Collaboration: is it only a metaphor?

- an action perspective on how to make it real

Angela Lacerda Nobre

Escola Superior de Ciências Empresariais do Instituto Politécnico de Setúbal ESCE-IPS

Campus do IPS, Estefanilha, 2914-503 Setúbal, Portugal

stract. The current complexity of organisational environments is related to

the challenges of the knowledge economy and it calls for a drastic and

breakthrough development of conceptual frameworks able to inform new and

innovative organisational practices. Knowledge management and organisational

learning already take this lead though it is necessary to complement them and to

use deeper and more complex insights able to grasp present organisational

reality. Social philosophy in general and action philosophy in particular

represent a powerful contribution to the improvement of organisational

developmental potential. The present paper represents an illustration and an

introduction to a drastically needed mediation between philosophical

contributions and management theory and practice.

1 Introduction

Collaboration and coordination are critical concepts within the current context of

organisational change. These concepts have been developed extensively within

specific knowledge fields such as Knowledge Management, Organisational Learning,

Computer Supported Collaborative Work, Communities of Practice, Organisational

Meaning, Organisational Communication, and Organisational Development.

However, management and organisational practices rarely profit from these

developments thus there is a wide margin for improvement in terms of understanding

why theory and practice are so often divorced from each other.

The present paper develops out of a series of six questions which gradually

disclose the main message which is being transmitted: that current organisational

settings need new theories and practices able to adequately respond to the challenges

of the new economy [8]. Within this paper, an action perspective is the ground for the

exploration of innovative and breakthrough conceptual frameworks. Action

philosophy is used as the background for new approaches to organisational

coordination and collaborative practices. The questions which form the road map for

this paper are the following: (1) How does collaboration relate to coordination? (2)

What makes them important within organisational settings? (3) How may they

represent a survival issue within the context of the knowledge economy? (4) What

difference does it make, to cooperation and to collaboration, to be computer

supported? (5) What is the relation between an activity perspective and a learning

Lacerda Nobre A. (2004).

Collaboration: is it only a metaphor? - an action perspective on how to make it real.

In Proceedings of the 1st International Workshop on Computer Supported Activity Coordination, pages 103-115

DOI: 10.5220/0002672101030115

 SciTePress

perspective on collaboration and cooperation? (6) What may be the role of action?

How may action and its philosophical meaning present breakthrough venues for new

theories and practices at management level?

2 Collaboration and coordination

Collaboration and coordination represent two aspects of the same single reality.

Collaboration consists of acknowledging the issue of voluntary and intentional

participation within a specific activity. Coordination refers to the degree of

adjustment and of common referents which different participants share with each

other while performing a specific activity. We may say that the face of an analogical

watch shows two hands which are coordinated: as the long hand goes around 360

degrees the short hand advances a twelfth part of the circle. This coordination enables

us to read the time. The hands of the watch are not only coordinated among

themselves but also with the Big Ben’s hands, otherwise we would say that the

watch’s time is not correct. We would also need to take into account the time zone as

different geographical fuses are subject to specific time differences in relation to

Greenwich time. Within each fuse we must also acknowledge the different seasons

time definitions whenever they have been stipulated. Why go into such detail in

relation to such a common example? The time example shows how far the routines

and procedures which we take for granted in our daily life are the product of a

historical development which is socially determined, i.e. social conventions produced

by specific communities subject to specific circumstances resulted in specific

coordination procedures.

Do we need to recall that 3000 years ago the Egyptians had a calendar and a time

scale every time we look at a watch? Certainly not. The crucial issue is that we

understand and value the importance of social determinations in relation to every

single coordination instance that permeates our daily life. Trains time schedules and

train stations, airports, factories, hyper-markets, schools or any institution is bounded

by coordination procedures which are socially determined. Organisational routines,

norms, rules, bureaucratic procedures, time tables, conventions and protocols,

represent coordination instances which keep an organisation together and are the

product of the organisation’s past and present community. The organisational identity

and the organisational memory are inherently and constitutively linked with these

coordination aspects. Identity and memory are connected with coordination issues

because these are themselves the product of organisational social life, these are social

conventions produced by historically situated communities. An organisation is a

single whole because these social bounds exist, i.e. an organisation is a social entity

and this social life itself determines every single aspect of the organisation’s existence

even those usually taken for granted as fixed and immutable entities. When we

referred to the time example the coordination issue was related to non human objects,

the hands of a watch. Different pieces of a machine or an engine may be said to be

coordinated among themselves. So the term coordination can be applied to both

human and non human situations. Though within organisational settings coordination

at human level is far more complex than that of physical objects, these examples still

represent didactic metaphors of what coordination means in human terms.

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Can we say that the hands of a watch collaborate? We would need a sophisticated

theory to support this statement, one that would interpret reality as a continuum in

which each entity may have different degrees and capacities to interfere with its

surrounding environment. With the term collaboration its most conventional

application is to human endeavours. Intentions, motivation and will are characteristics

which we usually attach to human beings. Nevertheless, non human situations may

represent strong and illuminating metaphors for collaboration. The evolution of

species and the way that in catastrophic situations the species which have

incorporated more characteristics from different species are the ones that have a best

chance of survival, is a critical example of collaboration. Still within a biological

setting, at micro level, in relation to micro-organisms, the way that virus and bacteria

survive and develop, and how the immune system responds, may also be enlightening

examples of collaborative activity. Human collaboration is usually interpreted using

psychological and cognitivist approaches. Individual’s interests and intentions may

explain collaborative behaviour: «In order to reach this objective I have to collaborate

in this task». Individuals traits and personality may also be used as justifications for

collaboration: «That person has a generous and extrovert nature and so collaboration

is straightforward».

Beyond psychological and cognitivist perspectives we may question why and how

those interests and intentions, traits and personality, developed and emerged. In order

to answer those questions we have to use social philosophy. Collaboration, from this

perspective, gains new and revolutionary insights. Though current and conventional

management theory rests almost fully on psychology and cognitive science to deal

with the human side of organisational life, social philosophy may bring an integrative

and transformational approach able to deal with the deeper and more complex levels

of management and organisational settings. From a social philosophy perspective

collaboration may be interpreted as the result of a specific positive, productive and

gratifying, experience which has occurred at community level. This experience may

be referred to as a learning process. Communities ‘learn’ to collaborate by

successfully practising collaborative activities, so that collaboration is a learning-by-

doing process. We referred above that coordination and collaboration are two aspects

of a single reality and that coordination instances are the result of social practices and

structures. The single reality we were referring to is organisational social life and this

social life affects, influences and determines both coordination and collaboration

practices.

The relatively recent management disciplines of organisational learning and of

knowledge management take a special interest on organisational environments where

knowledge is created and shared, collaborative forms of work and learning are

practised, and higher order inquiry processes, such as appreciative inquiry and

double-loop learning, are part of a constant and continual reflexive practice. The

growing interest in communities of practice is another example of the central role

these play within organisational contexts. The British Standard Institute document on

knowledge management describes it as: «The creation and subsequent management of

an environment which encourages knowledge to be created, shared, learnt, enhanced,

organised and utilised for the benefit of the organisation and its customers.» [6]. At

practical level, from an initial focus in technology issues, there was a gradual

development first to individual centred approaches and later to social related issues.

The growth in importance of the theory of communities of practice represents and

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illustrates this development process [15]. This development is based on the argument

that both organisational learning and knowledge management initiatives are

meaningless unless adequately ‘situated’, i.e. the appropriate contexts have to be

taken into account. This means that we must acknowledge, identify, value and nurture

the corresponding communities, be communities of practice, of knowledge or of

learning. Organisational learning certainly witnesses the novelty in management

studies. Within this knowledge field, one key structuring and central element is the

concept of double-loop learning developed by Argyris [3], who is one of the founding

fathers of organisational learning. This concept, which states the need for constantly

questioning our own assumptions, illustrates the jumping over the barriers of many

well established and departmentalised areas of knowledge. Victoria Marsick [9]

develops the concept of informal learning. Brown and Duguid [5] call attention to the

social life of information. Karl Weick [14] studies the process of meaning creation at

organisational level. The specific message of this paper is that these management and

organisational theories call attention to issues which these theories themselves cannot

explain. This means that they need further development and further integration and

that this may only be accomplished through the use of mediations.

3 Collaboration within organisational settings

The answer to the question of why coordination and collaboration are so important to

organisational life is that coordination and collaboration are the result, the reflection

and the product of social practices and structures. And these practices and structures

in turn represent the essence of the organisational identity and memory. Organisations

are social structures. As social structures, their social practices form a single and

organised whole which is itself constitutive of each organisation as such. In other

words, organisations exist as long as they are the arena for coordination and

collaboration practices. Coordination and collaboration exist per si within

organisations because that is what an organisation is about. Each organisation

constitutes and represents a specific and unique form of organising, designing and

promoting, coordination instances and collaborative practices. Given the issue that all

organisations inherently and inescapably present coordination and collaboration

mechanisms then we may consider the degree, the intensity, the extensity, the

inclusiveness, the energy, the dynamism, the creativity and the quality of these

mechanisms and processes.

At organisational level, the practices and processes are supported by social

relations which may be characterised as social structures. Archer and Bhaskar [2]

develop extensively the notion of social structures, posing the question as to how they

should be conceptualised. Roy Bhaskar, the father of critical realism theory, argues

that without the concept of social structure, or something like it, we cannot make

sense of persons. Bhaskar insists that the problem is that we need the idea of a social

structure, but that a social structure does not exist in the same way as a magnetic field:

«society is incarnate in the practices and products of its members. It does not exist

apart from the practices of the individuals; it is not witnessable; only its activities and

products are.» [2] (italics in the original). Structures are both medium and product,

enabling and constraining. Since social structures do not exist independently of

activities, they are not simply reproduced but are, as Bhaskar notes, reproduced and

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transformed. This author explains that it is because society is incarnate in the

practices of its members, that it is easy to lapse into methodological individualism, in

which society disappears and only individuals exist. Of course, “society has not

disappeared, since these individuals are persons and their acts are situated, not simply

in a ‘natural’ world but in a world constituted by past and ongoing human activity, a

humanised natural and social world.” (ibid, 1998)(italics in the original). The

argument of these authors follows that because social structures are incarnate in the

practices of persons, this means that they do not exist independently of the

conceptions of the persons whose activities constitute (reproduce, transform) them. It

is because persons have beliefs, interests, goals, and practical knowledge acquired in

their epigenesis as members of a society that they do what they do and thus sustain

(and transform) the structures. Bhaskar further elucidates this point: “... all agents

have practical knowledge (not necessarily cognitively available) and some degree of

understanding of the real nature of social structure which their activities sustain,

[however] unintended consequences, unacknowledged conditions, and tacit rules limit

the individual’s understanding of his or her social world.”

There is some parallelism between the importance of social structures within the

field of social studies and specific approaches set forward by organisational literature.

Peter Senge [12] states that: “Organisations change only when people change” and

“People change only when they change from within”. To learn, to acquire, to create

knowledge, is a social process thus not an individual and isolated task. Personal

learning as any personal phenomena is intrinsically and inherently social in essence.

The notion of knowledge as values and beliefs is also constitutively socially

structured. “Knowledge, unlike information, is about beliefs and commitments” [10].

And also: “The power of Knowledge to organise, select, and judge comes from values

and beliefs as much as, and probably more than, from information and logic.” [7].

Organisations cannot be regarded as objective and neutral entities as it is critical to

recognise the powerful impact of people’s beliefs and values - people’s thoughts and

actions are inescapably linked to their value system, they are integral to knowledge,

determining what the knower sees, absorbs, and concludes from her observations.

People with different values ‘see’ different things and organise their knowledge

according to their values.

In biology, the more sophisticated the species the better chances it has of survival

in strainful and stressful situations. Similarly, organisations have a better chance of

survival the better they are able to develop their coordination and collaboration

mechanisms and practises. The knowledge economy represents a revolutionary

potential change which is linked to the information and communication technology

development, the globalisation of markets, and the increase in the pace of change and

of the level of complexity of organisational environments [8]. These changers require

new theories and practices on behalf of organisations so that they may not only

survive but also reap the benefits of the new economic reality. The knowledge

economy brings forth a new approach to traditional neo-classical economics.

Knowledge becomes a new factor of production, new in terms of not being submitted

to conventional economical laws. Instead of diminishing its value by being used as

any other resource, knowledge, within a knowledge economy, increases its value by

being used and shared. Thus the crucial importance of promoting, fostering and

facilitating knowledge sharing practices, collaborative forms of working and of

learning, and community building, sustaining and intensifying mechanisms.

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In order to grasp the complexity of the new economy it is relevant to consider the

role of social philosophy. «There is no sharp dividing line between science and

philosophy, but philosophical problems tend to have three special features: (i) they

tend to concern large frameworks rather than specific questions within a framework;

(ii) they are questions for which there are no generally accepted method or solution;

(iii) they tend to involve conceptual issues.» [11].

Van der Wal summarises the development of contemporary philosophy and

highlights the key elements of this process within the period of the 20th century: «...

what have we ‘learned’ in the field of philosophy? In the case of philosophy,

‘learning’ is understood as getting a more adequate insight into the frameworks in

terms of which we spell our experience, in particular as getting an eye for aspects that

were overlooked or insufficiently noticed in the philosophy of earlier periods. In that

connection, we have four themes: (1) Subjectivity and inwardness, i.e. the issue of the

special mode of being of the subject (e.g. in phenomenology, and in existentialism).

(2) Intersubjectivity and connectedeness, i.e. the ‘discovery’ that by the relation

between subjects a very special dimension of reality is indicated that cannot be

adequately characterised in terms of the subject-object relationship (e.g. dialogical

and hermeneutic philosophy). (3) Mediation, the issue that meanings are always

context and tradition bound, that subjectivity, mind, etc, manifest themselves only as

‘incarnated’, mediated by nature (philosophy of language, philosophy of the mind).

(4) The evolution from a uniform to a manifold concept of rationality and experience

(epistemology, philosophy of science)» [13]. It is critical to highlight the way that

learning is understood within the present paper as well as the way it is described by

Van der Wall within a philosophical context. Learning is interpreted and presented as

an imminently practical action, experientially based, which is open to reality as it

manifest itself: «‘learning’ is understood as getting a more adequate insight into the

frameworks in terms of which we spell our experience».

4 Computer supported collaboration

Although coordination and collaboration are intrinsic and inherent characteristics of

an organisation, its computational activity is a choice and an option that organisations

have as a means to reach its ends. Without computers we could not have taken man to

the Moon or a robot to Mars, neither could we run a modern airport or a modern stock

exchange. However, aeroplanes and stock exchanges are anterior to modern

computers. The point that is important to make is that coordination and collaboration

are constitutive elements of organisational life and that computational expertise is

gradually becoming a prerequisite for organisations within current complex

environments. This complexity is not merely related to the intrinsic complication of,

for instance, aerospace technology but rather with the complex whole that today’s

reality represents. Having a hamburger stand is a straightforward simple business.

However, to run a world chain like Mac Donald’s would not be possible without the

computer and computerised activity. This complexity is connected not just to the

production chain of a hamburger but with the intricacies of today’s global markets,

forms of competition, and power influences. As a simple example it suffices to say

that Mac Donald’s real business and profitability results more from its global level

real estate transactions and business than from its fast food market share.

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Nevertheless, it is still crucial to consider coordination and collaboration within an

organisation whose activities are computerised. We can have organisations without

computers, so that we can have coordination and collaboration without computers, but

it still is relevant to consider how these coordination and collaboration may be altered

through the use of computers. The coordination capacity of a computerised

organisation increases exponentially and this is the most obvious effect and result of

using a computer. Computers are information processors and as such they represent a

valuable tool for coordination activities. The collaboration side of this equation is less

obvious though it is as important or even more so than the impact that computers have

in improving the coordination activities. Virtual communities, on-line discussions,

chat groups, special interest groups, portals, blogs, webpages, e-mail and the World

Wide Web, are examples of computerised social interaction and of personal and

collective communication mechanisms. Many factors are relevant within this on-line

social interaction. The freedom in terms of time and space is an immediate element.

The importance of the visual content is another critical aspect of contemporary

communication. The fact that in most circumstances it is necessary to write down

personal considerations potentially improves the reflective practice process. More

importantly, the fact that these personal registers may be consulted later by the author

or by others, and may be commented, contradicted and developed, represents a major

factor for the promotion and incentive of collaborative practices.

Computer supported collaboration definitely represents an increase in the potential

and collaborative capacity of an organisation. Though initially we have been referring

to collaboration and to on-line social interaction, through blogs or virtual

communities, at a general level, within an institution, exactly the same mechanisms

occur. Both collaboration and computer mediated interaction may be studied and

analysed outside of an institutional setting, though within organisations these

collaboration processes are particularly relevant as they represent the organisational

potential itself, and its survival and developmental capacity. As long as computer

supported social interaction increases the potential for collaborative practices and of

coordination mechanisms then computer supported activities represent a crucial

survival issue for today’s organisations. To make it clearer: it is not the simple

presence or existence and use of a computer that matters. Technology is critical

though it is so as long as it is able to interfere in a definitive and positive way with

organisational social life. The relation and the interference between technology and

the social aspects of an organisation is always present even when it is not visible

immediately and at a superficial level. The question is whether organisational

designers, managers and information systems experts and practitioners are able to

acknowledge and to explore this hidden potential and whether we have organisational

and management theories able to deal with and to grasp the complexity of an

organisational social life, in particular when it is being offered the privilege of

profiting from the high potential that a computerised organisation may benefit from.

5 The activity and the learning perspective and phenomenology

Every activity has a specific pattern and procedural logic yet it is also open to the

immediate circumstances which are present during its occurrence. We may

distinguish, artificially, a fixed and rigid part or component of an activity and also a

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flexible and changing part. An activity forms an organised whole so this separation is

artificial in the sense that it represents a methodological step in our effort to

understand what an activity is, and what it means and represents. When focusing on

the flexible and changing side of an activity we may also further continue this

process. We may artificially separate the changing elements that are related with the

surrounding environment and external conditions of an activity, from the influence

and agency power which every actor has over the activity which she performs. This

separation is still artificial and merely methodologically relevant as it is a means to

reach an end, that of better understanding an activity as such. The external and the

internal conditions of an actor performing an activity form an organised whole and if

we fail to grasp this reality we will be dealing only with a partial view of what an

activity is and represents. Following this reasoning, there is a dynamism which

characterises an activity and which includes both internal and external changing

conditions, yet there is a fixed or structured element in this dynamism as if it were a

dynamic pattern.

Learning is often considered as the process of acquisition of competencies and

skills. Though this is the most common interpretation and it is psychologically based,

it is also possible to consider an alternative perspective coming from a social

philosophy background. A phenomenological approach places learning as a life

activity, inherent to all living forms. As we are considering organisational settings it is

sufficient for us to focus on human learning. Learning, from this perspective, may be

regarded as a continuum and permanent process which may be more visible,

conscious and intense in some periods of time and in some phases of life though these

are only changes of rhythm and of pace of a single thread and unique process.

Learning, from this perspective, is not the linear, unidirectional and monolithic

accumulation of resources, of whatever kind, but rather a complex, multidimensional

and creative process which may only be paralleled with a developmental process. To

learn is to live and to learn is to develop, and backward and forward movements,

blanks and breakthroughs, are all integrated within a single and unique learning

process.

Phenomenology, extensively developed by Husserl (1859-1938), is a branch of

philosophy which proposes an interpretation of reality as an opening and integrative

movement able to grasp reality as it manifests itself. Instead of focusing on the mental

and cognitive abilities of individuals, as independent and autonomous interpreters of

reality, phenomenology integrates individuals and reality within a single whole from

which it may develop a gradual emerging and rationalisation process. This process

represents an alternative perspective of interpreting reality, an alternative to

psychology or even to other forms of philosophical analysis. It is possible to consider

cognitivist perspectives as a specific phase, or a stage, within a broader and more

complex process. The phenomenological approach centres its attention outside of the

cognitivist notion of the individual. Instead of having a subject studying an object

there is a total reframing of what studying itself means. The static subject perspective

becomes a dynamic subject-object together with all the reality in which each

individual is immersed. This particular philosophical instance is called being-in-the

world. The phenomenological perspective is particularly interesting when applied to

organisational settings. It can lead to powerful insights is terms of how to deal with

the tension between that which may be predicted and planned, and that which is being

constructed as we go along so that it cannot be captured or framed into a precise and

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prescriptive approach. Traditional management has conventionally focused mainly on

the predictive and prescriptive side of organisational life. The knowledge economy,

with its inevitable increase in complexity and in the pace of change, has forced a

gradual shift towards a closer attention to the creative and unpredictable power of new

forms of organisation, the ones where collaborative forms of work and of knowledge

sharing are the norm. Though psychology and cognitive science have the lion’s share

of influence within management settings, alternative perspectives such as

phenomenology, or hermeneutics and ontology, are gradually gaining new ground.

The need for better social philosophy resources in organisational analysis is justified

by the increased complexity of both internal and external organisational

environments.

Within an organisational context, learning may be said to be part, at least as a

potential, of every activity. Both the rigid pattern and the flexible dynamism of an

activity have to be learnt, the former in a visible and more formal way and the later

through a learning-by-doing and a learning-to-learn informal process. Formal and

informal learning are also an artificial distinction and an erroneous terminology as

they both represent rationalisation, and as such, formalisation, processes yet each one

of a different nature. Coordination and collaboration within organisations, are based

on two confronting issues. On one hand, they are based on the critical importance and

central role that these activities represent within organisational life and, on the other

hand, they are based on the fragility and delicacy of such processes as they are

connected and determined by the complexity of organisational social interaction. The

better able we are to recognise and acknowledge the way that learning processes

permeate organised activity, the better will we be able to design organisations and

information systems which are able to promote, to foster and to facilitate collaborative

work and coordination practices. The specificity of a phenomenological approach or

of other philosophical strand may only be briefly mentioned within the context of a

paper yet the central message to retain is that there are, there exist, a myriad of

alternative perspectives which may bring new light and new insights into

organisational reality. This application is not immediate and straightforward yet it is

already a giant’s step to merely consider the possibility of other perspectives and

points of view. The opportunities and challenges of the new economy definitely call

for innovative, open and creative perspectives.

6 The role of action and management theory and practice

Action, philosophical action, is not equivalent to doing something. Action may be

compatible to someone being perfectly still, as reflection is a critical component of

action. Doing is action only when there is some degree of freedom and of self-

determination in that doing process. The Charlie Chaplin’s film, «Modern Times»,

frames doing processes which are not action as the factory worker must endlessly

repeat the same movement over and over again. Every time there is a conscious or

unconscious, voluntary of involuntary, chosen or imposed decision not to interfere

with the course of an activity there will be doing but not action. Action presupposes

that there is an interchange, someone that is able to affect something and who also is

being affected by that something. Action assumes that agents or actors have agency

power, i.e. are able to follow directions which are not necessarily those predetermined

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or predicted initially. Once action is in action, no prediction is possible. The anti-

predictive nature of action places it as an apparent undesirable guest to organisational

settings or to any contexts where prediction is key. Most conventional perspectives on

management relate it to forms and strategies which enable prediction, anticipation and

planning. Traditional management is synonymous to command and control measures

and procedures, with single voice and unidirectional communication channels.

The changes imposed by the knowledge economy, its increase in complexity and in

the pace of change seriously compromise traditional management forms. Similarly to

the way that the new economy does not wipe out the old economy in a blink of eye

lashes, also old forms of management and old leadership styles cannot change and,

indeed, should not change overnight. The point that it is critical to make is that it is

possible to describe at least two alternatives, one being traditional management and,

the other one, new forms of management, characterised by flatter, more horizontal

organisations, where communication is multidirectional and where multiple voices

can be heard. Instead of a command and control culture there is an open and

challenging environment. Instead of roles and responsibilities being clearly assigned

there is a greater degree of flexibility and of collective and distributed sharing of

activities and of responsibilities.

The best and most common image is that of comparing a classical music orchestra

with a jazz orchestra. The former has perfectly assigned roles and everyone knows

what is expected of her. All goes well as long as every single player focus on her own

performance and on the conductor’s directions and ignores everything else. The later

form of organisation, the jazz orchestra, is centred on an extreme attention to each

other and a focus on the overall result of the group as a whole. Each individual action

takes the others into account as well as the collective product. In the first one, the

conductor coordinates the orchestra single handily. In the second one the coordination

emerges out of each practice and through the practice itself. In the first one, there is a

strict partiture to follow, and times may be predicted accurately. In the second one

there is only a loose theme or a starting melody from which the whole piece develops.

Collaboration in the former one is unidirectional, every musician has to collaborate

with the conductor. In the former one, there is no conductor. The conductor’s role is

performed in a flexible and distributed way, each one taking the lead as it seems fit to

do so. Collaboration is then multidirectional and much more intense and

sophisticated.

As long as modern forms of organisations may be compared to jazz orchestras then

an action perspective will not only be relevant but a must, a cheer necessity and a

survival issue. Within an action perspective there is also room for plans and for

improving the systematisation processes. It is similar to the situation that most jazz

musicians have a sound training in classical music and it is from that solid

background that they advance into more creative and improvised activities.

Improvisation, creativity and intuition, similarly to what has been mentioned about

informal forms of learning, represent specific and special forms of rationality, with

their own logic and rationale.

The crucial message is then that today’s organisations need to master both the

traditional and functionalistic mechanical managerial activities as well as the creative,

flexible and innovative new forms of management. An action perspective helps to

integrate both activities and functions. By bridging and integrating these often

interpreted as irreconcilable areas it opens true windows of opportunity for

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organisational development. Innovation, in particular organisational innovation,

becomes the immediate result and end product of an action perspective.

To recapitulate, an action perspective takes into account the intentionally of the

actor as well as the actor’s openness to her surrounding reality. As such, action cannot

be perfectly predetermined or predicted. However, it is exactly the reliance on

individual’s agency power and decision making capacity which is needed within an

organisational environment which is extremely complex and volatile. The higher the

complexity the greater the need for action oriented actors. The less the predictive

power the more important to have self acting individuals. But the action perspective

does not end here. Action is not synonymous to independent and isolated individuals,

agents or actors. Autonomy and self intentionally are not incompatible with a

cohesive collective environment or with an intense social interaction. The jazz

orchestra captures these features in perfection: autonomous actors show a great

awareness and attention to the group as a whole and act, i.e. improvise, accordingly.

There is a distributed social organisation where dialogue and heteroglossia, or

multiple voices, to use Bakhtin’s terminology [4], are present.

So an action perspective presupposes a specific organisational environment and

organisational culture. One that promotes collaboration by designing coordination

mechanisms which both satisfy the structural organisational needs and also leave

room for creativity and innovation. «Culture is the most important and least

understood set of dynamics at work in an organisation, creating the context in which

all work is done.» [1]. An action perspective is both a conceptual framework and an

organisational practice, which may be implemented and promoted through the further

acquaintance with the rich world of social philosophy. This may not be possible

directly but there are great gains to be expected from mediation forms which bridge

the philosophical and the managerial worlds. This has been the aim of this paper: to

open possible exploratory roads for the development of management theory and

practices which respond in an adequate and successful manner to the challenges being

presented by the knowledge economy.

More than a theory and a practice, an action framework represents a specific way

of interpreting reality. When applied to organisational reality it may open new points

of view and expand the horizons in a way which would not have been possible

otherwise. This to say that it is possible to apply an action perspective to any

organisation, as a reading lens, though some organisations may be closer to be able to

profit fully from what an action perspective has to offer that others. An action

perspective would be best adopted through an organisational learning or a knowledge

management tool or instrument as these parallel disciplines represent the newest

forms of management development both in theory and in practice. However, these

disciplines have often followed the conventional management reliance in psychology

and in cognitive science. An action perspective is not directly incompatible with these

trends rather it goes further and deeper than them. This potential must be recognised

and acknowledge otherwise there cannot be any real gains from the adoption of an

action perspective to collaborative work and coordination practices. Making

collaboration a real practice and exploiting its full potential through an action

perspective is a powerful yet subtle endeavour. The way it becomes visible is through

its actual application. Its results are the confidence which each individual gains and

which is visible to others, both internally and externally to the organisation, as well as

the level of high trust which is developed among the groups and which permeates

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every social interaction. This trust and this confidence is the product of a deeper level

understanding of organisational phenomena and of organisational reality. For those

familiar with action research, a good image is that of using action research not as a

research method but rather as a management practice, as a constant and continuing

reflexive practice. And this, is a learning-by-doing and a learning-to-learn process.

7 Final words

The purpose of the present paper is to highlight the window of opportunity that social

philosophy in general and that philosophy of action in particular has to offer to

organisational settings. This contribution is particularly relevant under the current

conditions of the knowledge economy of the information age. This paper followed a

series of six questions where organisational coordination and collaborative practices

have been discussed. The main focus has been on stressing the constitutive nature that

both coordination and collaboration represent to what it means to be an organisation,

i.e. an organisation is constitutivelly defined by the coordination and collaboration

design, mechanisms, processes and activities that it puts into action. In order to better

grasp this reality we need to acknowledge the importance of organisations as social

structures. It is through social interaction that organisations become what they are, as

organisations exist as social entities.

Within management settings, the disciplines of knowledge management and of

organisational learning already focus on the need for novel and innovative

organisational forms and stress the importance of creating specific organisational

environments. These environments represent specific forms of social interaction, and

they promote knowledge creation and sharing, and collaborative work and learning.

However, these new disciplines call attention to issues which they themselves cannot

explain. This is the argument in favour of the need for the use of broader, deeper and

more complex social philosophy approaches. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate

and to prove that it is possible, meaningful and desirable to constitute mediations

between philosophical areas and management theory and practices. Once these

mediations are present and in action then new and breakthrough organisational

practices may emerge. This emergence process may itself be referred to as the

development and coming into existence of the knowledge economy and of the

learning society.

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