To organize and implement social development projects through interorganizational collaboration is common, but lack empirical studies from a psychological perspective. The study´s aim was to make a collaboration analysis on the implementing actors within a social development project, to understand how the collaboration was functioning. The study took place within a project for marginalized groups in Tanzania, arranged by a Swedish NGO and implemented by interorganizational collaboration. Eight participants were interviewed on six areas: Environment, Membership characteristics, Process and Structure, Communication, Purpose, and Resources. The findings highlight the complexity of interorganizational collaboration. The studied collaborative network is overall working in the same direction, but has both functional and dysfunctional areas where the dysfunctional need to be improved for the collaboration to work well. The study indicates that interorganizational collaboration brings benefits for social development projects, and the six areas studied seem to cover essential areas of interorganizational collaboration.

National calls for improving the prospects of STEM workforce development and broadening participation in STEM place the focus of change within the education system. Despite many efforts towards integrating STEM, and specifically engineering, into pre-college settings, mechanisms for change in schools towards these goals remain underdeveloped. While collaborative solutions involving multiple organizations across sectors towards addressing this complex problem appear promising, more work is needed to develop a critical understanding of the processes involved when such different organizations come together to collaborate towards a social goal. Based in an effort to bring more theoretical literature into the discourse around school-university-industry partnership, the purpose of this research is to contribute to a better understanding of how K-12 STEM interorganizational relationships develop in their initial stages by focusing on the collaborative processes and structures and to develop implications for future success of such collaborations. To accomplish this, I used a multiple case study design to investigate the collaborative processes that emerged in the first year of the partnership within VT PEERS (Virginia Tech Partnering with Educators and Engineers in Rural Schools). I centered my analysis on select adult stakeholders in the collaborative problem who were also programmatic participants including teachers, administrators, industry partners, and university affiliates. Using pre-year and post-year semi-structured interviews with these stakeholders, I characterized the collaborative processes in the first year of the program. Interpretation of results comparing across cases indicated considerations for education and organizational theory literature as well as implications for collaborative practice. Findings confirmed the emergent and negotiated nature of interorganizational collaboration and highlighted the importance of managing communication and reflection in partnership. Organizational culture may impact capacity building when organizations come together towards a complex social goal, particularly when industry is involved, and autonomy and operational issues within the school system and teaching can make collaborating with schools particularly challenging. When organizations come together towards a social goal centered around one of the collaborative partners, equality in exchange may not be a good measure of success. With the caveat that communication needs to be well managed to build credibility among partners, an unequal but equitable exchange of resources may be appropriate in collaborations towards a social goal. While it is tempting to continue to measure quality in interorganizational collaborations narrowly by the outcomes produced, a macro-level look at the collaborative processes involved enables collaborative stakeholders to be intentional about designing for future success. / Doctor of Philosophy / National calls for a higher number and greater diversity of STEM professionals place the burden of change on school systems. Despite some successful efforts, there still remains significant challenges to making change in schools. Partnerships between private companies, universities, and school systems appear promising, but current work is limited in its conclusions. There is a need to reflect more critically on the process of how organizations build relationships in addressing social goals if we are to gain a better understanding of how to make these partnerships successful. To address this, I conducted pre-year and post-year interviews with teachers, administrators, industry partners, and university affiliates during the first year of VT PEERS (Virginia Tech Partnering with Educators and Engineers in Rural Schools). Because the project took place in three different rural school counties, I looked for similarities and differences across the collaborations in each county to build a broader understanding and develop implications for other partnerships. Findings from this study led to several important takeaways about collaborating across organizations towards goals in K-12 STEM. First, collaboration is a process and initial plans will change and develop over time. Reflecting on this and keeping open communication through changes potentially equips collaborators to better weather the ups and downs of partnership. Second, the nature and flexibility of an organization’s work environment impacts how much tension they feel between getting their everyday work done and contributing to the collaboration. Third, unequal costs and benefits may be acceptable in a collaboration as long as collaborators are in agreement on the balance. Again, communication is important to build trust and understanding among partners for a healthy balance to be achieved. Overall, taking a birds-eye view of collaborative processes allows collaborators to be more intentional about designing for future success.

As redes de inovação têm sido frequentemente referenciadas na literatura como forma de complementar as atividades inovadoras das empresas, tendo em vista seu importante papel na transferência de conhecimentos. Considerando-se que, cada vez mais, a inovação pode ser fruto de um processo de interação entre diferentes atores, do que de um esforço isolado, o presente estudo teve por objetivo verificar qual a contribuição dos parceiros estabelecidos em redes de inovação para o desempenho inovador das empresas. Pretendeu-se, mais especificamente, realizar uma análise sob o ponto de vista das empresas da Indústria Elétrica Eletrônica, que, por pertencerem a um setor de tecnologia intensiva, cuja competitividade é global, são altamente dependentes da atividade inovativa. Visando ao alcance desse objetivo, realizou-se uma pesquisa descritiva e exploratória, de caráter quantitativo. Para o exame dos fundamentos teóricos, foram abordados conceitos relacionados aos tipos de inovação, às redes de inovações e suas tipologias, à transferência de conhecimento na rede, à utilização de estratégias de exploração e explotação, à capacidade de absorção do conhecimento e aos tipos de parceiros estabelecidos nas redes e suas possíveis contribuições. Complementarmente, realizou-se um levantamento por meio da aplicação de questionários, totalizando uma amostra de 185 empresas. A análise dos dados da pesquisa foi feita com base na estatística descritiva e multivariada, por meio da aplicação da modelagem de equações estruturais e da análise multivariada de variância. Dentre os principais resultados, foi observado que o estabelecimento de relações de colaboração com clientes e consumidores, competidores e universidades e institutos de pesquisa pode corroborar com os resultados em inovação de processo e organizacional. Ressalta-se também que, apesar da obtenção de alguns resultados significativos acerca da contribuição de diferentes parceiros na rede, as empresas da Indústria Elétrica Eletrônica ainda atribuem maior importância às atividades internas para inovar. Em outras palavras, apesar do alto número de relações com clientes, consumidores e fornecedores, ainda se nota uma centralização do processo de desenvolvimento das inovações. / Innovation networks have been frequently referenced in literature as a way to complement the firm\'s innovative activities, in view of its important role in knowledge transfer. Considering that, currently, innovation may be the result of a process of interaction between different actors, rather than an isolated effort, this study aims to verify the contribution of partners established in innovation networks for company\'s innovative performance. It was intended, more specifically, to perform an analysis from the point of view of Electrical and Electronic Industry firms, which, for belonging to a technology-intensive industry, are highly dependent on innovative activity. As a way of reaching this purpose, a descriptive and exploratory research was applied, based on the quantitative method. In the theoretical research, concepts related to innovation types, innovation networks and their typologies, the transfer of knowledge in the network, the use of exploration and exploitation strategies, the absorptive capacity, the types of partners established in the networks and their possible contributions have been addressed. In addition, a survey was applied to a total sample of 185 companies. The data examination was performed using descriptive and multivariate statistics, by applying the structural equation modeling and multivariate analysis of variance. As the main findings, it was observed that the establishment of collaborative relationships with clients and customers, competitors and universities and research institutes can corroborate to process and organizational innovation. It also emphasized that, despite getting some significant results concerning the contribution of different partners in the network, Electrical and Electronics Industry companies also attach more importance to internal activities to develop their innovations. In other words, despite of the high number of relationships with customers, suppliers and consumers, it still noticed a centralization of developing innovations\' processes.

Background: Due to the dynamic business environment and acceleration of technological renewal the need to pursue newest knowledge becomes crucial and more and more challenging for companies. Traditionally firms tended to keep R&D in-house but now they have to search for alternative approach to innovation, namely open innovation. Science parks are claimed to facilitate the process of inter-organizational collaboration and open innovation, in particular due to geographic proximity of on-park actors. Aim: This research is aimed to investigate the influence of geographic proximity of companies situated within a science park on collaboration and open innovation initiatives. Apart from this, other factors in a science park environment that can have an effect on open innovation are studied as well. In particular, these issues are analyzed from the perspective of on-park small and medium enterprises. Completion and results: This study revealed that geographic proximity of firms within one science park can influence open innovation to some extent. In particular, effects of certain mechanisms of geographic proximity were observed. However, all in all, geographic proximity does not have a decisive influence on inter-firm collaboration in Swedish science parks. Besides geographic proximity, other factors that may stimulate open innovation process for SMEs were analyzed.

In this mixed-method study, I explore the idea that an entrepreneurial orientation serves as a key driver of nonprofit organizational performance, and that a focal nonprofit’s set of collaborative ties moderates that relationship. I theorize that for nonprofits operating in an environment characterized by resource scarcity, possessing an EO is vital. More specifically, I theorize that organizations with smaller and less heterogeneous sets of collaborative ties benefit more from an EO than those with larger and more heterogeneous sets. I also explore the possibility that a focal nonprofit’s pattern of collaborative ties may be a function of that nonprofit’s EO. These ideas are tested using an original data set collected from a sample of the estimated 200 economic development organizations operating in eastern Kentucky. This is an area where economic growth has been particularly elusive, and where a deeper understanding of the entrepreneurial and collaborative practices of nonprofits might be especially valuable. The results reveal some significant empirical support for these ideas, and point to a promising research program aiming to uncover the interactive effects of EO, collaborative networks, and nonprofit performance across a range of organizational contexts.

As redes de inovação têm sido frequentemente referenciadas na literatura como forma de complementar as atividades inovadoras das empresas, tendo em vista seu importante papel na transferência de conhecimentos. Considerando-se que, cada vez mais, a inovação pode ser fruto de um processo de interação entre diferentes atores, do que de um esforço isolado, o presente estudo teve por objetivo verificar qual a contribuição dos parceiros estabelecidos em redes de inovação para o desempenho inovador das empresas. Pretendeu-se, mais especificamente, realizar uma análise sob o ponto de vista das empresas da Indústria Elétrica Eletrônica, que, por pertencerem a um setor de tecnologia intensiva, cuja competitividade é global, são altamente dependentes da atividade inovativa. Visando ao alcance desse objetivo, realizou-se uma pesquisa descritiva e exploratória, de caráter quantitativo. Para o exame dos fundamentos teóricos, foram abordados conceitos relacionados aos tipos de inovação, às redes de inovações e suas tipologias, à transferência de conhecimento na rede, à utilização de estratégias de exploração e explotação, à capacidade de absorção do conhecimento e aos tipos de parceiros estabelecidos nas redes e suas possíveis contribuições. Complementarmente, realizou-se um levantamento por meio da aplicação de questionários, totalizando uma amostra de 185 empresas. A análise dos dados da pesquisa foi feita com base na estatística descritiva e multivariada, por meio da aplicação da modelagem de equações estruturais e da análise multivariada de variância. Dentre os principais resultados, foi observado que o estabelecimento de relações de colaboração com clientes e consumidores, competidores e universidades e institutos de pesquisa pode corroborar com os resultados em inovação de processo e organizacional. Ressalta-se também que, apesar da obtenção de alguns resultados significativos acerca da contribuição de diferentes parceiros na rede, as empresas da Indústria Elétrica Eletrônica ainda atribuem maior importância às atividades internas para inovar. Em outras palavras, apesar do alto número de relações com clientes, consumidores e fornecedores, ainda se nota uma centralização do processo de desenvolvimento das inovações. / Innovation networks have been frequently referenced in literature as a way to complement the firm\'s innovative activities, in view of its important role in knowledge transfer. Considering that, currently, innovation may be the result of a process of interaction between different actors, rather than an isolated effort, this study aims to verify the contribution of partners established in innovation networks for company\'s innovative performance. It was intended, more specifically, to perform an analysis from the point of view of Electrical and Electronic Industry firms, which, for belonging to a technology-intensive industry, are highly dependent on innovative activity. As a way of reaching this purpose, a descriptive and exploratory research was applied, based on the quantitative method. In the theoretical research, concepts related to innovation types, innovation networks and their typologies, the transfer of knowledge in the network, the use of exploration and exploitation strategies, the absorptive capacity, the types of partners established in the networks and their possible contributions have been addressed. In addition, a survey was applied to a total sample of 185 companies. The data examination was performed using descriptive and multivariate statistics, by applying the structural equation modeling and multivariate analysis of variance. As the main findings, it was observed that the establishment of collaborative relationships with clients and customers, competitors and universities and research institutes can corroborate to process and organizational innovation. It also emphasized that, despite getting some significant results concerning the contribution of different partners in the network, Electrical and Electronics Industry companies also attach more importance to internal activities to develop their innovations. In other words, despite of the high number of relationships with customers, suppliers and consumers, it still noticed a centralization of developing innovations\' processes.

Disasters such as major floods and heat waves are taking an increasing toll on societies. Like other pressing policy issues, they are complex and cut across sectors, jurisdictions, and professional fields. Addressing these problems requires interorganizational collaboration between heterogeneous organizations and thus, interactions between representatives who may have different professional views and identities. Successful collaboration partly hinges on their capacity to integrate perspectives and develop sustainable working relationships despite differences. This thesis aimed to improve our understanding of the role played by professional differences in perspectives and identities in public-sector interorganizational collaboration. Three specific objectives were pursued in a multilevel approach: 1) To document the role of professional diversity for interorganizational collaboration when considered outside of sectoral or jurisdictional differences; 2) To investigate how salient differences in professional identity affect perceptions and reactions following task disagreement; and 3) To investigate the cognitive and relational pathways by which emotions, conflict perceptions, and information processing can predict decision quality and relationship quality following disagreement. Study 1 examined the experience of interorganizational collaboration in disaster management based on qualitative interviews with professional- and executive-level public servants from relevant Canadian federal organizations. Findings suggested that professional diversity was not by itself a salient issue. The most disempowering type of diversity was differences in mandates, especially when combined with differences in expertise or identities. Study 2 examined whether group composition based on professional identity was associated with differential perception of and reaction to disagreement during interorganizational problem solving. It was based on a small sample of experienced senior risk managers involved in a quasi-experimental simulation. In terms of disagreement perception, nonparametric analyses indicated that interprofessional teams reported more disagreement than homogeneous ones even if observed disagreement did not differ. In terms of reaction, disagreement showed consistent negative associations with reported measures of effectiveness, performance, and relationship quality in homogeneous teams. In contrast, these associations were either positive or nonsignificant in interprofessional teams. Study 3 experimentally tested in a disciplinary-defined university sample whether salient group professional composition affected how people perceived and reacted to a scripted task disagreement. Findings indicated that after experiencing the exact same task disagreement, participants in interprofessional teams were significantly more satisfied with their team than those in homogeneous teams. Path analyses supported the two hypothesized pathways linking emotion following disagreement to integrative decision making and satisfaction: a) a cognitive pathway whereby surprise predicted beneficial outcomes through increased reported task conflict and increased information processing and b) a relational pathway whereby negative emotions predicted detrimental outcomes through increased reported relationship conflict and decreased information processing. As a whole, the thesis improves our understanding of the cognitive and relational roles played by professional diversity in interorganizational collaboration. It provides evidence on the beneficial effects of salient diversity for group cohesion in the face of disagreement. It documents intervening cognitive and relational processes predicting performance and relational quality following task disagreement. Finally, it proposes research avenues whereby social psychology can be leveraged to support the adaptation of public-sector organizations to contemporary challenges in public policy.

In 2015, Swedish Non-Profit Organizations (NPOs) served as the backbone of society, assisting 162.877 immigrant refugees escaping conflict zones throughout the world. As the thrive to include newcomer refugees in the Swedish society continues, non-profits are facing numerous of challenges such as operating in highly competitive environments marked by shrinking grant budgets and increased pressure to provide long-term impact. To achieve optimal NPO organizational sustainability, the non-profit sector must therefore interact and learn how to address the aforementioned difficulties collectively. Furthermore, existing studies emphasizes the scarcity of research on learning through non-profit collaboration, as the knowledge management and organizational learning field has mostly concentrated on the for-profit sector rather than the non-profit sector. To fill this research gap, this study uses a qualitative approach to investigate NPO perceptions of interorganizational learning through collaboration, conducting ten semi-structured interviews with NPO employees working with newcomer refugees in Sweden. The results indicated that the NPOs’ learning outcomes connected to the need for collective sensemaking of the Swedish government’s new migration policies, which had a significant influence on the target groups prospects of remaining in Sweden. Moreover, the NPOs learned from unsuccessful collaborations, resulting in changes to the organizations’ routines and processes aimed at improving future collaborations. As a consequence, learning outcomes were incorporated into their organizational memory through digital Knowledge Management Systems such as Google Drive and Rise-Up. They were, however, heavily reliant on people’s willingness to share tacit and explicit knowledge, as well as an organizational culture that encouraged them to knowledge share. As a result, most non-profits either did not upgrade these systems at all or did not have the technological infrastructure to do so in the first place.

Syftet med Barnahus är att barn som misstänkts blivit utsatt för våld eller övergrepp ska i en trygg och barnvänlig miljö förmedla sin upplevelse, samt hjälpa barnet genom stöd och insatser att bemästra utsattheten. Studien grundas på kvalitativa intervjuer som metod. Respondenterna som ingår i studien representerar Socialtjänsten, Polismyndigheten, Åklagarmyndigheten, Barnkliniken och Barn- och ungdomspsykiatrin. Resultatet presenterar samverkansparternas upplevelse av samverkans funktion, fördelar och brister, samt hur barnets rättigheter tillämpas i utredningsprocessen. Resultatet påvisar att respondenterna upplever samverkan i Barnahus som en möjlighet till personlig och yrkesmässig utveckling, och att samverkan över yrkesrollerna är en förutsättning för att tillgodose barnets behov av skydd och trygghet. Dock framkommer det av resultatet att parterna upplever brister i samverkan. / The purpose of Children´s Advocacy Center (Barnahus) is that the children who is suspected victim of violence or abuse, in a safe and child-friendly environment convey their experience, and help the child through support and effort to overcome the vulnerability. The study is based on qualitative interviews as a method. Respondents included in this study represent the Social Services, Police Authority, Prosecution Authority, Department of Pediatrics and Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. The result presents the collaboration partners experience of collaborative functionality, advantages and deficiency, and how the child´s rights are applied in the investigation process. The results establish that the respondents experience collaboration in Children´s Advocacy Center as an opportunity for personal and professional development and collaboration across professional roles are essential to meet the child´s need for protection and security. However, it comes clear to the outcome that the parties experience deficiencies in cooperation.

Contemporary terrorism is becoming increasingly indiscriminate, and rail bound traffic appears to be vulnerable and at high risk for terrorist attacks. An attack targeting a train or subway system can have enormous implications, both in terms of human suffering and long-term societal consequences. This dissertation aims to analyze how public and private organizations prepare for and respond to crises emanating from terrorism targeting rail bound traffic. It also examines different practices, networks and ideas related to interorganizational collaboration. Contemporary research emphasizes the importance and advantages of collaborative action in crisis management, and the idea of inter-organizational collaboration is also embedded in policy documents and has support among practitioners. Despite this, interorganizational collaboration often turns out to be difficult in practice, and it stands out as a critical factor in many crisis situations. Hence, it is crucial to identify and better understand the challenges associated with interorganizational collaboration in the context of terrorist-induced crises. This dissertation is a contribution to this endeavor. In order to capture the inherent complexity of the topic this dissertation combines and merges literature from three research fields: crisis management research, disaster medicine research and terrorism studies. The dissertation examines international experiences of terrorist attacks directed against rail bound traffic. It identifies the way in which attacks have changed over time and analyzes the main challenges of providing pre-hospital care following a mass-casualty attack. In addition, Sweden is used to provide empirical focus in an analysis of preparedness. Relying on scenario-based interviews with central crisis management actors and actors from rail bound traffic, current preparedness practices for responding to a multi-site terrorist attack on rail bound traffic in Sweden is analyzed. The research shows that both public and private organizations have developed risk awareness about terrorist-induced crises. However, their preparedness practices are characterized by significant variations and substantial uncertainty. Scare resources are a critical factor, and actors find it difficult to invest in preparedness for seldom-occurring crises. This difficulty is accentuated by the fact that no major mass-casualty attack has taken place in Sweden. A terrorist attack differs from a routine event and poses new and different challenges for inter-organizational collaboration. A large number of organizations are supposed to work together under severe time constraints, and their work can be delayed by particular security concerns. It is assumed that rail bound traffic actors engage in collaborative crisis management; however, there appear to be few mechanisms to prepare them, in a systematic way, for managing this particular type of crisis. Among actors, inter-organizational collaboration is understood primarily from a normative view rather than from the point of view of its practical meaning. As a consequence, it is difficult to turn risk awareness and a commitment to working together into actual practical action. In addition, collaboration between different levels in the crisis management system is particularly challenging. This dissertation also identifies a tension between viewing crisis management as an example of policy-as-usual or from a crises-as-exceptions perspective.