A Theoretical Framework to Capture Stakeholder's Perspectives for the Design of Collaborative Communication Structures for Specializedl Organization

Abstract

Small consults business often specializes in one aspect of the business analyst. This specialized focus is done by necessity due to scarcity of resources and to maintain a proprietary market niche.  However, this specialized focus results in a growth inhibitor due to their lack of ability to address all the potential client’s needs. Moving to a multiple entity collaborative approach can provide a competitive advantage. By having many specialized business analysts and interactions can provide different value generation objects to co-produce a product or service to best serve customer requirements. Yet, interacting with multiple entities that do not communicate with each other well can be dysfunctional and unsatisfying for themselves and most importantly for clients. When multiple interests and beliefs are in place, soft systems methodology (SSM) and CATWOE tool can assist leaders to find the “middle” ground for all participants to collaborate. However, SSM is based on the observer doing all the design work, a feature not desirable when designing collaborative structures. In this research, a participative version of Soft Systems Methodology for energy analysis was developed to assist E3 (Economic, Energy, and Environment) practices and principles by using a set of questionnaires to capture information regarding the diversity of stakeholder's perspective. The resulting data then lead to the creation of root definition and the design of communication structure in the collaborative organization. The resulting version is capable of assisting collaborative specialized organization’s leaders in the design of communication structures to coordinate collaborative efforts.