Facilitating Collaboration in Public Management

Education, Research, Health, Social Security and other "public goods" are organized by a mix of organizations, partlypublicly-funded, partly private enterprises, partly public-private partnerships. The quality of the services relies greatly onthe coordination and collaboration of these specialized organizations. How can cooperative relationships be built thatguarantee trustful communication, binding decisions, and productive team-work? How can collaboration and competitionbe balanced? What are the differences between loose-coupled networks and tightly built collaborations and which type isthe best solution for which tasks? How can mergers be managed as result of such collaboration? How must organizationsprepare themselves and their internal structures to engage in trans-organizational collaboration?This volume investigates the potential and challenges inherent in collaborative ventures. It is based on the authors’ rich experiences derived from consulting engagementsand research projects in publicly-funded service organizations, non-profit organizations, public-private partnerships, and for-profit enterprises. The focus is on the rolethat management consultants can play in facilitating such collaborative ventures. Especially within the European context, this particular organizational form is becomingan increasingly common and powerful type of organizational system, and, as such, interventions that can ease and expedite their performance demand our attention andscholarship.As the authors skillfully document and illustrate, cooperative relationships and networks function according to their own underlying logic, which is typically grounded ina spirit of collaboration and negotiation. As they argue, the resulting dynamic reflects a different perspective on building interpersonal, intergroup, and interorganizationalrelationships, one that is removed from historic attempts at coordination through tight hierarchical control, which, as they underscore, is often "inflexible, bureaucratic,and incapable" of achieving the level of commitment and dedication necessary for success.Collaborative ventures involve goals that must be jointly pursued, the partnerships must strive for levelscommitment, involvement and motivation from their members that go well beyond those that hierarchical top-downstructures typically provide. As the authors convincingly demonstrate, such high levels of collaboration do notemerge on their own. Mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures, partnerships, and strategic alliances are often launchedwith great fanfare, only to fall well short of pre-venture expectations. To truly work in practice, collaborativerelationships and networks must be deliberately formed, developed, organized, and guided. Yet, as this volumeamply illustrates, the underlying process is infused with a number of tensions - from the challenge of balancingcollaboration and competition, to the appropriate mix of loose-tight controls and linkages, to ensuring commitmentfrom members to the partnership while they maintain allegiance to their primary organization.