Innovation and knowledge processes in an inter-organisational partnership

This paper is based on the research being carried out with a partnership of seven charity organisations in the U.K. – the Collective. The environment in which voluntary sector organisations (VSO) operate is very dynamic and subjected to rapid changes. Uncertainty about the future is a common feature of all organisations but it is exacerbated across VSO by short and irregular funding patterns. Within this increasingly uncertain environment, the partners of the Collective are striving to improve their services focusing their attention on deciding how they could ‘manage’ what they know in new and innovative ways. In the paper, both knowledge and innovation are considered as dynamic, emergent and intrinsically linked to social action. While knowledge is generated, shared and transformed through participation in social interactions; innovation cannot be separated from the work, decision-making and learning that takes place as people engage in everyday social life. The results suggests that in the Collective’s case innovating on organisational practices has to do more with managing conflict and collaboration among the different partners than with accumulating and managing knowledge.