“We’re Not a Job Shop": Strategically Managing Mixed Motives at Disciplinary Boundaries

• In Event: The Transformative Effects of Communication at Boundaries

Abstract

Interdisciplinary collaborative relationships are often characterized by the need to negotiate local level (within discipline) and global level (across discipline) goals. Although theorists have identified the potential for conflict associated with mixed motives (e.g. Keyton, Ford, & Smith, 2008; Wittenbaum, Hollingshead, & Botero, 2004), few studies have explored how these tensions transform the ongoing practice of work. This paper draws on a yearlong ethnographic study of four teams of weather researchers as they collaborated with industry and government organizations. Each team built designed and built computer-based simulation models to inform their collaborators’ policy decisions. The analysis focuses on how researchers simultaneously produced novel scientific findings while creating outputs that would meet collaborative goals. Researchers were aware of the mixed motives present in their relationships and, in response, developed unique strategies to manage them. I show how these strategies were expressed through communication with collaborators and in ongoing technology design.

Author

• William Barley, Northwestern U