ABSTRACT
Over the last decade, several contributions have suggested that refi ning our understanding of intra-organizational coordination requires opening the “black box” of coordination processes (e.g., Berman, Down & Hill, 2002; Faraj & Xiao, 2006; Becky, 2006; Klein, Ziegert, Knight, & Xiao, 2006; Rico, SanchezManzanares, Gil, & Gibson, 2008; Okhuysen & Bechky, 2009; Lechner & Kreutzer, 2010). Indeed, in reckoning coordination as essentially a matter of structure, the dominant perspective of contingency (e.g., March & Simon, 1958; Lawrence & Lorsch, 1967; Galbraith, 1973; Mintzberg, 1978; Gupta, Dirsmith, & Fogarty, 1994) fails at exploring the micro level of coordination, as well as in delivering a comprehensive appreciation of the way individuals handle collaborative tasks in a situation. Such theories draw on the assumption that an environment remains suffi ciently predictable to allow prespecifi cation of the most effi cient modes of coordination. Moreover, these theories favor studying coordination at the organizational level, and they do not examine how coordina tion is performed by individuals in practice.
