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2 COLLABORATION
In the academic literature the term, “collaboration”
itself does not present as a single term (Fyall and
Garrod, 2005). the terms, ‘collaboration’ and
‘cooperation’ are used interchangeably. Adding to
the confusion, other words such as ‘partnerships’,
‘alliances’, ‘joint ventures’ and ‘consortia’ are also
applied as common or general term in most research
papers.
The use of the terminologies became obvious
when other terms such as networking,
communication and coordination are also considered
and related to each other (Himmelman, 1996). The
following discussion in this article focuses on those
concepts. Other researchers have studied differences
among the terminologies of coordination,
cooperation and collaboration.
Himmelman (1996) shows a progressive increase
in the complexity of the relationship from
coordination to collaboration. Organisations that
coordinate typically share information, whereas
cooperating organisations share information as well
as physical space and transportation resources.
Organisations that collaborate share information,
physical space, transportation resources and further
invest in the training of staff.
Camarinha-Matos and Hamideh (2006)
proposed an interaction level of maturity levels of
networking, cooperation, coordination and
collaboration. As the relationship progresses from
the lowest to the highest level, the amount of
integration increases and people are working
together and sharing their responsibilities. Therefore,
collaboration is an emerging and long process that
requires the highest level of maturity as well as
integration.
The proliferation of the information and
communication technology (ICT) development with
low cost computing have given a tremendous
influence on how business operation is conducted by
allowing organisations to be connected virtually
regardless of the geographical location or known as
collaborative networks. Collaborative networks
(CN) are defined as groups of businesses,
individuals and other organisational entities that
work together by combining their capabilities and
resources to achieve targeted outcomes (Shuman and
Twombly, 2008).
3 PARTNER SELECTION
One of the main prerequisites to get those
advantages that need to be considered carefully
before becoming involved in collaborative projects
is selecting the right partners to work together
(Killing, 1983;Dong and Glaister, 2006). This is
because selecting the right partners, who have
compatible goals, appropriate skills and effective
motivation, has been recognised as crucial for
successful collaboration (Dacin and Hitt, 1997). The
chosen partners for collaborative projects might
affect the overall mixture of available skills and
resources as well as the operating policies and
procedures (Geringer, 1991).
However, according to Wildeman (1998) the poor
success rate of collaboration showed that 60-70% of
collaboration disbanded prematurely due to certain
factors such as lack of management skills.
Organisations should identify selection criteria that
should be employed prior to the setting up of
collaboration projects. Furthermore, the process of
setting up collaborative projects is time consuming
and costly. However, many organisations select their
partners in an ad-hoc manner
While it seems that an almost unlimited range of
criteria exists in selecting partners, Geringer (1991)
simplified by distinguishing broad categories of
criteria. These two categories are called ‘task-
related’ and ‘partner-related’ criteria respectively.
The typology provides better understanding of the
selection process and how they proceed in selecting
partners(Tatoglu, 2000).
Little prior research has specifically focused
on the partner-related criteria and therefore, the
focus of this paper is on partner-related criteria as it
has great impact on organisations and business
performances (Kannan and Tan, 2002). Furthermore,
partner-related criteria can be critical criteria as they
can influence the efficiency and effectiveness of
corporation between partners (Thomlinson, 1970).
The consideration of those criteria during the
selection stage is also vital to make relationship
management easier and the chances of the possibility
of successful collaboration are higher (Abramov et
al., 1997). The identified list of criteria for selecting
partners was based on a comprehensive and
thorough literature review from forty-one
established journals (Mat et al., 2008).
4 RESEARCH METHODS
The quantitative research approach has dominated
the late 19th century until the mid-20th century
(Creswell, 2009). It is a means of systematic
scientific investigation of exploring the relationship
among variables using statistical procedures or
mathematical expression. The format of questions is
SELECTING PARTNERS FOR COLLABORATIVE NETWORKS - Mixed Methods Approach
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