ABSTRACT
As scarce resources and limited funding continue in today’s complex policy landscape, it seems likely that organizations representing the public, private, and nonprofit sectors will continue to work within collaborative arrangements to resolve interconnected problems. Multiorganizational collaboration occurs when two or more organizations leverage information, resources, and expertise to achieve collective goals that a single organization is unable to achieve (Bryson, Crosby, & Stone, 2006). While the utilization of multiorganizational collaboration in the provision of public goods and services is a prominent theme among public administrators and scholars, a managerial roadmap for successful collaboration has yet to be developed. Collaborative public management is a “process of facilitating and operating in multiorganizational arrangements in order to remedy problems that cannot be solved-–or solved easily-–by single organizations” (McGuire, 2006, p. 33). A participative management approach is used as the group works together to establish goals. Participants are viewed as equals within the arrangements as no one person has authority or formal power over another (McNamara, 2011). However, there is typically one person who invites relevant stakeholders to the table while creating an atmosphere of open discussion. The title most commonly given to this individual is ‘manager’ or ‘convener’ (McNamara & Morris, 2012). While ‘collaborative manager’ is a term often used to describe a person who facilitates the multiorganizational arrangement (see, for example, Agranoff & McGuire, 2001; Agranoff, 2006; Bryson et al., 2006; Mandell, 1999; Mandell & Steelman, 2003), the term ‘manager’ can create confusion as it typically involves a directive role (McNamara & Morris, 2012). Another term used to describe this role is ‘collaborative convener’, which emphasizes facilitation amongst equal partners absent formal authority (McNamara & Morris, 2012). “A convener is someone who works among equal partners to create conditions conducive to successful collaboration” (McNamara & Morris, 2012, p. 87). However, ‘convener’ does not necessarily take into account the strategic component of bringing together the
right participants while acknowledging elements that impact relationships and preparing an environment conducive for collaboration. In other words, collaborative success takes more than facilitating interpersonal relationships. It also requires the deliberative creation of external factors that help create opportunities for success. Takahashi and Smutny (2002) propose the use of the term ‘collaborative entrepreneur’ to describe a person that helps participants engage in interactions that address complex problems while creating an environment that further facilitates these interactions (p. 165). In this sense, the entrepreneur serves as a coupling mechanism between a complex problem, relevant stakeholders, and the external environment. It is this role that provides the focus for this chapter as a combination of facilitative and strategic skills better capture the complex atmosphere of bringing together and sustaining collaborative relationships. In their research, Takahashi and Smutny (2002) focus on the role of a collaborative entrepreneur as part of a larger focus on governance structures in three case studies involving small, community-based organizations. This chapter moves beyond their work in two significant ways. First, this chapter incorporates the public policy and collaborative management literatures to create a well-rounded skill set for the collaborative entrepreneur. While Takahashi and Smutny (2002) focus on the public policy literature, they do not tie the idea of a collaborative entrepreneur back into the collaboration literature. This is problematic because the collaboration literature offers important theoretical discussions regarding the management of multiorganizational arrangements that should be part of the broader conversation. Second, this chapter clearly identifies a skill set for the collaborative entrepreneur which was not the focus for Takahashi and Smutny (2002). It is through this skill set that the idea of a collaborative entrepreneur is operationalized and becomes more applicable to practitioners engaging in these types of activities. Because collaborative arrangements operate outside legal-rational authorities, the ways in which collaborative entrepreneurs cultivate and sustain relationships between participants is worthy of exploration. The skill set for a collaborative entrepreneur can be based on an expansion of the literature’s foundation for that of a collaborative manager. The focus of Agranoff and McGuire (2001) on activating, framing, mobilizing, and synthesizing provides a useful starting point for this discussion. The purpose of this chapter is to expand on this framework in a way that incorporates a strategic component acknowledging a need to create favorable environmental conditions for collaborative action. This gap in the literature is an important area to address for two reasons. The first reason highlights the importance of definitional clarity as a theme within this volume. The development of an entrepreneurial skill set may help us to better understand the interpersonal and contextual conditions that support the formulation and sustainment of successful collaborative relationships. In better understanding these conditions, we may also
gain a clearer understanding of collaboration itself and the predetermined nature of collaborative success. As with McGuire’s (2006) work on a skill set for a collaborative manager and the work of McNamara and Morris (2012) on the skill set for a collaborative convener, there is a desired skill set for a collaborative entrepreneur. Therefore, it is plausible to suggest that multiorganizational arrangements with access to a person with the desired skill set may be more likely to find success. If a collaborative entrepreneur plays an important role in creating a foundation for the arrangement’s success, filling this role with a person holding particular skills becomes an important aspect of an organization’s strategic plan and a component of employment decisions. The second reason highlights the importance of an interdisciplinary approach to collaboration as a theme within this book. Cross-pollination with the public policy literature can help us gain a deeper insight into the role of the collaborative entrepreneur while expanding on the research presented by Agranoff and McGuire (2001). More specifically, including components of a policy entrepreneur, policy window, and the policy subsystem into the skill set of the collaborative entrepreneur better accounts for the strategic context that practitioners often face in multiorganizational domains. Although the literature acknowledges the potential usefulness of collaborative arrangements in resolving complex problems (Harmon & Mayer, 1986; Keast, Mandell, Brown, & Woolcock, 2004; Rittel & Webber, 1973), there is much involved in creating the environmental context that will support the arrangement’s agenda. This chapter is divided into four sections. First, an overview of the collaborative management literature and the activities developed by Agranoff and McGuire (2001) are introduced. Next, themes pertaining to the skill set of the collaborative entrepreneur are explored. Third, the importance in developing this skill set is discussed. The chapter concludes with implications for the theory and practice of public administration.
