Abstract
High failure rates often observed in practice suggest that collaborative relationships are still not well understood. In this paper we investigate the nature of these relationships from second-order Cybernetics and Social Systems Theory perspectives. Thereby we develop a novel theoretical framework, the Collaborative System, which explains: 1. the organizational function of collaboration; 2. the system’s elementary operation; 3. its coupling mechanism; 4. the system autonomy and; 5. its ‘value’ creation mechanism. The proposed framework is innovative and has far reaching consequences for the understanding of different forms of collaborative relationships. Nevertheless, it raises a whole new set of questions yet to be explored.
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Neumann, D., de Santa-Eulalia, L.A., Zahn, E. (2011). Towards a Theory of Collaborative Systems. In: Camarinha-Matos, L.M., Pereira-Klen, A., Afsarmanesh, H. (eds) Adaptation and Value Creating Collaborative Networks. PRO-VE 2011. IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology, vol 362. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-23330-2_34
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-23330-2_34
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