Rogers (1995) based on more than 20 years of research. Rogers defines innovation diffusion as the process by which an innovation is communicated through certain communication channels over time among the members of a social system.

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Rogers proposes that the innovation diffusion process takes place in five stages: (1) Knowledge is the stage where a potential adopter learns about the existence of an innovation and gains some understanding of it. (2) Persuasion is the stage where a favourable or unfavourable attitude towards an innovation is formed. (3) Decision is the stage where activities are undertaken which lead to the adoption or rejection of an innovation. (4) Implementation is the stage where an innovation is actually put to use. (5) Confirmation is the stage of reinforcement for an adoption decision which has already been taken. Information about the existence of an innovation will be of interest to potential adopters in the early stages of the innovation-decision process, and evaluative knowledge is mainly sought in the persuasion and decision stages, e.g. the relative advantage of the innovation over, and its compatibility with, existing conditions; its ease of understanding; whether it can be easily piloted; and whether examples can be viewed elsewhere (Kautz and Larsen, 2000). This information is essential for reducing uncertainty about an innovation’s consequences, and is most often sought from trusted peers. Rogers also indicates that interpersonal and local communications are relatively more important at the persuasion stage. Rogers emphasises innovativeness as another important aspect of the process. This is the extent to which an individual is relatively quicker in adopting an innovation than others. Rogers proposes five categories of innovativeness: (1) Innovators who are gate keepers in the flow of new ideas into a social system. (2) Early adopters that decrease uncertainty about a new idea by adopting it and by then conveying a subjective evaluation to near-peers. (3) The early majority that follow in adopting an innovation and who through their position between the early and the late adopters are important links for further diffusion. (4) The late majority that, according to Kautz and Larsen (2000), often have scarce resources which means that almost all of the uncertainty about a new idea has to be removed before they adopt. (5) Laggards that are behind, extremely cautions concerning awareness knowledge, and may never adopt the innovation. About 17 per cent of CoInv community members (categories 1 and 2) may be expected to act as innovation champions. About 83 per cent of community members (categories 3 through 5) will explore and rely on their advice. Each sub-group category of the overall community shares knowledge with the sub-group category that follows it, and each in their turn serves to reduce the risk of adopting the knowledge into the following individuals’ personal knowledge base. In a sense innovation champions are catalysts or inhibitors for intermittent or ongoing knowledge sharing efforts. In most mature organisations these champions through their ongoing relationships will be well aware of who falls within the various categories, and will as a matter of course seek to share knowledge with pragmatists. This is not an insignificant factor, since without this

insight, Murphy’s Law almost certainly ensures that opinion leaders trying to share innovation-related knowledge will meet up with laggards, and face a barrage of “Yes, but . . . .” responses. Innovation champions are active in supporting innovation and seeking out opportunities, but they need to be encouraged and motivated by management. Howell and Higgins (1990, p. 55) say that “without champions organisations may have a lot of ideas but few tangible innovations. The challenge facing management is to identify and effectively manage existing champions and to nurture potential champions”. Parker and Axtel (2001) and Howell and Bois (2004) say that in order to motivate others to innovate, champions need to take multiple perspectives and to work collaboratively with others, Howell and Bois extending this collaborative work into the field of idea generation. Champions naturally have a range of networks in which they participate and may be characterised as renaissance people (Howell, 2005) with a large variety of interests and a diversity of activities. They tend to have had a long tenure in the organisation (Howell and Higgins, 1990) with experience in many divisions and locations, and an in-depth knowledge of the industry. Van de Ven (1986) says that one of the key issues for organisations is gaining appreciation of ideas, needs and opportunities for innovations. A 1996 study (Melcrum, 2006) of 150 major US firms found that innovative companies had a profit growth that was four times that of non-innovative companies. The presence of innovation champions makes a “decisive contribution to the innovation by actively and enthusiastically promoting its progress” (Archilladelis et al., 1971, p. 14), and a number of research projects have correlated the presence of such champions with successful innovations (Beath, 1991; Beatty and Gordon, 1991; Holbeck, 1990). They tend to emerge informally in an organisation (Scho¨n, 1965; Tushman and Nadler, 1986) which makes it difficult to routinely identify them. Some authors see these champions as transformational leaders who play a key role in innovations (Stata, 1989; Tushman and Nadler, 1986) by bringing together the people, and promoting vision and trust. Oberg (1972) says that transformational leadership is closely linked to the innovative process in organisations and that the transformational leader espouses values that are different from the organisational norm – they must thus have charisma. Howell and Higgins (1990, p. 321) go further and link transformational leadership to champions hypothesising that “champions will exhibit transformational leader behaviours, that is, charisma, inspiration, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration”. Such charismatic leaders exercise extensive influence over the orientations of others (Etzioni, 1961) and relate their mission and vision to the values and ideals of the organisational members, and the organisational culture. They will engage in symbolic actions through story telling (Lagace, 2005), and will thus provide a vision for the community. Other important qualities of innovation champions that have been identified (Jenssen and Jorgensen, 2004) include the ability to take risks combined with a diplomatic talent (Chakrabarti and Hauschildt, 1989); strong advocation and promotion (Beath, 1991) with the ability to overcome opposition (Markham, 1998); and an ability to navigate through the social and political organisational environment (Day, 1994). Mumford et al. (2002) question the value of charisma and transformational leadership of creative people, as a leader’s vision may prevent creative people from forming unique ideas and pursuing their own vision of the work (Mumford and Licuanan, 2004). Again, here we would argue is where a CoInv would support the

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innovation process more effectively, as leaders would only emerge by consensus and these communities would naturally be involved in a multiplicity of innovatory ideas, rather than just that promoted by a solitary leader. Krause (2004) and Mumford et al. (2002) found that in relation to innovation leadership, autonomy and the exercise of influence through expertise were of particular value and thus social and organisational styles influence creative behaviour (Mumford and Licuanan, 2004). Howell (2005) has identified six crucial things that champions require from the workplace: to work within an innovative environment; to work with other innovators; to be challenged and to learn; to be (socially) connected within and without the organisation; to be recognised for their work; and to work for management that supports their activities. As previously stated, innovation champions already have extensive social networks in place and the challenge to the organisation and those charged with entrepreneurship is to transform these networks into communities of innovation. Once a CoInv is formed all the other champion requirements, as identified by Howell, naturally fall into place. CoInv will provide stimulus and constant learning opportunities as they will be built from other champions from all parts of the organisation, irrespective of discipline, functional unit, and organisational role. A CoInv would fulfil also Mumford et al.’s (2002) requirements for the generation of novel and useful ideas in a creative venture. They would provide the opportunity for intellectual stimulation as members of the community, being themselves ideas champions, would naturally support creative notions; they would provide the structure to permit those interested in innovation to become involved; and by their nature as a form of CoP, they would be given autonomy in their activities (and would be supported by the necessary resources to this end). CoInv provide the necessary ideas shelter and ideas formation resources, as part of their natural formation, and the opportunity for recognition of an individual’s part in the process due to the natural equality within any CoP. Intrinsic motivation would be a character trait of those involved in such a community and people are most creative when they are motivated by interest, satisfaction and challenge. The presence of champions operating within these communities would inspire and stimulate. A number of authors have identified that innovation champions are natural entrepreneurs (Beatty and Gordon, 1991; Pinchot, 1985). Coulson-Thomas (2003) identifies the presence of knowledge entrepreneurs in an organisation as being those who innovate knowledge and knowledge sharing activities and this would also fit with the idea of innovation champions within a CoInv. Entrepreneurs (Ekvall, 1988) are individuals who seek freedom and Kets de Vries (1977) identifies them as being innovative. Champions will also have analytical and technical skills (Beatty and Gordon, 1991), as well as knowledge both in the specific (and thus be knowledge entrepreneurs) but also in the generic (Chakrabarti, 1974) organisational situation and environment. This knowledge will come from experience as detailed above and is often a pre-requisite for innovation (Pearson, 1988). Innovation champions operate through strong social networks developed through this experience, and according to Jenssen and Jorgensen(2004) these networks may be decisive in developing the support for, and the championship of, the innovation. A champion’s social network provides them with their power base (Beatty and Gordon, 1991), and Krackhardt(1992) argues that an innovation champion needs to maximise their social ties – both strong and weak – in

order to succeed. The issue for organisations is how to discover these innovation champions and their social network to populate a CoInv and this is discussed below.

Identifying innovation champions and mapping their social networks Identifying legitimately influential individuals, and visualising the complexities of their relationship patterns have traditionally been difficult, time consuming, and expensive. Network visualisation and analysis (NVA) has been reported as an important new cost-effective way to address this challenge (TLA, 2006). Its application to CoPs has been described (Smith, 2005a), and its application to the identification of influential individuals (opinion leaders) has also been detailed (Smith, 2005b). In NVA practice, data regarding individuals who seem to fulfil given descriptive identifying archetypes are collected from a target organisational community, e.g. innovation champion archetype. These data are then analysed to produce lists of qualified individuals ordered by their influence. Social network analysis (SNA) may also be applied to the data to suggest the relationships between organisational actors and to map their social networks, SNA is a very rich theoretical methodology that is only recently emerging as a practical and dynamic approach to real organisational problems (Kilduff and Tsai, 2003), although the ability of SNA to reliably clarify the complex relationships between network agents has been questioned (Snowden, 2005). A number of simplified descriptive SNA texts exist, for example Scott (2000). Because of its highly mathematical nature, computers are typically used for calculation and display (Borgatti et al., 1999). One of the practical NVA applications reported by TLA (2006) involved a major retail organisation with branches in a number of different cities that undertook to identify its most influential individuals with regard to innovation, and leadership. A further objective was to gain insight into the organisation-wide network of communications and trust-tagged relationships related to these themes. In the study, e-mail-delivered questions that relate to the above objectives were posed to all members of the three most senior management levels across all the company’s locations and departments. The questions were based on archetypes describing relevant innovation and leadership identities. Members of the target community responded by picking, from a list displayed to them on a dedicated Internet site, the names of individuals that they had personally directly experienced as corresponding to the archetypes. The final response by the group to the questions was around 75 per cent. The NVA identified a significant number of individuals demonstrating noteworthy innovation and leadership influence. Although there were names that appeared in both the innovation and leadership lists, significant differences overall were evident, indicating that innovation champions form a recognisable archetype; this supports our contention that they are not typically team leaders. This information was used in the case described to facilitate setting up steering groups and knowledge sharing communities on already existing trust-tagged networks. This approach requires further more rigorous research to substantiate its usefulness in identifying innovation champions and facilitating the formation of CoInv, but does seem to offer promising potential in this regard.

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Conclusions Innovation is essential to retain and improve organisations’ market and competitive positions, and as such requires maximum internal support so that the current poor translation rate from idea to product is reduced. A CoInv would greatly assist. In this paper we have argued that identifying champions of innovation will permit a CoInv network to be formed and that forming such a community will potentially trigger more innovations that are successfully supported. We have argued, based on the literature cited, that innovation champions are special people, with a particular personality type and psychological profile. In order to succeed in championing innovations through the organisation, from idea and concept through to marketable product, they need not only procedural and resource support, but also social and cognitive support. We contend that this social support can be provided by a special type of CoP – a CoInv. We also contend that a CoInv provides important emotional support to champions and a fertile breeding ground for further innovations. It will also provide the shelter for knowledge entrepreneurs (Coulson-Thomas, 2003) to develop and thus provide greater stakeholder value for the organisation. Although rigorous empirical research studies are required, we suggest based on the TLA study described here, a means by which innovation champions may be identified, and it is our contention that once identified, these champions, with appropriate organisational support, will be motivated to form CoInv.

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