ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the processes and causes of network success and failure, defined in terms of the ability of the network to become a sustained and valued form of business activity for its members. It explores four different case-study network initiatives as follows: a failed informal ‘new entrepreneurs network’; a successful informal ‘local cluster group’; a failed formal ‘defence contractors network’; and a successful formal ‘small-firm technology group’. The four cases were developed in a qualitative manner, consisting of a series of in-depth interviews undertaken with the managing directors of companies that had participated in one of four inter-firm network initiatives. They explore the motivation and rationality of small and medium enterprise (SME) managing directors to join the network initiatives, and the importance they place on collective business action in general. They assess the role of the initiative facilitator/broker and the actual mechanics of exchange and interaction during the critical early stages of network formation.
