|
This Paper examines the issues of
collaboration within and between large, complex organisations. We
examine four kinds of challenges in complex collaboration, with insights
from in-depth case studies considered at recent
FISSING
meetings by people who took a central role:
1.
providing internal shared services
2.
achieving seamless external customer
loyalty
3.
collaborating with external contractors
4.
collaborating across deep ethnic and cultural differences.
The four kinds of challenge are explored
in the four chapters summarised below.
Collaborating for
Shared Services
Jon Tye, Head of HR Solutions at Watson
Wyatt, reported on
the trends and research findings on collaboration in shared services and
illustrated this with a case study. His interest lies in the ways in
which the HR function can work with other support functions to create a
more integrated and efficient service delivery model – with a focus on
operational service performance.
Collaborating for
Customer Loyalty
Gary Saunders, founder of
fe3,
used his work with Bayer – the multi-national chemical and healthcare
corporation – to illustrate the way that a major project involving
several business functions, aimed at generating increased customer
loyalty, relies on collaboration across those functions to produce
business results.
Collaboration with
Contractors
John Doyle, a Director of ITS,
described the approach taken by the MOD to engage with major,
multi-million pound suppliers, and drew some lessons from his
experience.
Having advised a wide range of large
organisations on OD, performance management, evaluation, and quality and
cultural issues, John was well placed to develop collaborative strategy
in such a complex organisational setting.
Leadership,
Organisations and Collaboration
Mannie Sher is the Social and
Organisational Consultant and Director, Group Relations Programme at The
Tavistock Institute. He introduced a deeper level of understanding of
inter-personal collaboration and showed how this applied to the
fundamental divides found in ABSA – the South African bank.
He provided a model for understanding
collaboration and explored this
case study in depth – he believes we learn differently that way. The
insights into collaboration were profound.
Forward
Action – the final section - pulls
together some Members’ views on how and how not to go about generating
collaboration, notes some key challenges that may face
members, and suggests a way forward.
|
