Perceived discontinuities and continuities in transdisciplinary scientific working groups

What is it about?

The paper draws on organizational discontinuities theory, which suggests that virtual work is characterized by the need to span boundaries (e.g., geography, time zone, organization) but that boundaries are not all equally problematic. Specifically, boundaries are problematic when they create discontinuities, that is, increases in the cost of communication. However, groups can learn how to work across the boundaries (that is, they can create continuities), making the boundary unproblematic. In this paper, we applied the discontinuities-continuities framework to analyze work within a large distributed scientific collaboration, the DataONE project. A particular feature of this project was its organization into working groups, but this structure created many boundaries with associated discontinuities. However, through sustained interaction, working group members were able to create continuities to overcome these problems.

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Why is it important?

The paper is important first because it provides an empirical test of organizational discontinuities theory. Second, the paper has practical implications. The working group structure was the only feasible structure for DataONE, but it resulted in contributors to the project facing many boundaries and discontinuities that took work to overcome. Other large projects will likely face the same constraints and so make the same choice of structure. The framework leads to a number of suggestions to should help projects applying a working group structure to become effective more quickly.

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