Crossing Learning Boundaries.

The Utility related Virtual Organisation ISES

Abstract

Due to changing circumstances, organisations start to co-operate with their competitors or with firms from other industries that can complement their range of products. This development of independent partners sharing, their resources and equipment with each other, can also be seen in the Swedish utility industry and will soon happen to other utility businesses after the deregulation of the European utility industry has become a fact. The co-operation can be seen as a virtual organisation and this research project investigates how virtual organisations operate and how partners establish and maintain such an organisation. For this reason the R&D virtual organisation ISES, formed by the utility related joint venture EnerSearch AB, is taken as a case study. When comparing a virtual organisation with traditional organisations, five boundaries are presented that can both create and inhibit learning and communication. Since learning can be viewed as a major objective of a virtual organisation, the five boundaries are discussed in more detail and are related to empirical results in the project ISES. These boundaries are time, space, diversity, structure and distribution and are characteristics of a virtual organisation. By observing this organisation, opportunities and obstacles of a virtual organisation are found that could help organisations who would like to establish a virtual organisation. One example is the difference in decision styles or personality of the members of a virtual organisation, which influences information distribution, communication and co-operation.

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