Boundary-Spanning and Boundary Spanners
By Dori Digenti
In the 1970s and 80s, the role of the “gatekeeper” was common in discussions of technical transfer. The gatekeeper acted as a point of contact and a consolidator of external sources of information for the team or department. Typically, the type of information the gatekeeper dealt with was technical information for research or product development, and typically the flow of information was focused on that coming into the organization. With the advent of globalization and the Internet, the gatekeeper became less necessary, as technical information from everywhere was (at least in theory) available to everyone. In the 1990s to the present day, then, the recognition of complexity in business relationships and in information management have moved us from the role of gatekeeper to one of “boundary spanner.”
Boundary spanners have a natural orientation to external sources of information. We can say that boundary spanners are attracted to the margins and external interfaces of the organization, and find ways to use that interest to enhance job performance. Boundary spanners tend to 1) read more, 2) maintain longer-term relationships with experts, 3) draw on a wider pool of expertise than others, and 4) are able to derive more value from external sources of information. Boundary spanners exploit the “strength of weak ties,” using broad interorganizational knowledge exchanges with a wide range of sources to bring innovative information to the organization. Many have questioned if boundary spanners can be trained; C3 LearnNet believes that the boundary spanning skills can be learned through cross-boundary learning interactions. At the same time, boundary spanners do seem to spontaneously emerge in many organizations.
As a system thinker, the boundary spanner understands the specific interests and needs of the varied systems involved in a project. Boundary spanners have their finger on the pulse of informal networks within and without the organization — and so have an advantage in the move to flattened hierarchies because they are not as dependent on formal organizational structures for information. By the same token, boundary spanners may put too much focus on informal relationships and forget to consider impacts on the formal power structure. Successful boundary spanners are able to span the informal/formal boundary as well as the more obvious departmental, technical, and cultural lines.
The boundary spanner needs another essential ingredient beyond a large network: s/he must sustain credibility among a large number of peers. This credibility is based on the quality of information delivered; interpersonal relationship-building skills; and a track record of responsiveness and reciprocity.
Diane Sonnenwald of the University of North Carolina has created a system of boundary spanning roles based on her work with design teams. She sees five discrete boundary types: organization, task, discipline, personal, and multiple, with several roles responding to each type. Her premise is that project teams can consider these roles and identify team members who will fulfill each of them in the course of the project. She suggests that communications will be enhanced through this method, and the team will be more effective as a result.
To summarize, boundary spanners have emerged in organizations as a vital part of the informal knowledge sharing connection to external sources information. They have a unique set of interpersonal, communication, and knowledge skills that allow them to use those information sources to create value for the organization. Boundary-spanning skills can be learned, and at the same time, there is a natural tendency for some people to become boundary spanners.
Many of the explorations of boundary-spanning focus on verbal communication as the major boundary spanning mode. A better formulation is to consider communication in all its forms, including the role of agreed-upon boundary objects and collaboration tools. In terms of collaborative capability, boundary-spanning seems to still be the background, whereas the focus (including budget focus) of collaboration efforts is on IT tools. I was encouraged in this short research project to see that there is thought being given to boundary-spanning roles and the connection between boundary spanning and innovation. Our organizations will benefit from valuing boundary-spanning activities more, and we can help that process by making sure that the connection between our good new ideas and boundary-spanning activities are visible. Further, perhaps we can compare what is happening in our learning centers, and encourage more emphasis on the skills that will build boundary-spanning capacity in the organization.
References:
The Change Agents’ ToolBox, March 2001, http://www.nasmhpd.org/ntac/toolbox/agent8.html
Communication roles that support collaboration during the design process, Sonnenwald, D. H. http://ils.unc.edu/sonnenwald/abstracts.html
Employing Social Network Mapping To Reveal Tensions Between Informal And Formal Organisation, Steve Conway http://www.re-skill.org.uk/odyssey/conway-1a.htm
Innovation and Team Working: Combining Perspectives Through a Focus on Team Boundaries, Steve Conway and Ros Forrester http://research.abs.aston.ac.uk/working_papers/9905.pdf
Measuring the Impact of Information on Work Performance of Collaborative Engineering Teams, Kim, Seung-Lye http://www.asis.org/Conferences/MY98/Kim.htm
Networks of Innovative Managers: The Paths of Experience and Education”, Fred Stewart http://www.bus.ed.ac.uk/ESRC/Projects/7_Steward.html
Social Comparisons in Boundary-spanning Work: Effects of Community Outreach on Members’ Organizational Identity and Identification, Caroline A. Bartel
http://www.johnson.cornell.edu/ASQ/asq.sept.abs01.html#Social
Copyright 2002. Dori Digenti. All rights reserved.
