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| 說明 | 175 p |
| 附註 | Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-01, Section: A, page: 0244 |
| Adviser: Lloyd S. Baird |
| Thesis (D.B.A.)--Boston University, 2009 |
| Integrating knowledge across divisions of labor is recognized as prime challenge of the firm in organizational theory and strategy. This dissertation examines how experts succeed at collaborating in circumstances that take this challenge to the extreme. For the purpose of knowledge development in a highly novel and complex situation, experts must reconcile their perspectives across diverse specializations that are built upon years of training and work experience as well as idiosyncratic nomenclatures and approaches to frame and solve problems. This thesis identifies means of work organization with which experts achieve synthesis |
| The study draws from 18 months of fieldwork in cancer research at two top universities in the North Eastern US. Scientists operate in the newly emerging field of systems biology that embraces disciplines with two very distinct approaches to knowledge development, namely experiments and computational analysis. Based on interviews, observation of work practices, meeting attendance, and archival material this dissertation builds process theory on how experts collaborate in order to develop knowledge in situations of complexity and novelty |
| The study presents a dynamic model of knowledge development. I argue that work proceeds in an eight-shaped cycle that consists of alternating individual and collective work phases. Scientists move work forward by partitioning it into individual contributions that everybody makes based on their expertise. Collectively, scientists then review the contributions and interpret their implications for the work in other disciplines. Throughout a repeating cycle of these work phases, scientists apply a set of collaborative practices with which they associate emerging knowledge with knowledge from the literature and reconcile insights across disciplines |
| This dissertation contributes to the literature in specifying the role of individual work as a fundamental driver of collective work. It delivers a clear distinction between cooperation and collaboration. Furthermore, it exposes shared work practices that crosslink knowledge in one area of specialization with work in another. This process leads to synthesis among contributions of diverse origins The thesis outlines the foundation of a theory of collaboration that hinges upon a consideration of the individual and collective dimension of work to explain and predict the process of collaboration across domains |
| School code: 0017 |
| 主題 | Business Administration, Management |
| 0454 |
| ISBN/ISSN | 9781109003048 |
