ABSTRACT

Modern industries are characterised by a high degree of division of labour. The cooperation between different disciplines and expertises within organisations, and the coordination of the contributions of the different actors into collective achievements to ensure safe and efficient operations in risk-exposed industries is thus an important field for research. A characteristic feature of modern industries is the division of labour that renders possible a high degree of specialisation and the accomplishment of highly complex work. A challenging implication of this division of labour is the work related to coordinating the different contributions – to put together what has been divided. The notion of common ground is rooted in Herbert Clark’s contribution theory. It was coined to describe the way people achieve joint understanding, in the form of ‘mutual knowledge, mutual beliefs, and mutual assumptions’ in the course of conversation. The process by which common ground is achieved between two or more participants is called a grounding process.