Internal and External Communication, Boundary Spanning, and Innovation Adoption: An Over-Time Comparison of Three Explanations of Internal and External Innovation Communication in a New Organizational Form.

This research report compares three differing explanations of the dynamic interrelationships between internal and external innovation-related communication in a new organizational form. In the functional specialization explanation, individuals are said to focus on the mix of internal and/or external communication dictated by their formal positions. The communication stars explanation suggests that individuals maintain similar levels of communication in both networks. The cyclical model posits a more dynamic pattern that shifts back and forth between internal and external communication, depending on the consequences of their prior communication behavior. The new organizational form examined for three years was the Cancer Information Service, a geographically dispersed federal government health information program. Our results indicated that there was a lagged effect for the communication stars explanation.

Keywords: Boundary Spanning, Communication Stars, Health information, Innovation, Networks

External communication links, which are often associated with boundary spanning, are critical to enhancing innovations since they provide opportunities for learning and for securing needed resources (Goes & Park, 1997) and for the diffusion of ideas between and within organizations (Cziepel, 1975; Daft, 1978; Ghosal & Bartlett, 1987: Kimberly, 1978; Robertson & Wind, 1983). Such links are the mechanism that operationalizes environmental cues to the internal organizational structure (Corwin, 1972; Lozada & Calantone, 1996; Spekman, 1979). The present study examines external communication longitudinally in the more voluntary communication environment of a new organizational form. Most of the prior literature on innovaton-related communication has emphasized the constraints posed by a person's formal position; however, more recently it has been suggested that new, emerging designs provide opportunities for individuals to shape their own innovation related communication patterns.

We will directly contrast explanations derived from formally prescribed (functional specialization) and emergent (communication stars) theoretical positions (Monge & Eisenberg, 1987; Johnson, 1993). In the functional specialization model, individuals are predicted to focus on either internal or external communication depending on their formal functional positions. The communication stars explanation argues that individuals are disposed to the same levels of communication in both internal and external networks. Yet a third model offers a cyclical explanation, positing that individuals rotate their internal and external communication in a dynamic pattern depending on organizational requirements.

Most of the current organizational literature tends to favor virtual designs. Virtual designs are based on market assumptions (Galbraith, 1995) and place an increasing burden on individuals to find their way amidst chaos (Miles, Snow, Matthews, Miles, & Coleman, 1997). However, other studies have suggested that the increasing complexity of these forms needs to be balanced by a concomitant interest in formalization (Johnson, LaFrance, Meyer, Speyer, & Cox, 1998; Johnson, Meyer, Berkowitz, Ethington, & Miller, 1997), which reduces uncertainties arising in these new forms. A host of environmental factors contribute to the development of new organizational forms: concerns about personnel costs (e.g., pensions, health costs); external pressures to keep the number of members on their permanent staff low; uncertainty reduction; needs to pool knowledge and information or to create it in the case of research and development (R&D) firms (Gibson & Rogers, 1994); increasing access to information by reducing institutiona l barriers (DeBresson & Amesse, 1991); affiliation (e.g., with a more credible national organization); and building mutually supportive power bases to lobby various stakeholders. Fundamentally, consortiums are formed so that their members can accomplish more than they could do on their own. Increasingly, organizations find that they are either strapped for resources or are pursuing such large projects that they must pool their resources to pursue innovations (Browning, Beyer, & Shelter, 1995; DeBresson & Amesse, 1991; Hakansson & Sharma, 1996).

Creating new organizational forms is difficult, particularly in health care (Arnold & Hink, 1968; Farace, Monge, Bettinghaus, Eisenberg, White, Kurchner-Hawkins, & Williams, 1982; Kaluzny, Lacey, Warnecke, Hynes, Morrissey, Ford, & Sondik, 1993; Kaluzny & Warnecke, 1996; Luke, Begun, & Pointer, 1989). At least five barriers have been identified: (a) Cooperating agencies often have different missions (e.g., providing social support vs. treatment for cancer patients); (b) outcome and effectiveness measures differ among agencies; (c) the coordination costs are too heavy (DeBresson & Amesse, 1991) to truly integrate the efforts of diverse organizations (Arnold & Hink, 1968); (d) members of coalitions may have multiple goals (Stevenson, Pearce, & Porter, 1985), and may resent the loss of decision-making latitude; and (e) the cost of managing their linkages increases (Oliver, 1990). In the face of these obstacles, there is an increasing need to develop new theories and fresh perspectives based on empirical data ab out the operation of these new organizational forms (Luke et al., 1989). Indeed, the ability of a society to create new organizational forms may directly affect its ability to adapt to new environmental circumstances (Romanelli, 1991), such as an increasingly competitive global environment.

The success of new organizational forms depends on managing interorganizational relationships through external communication. Consequently, more empirical study is necessary to determine the ideal balance between formalized structure and emergent communication networks in these new organizational forms. Specifically, research must give more attention to individual patterns of internal and external communication. Research is particularly important now given the increased attention paid to new organizational forms and an increased recognition that within these new forms there are not clear boundaries, but rather gradations of affiliation between entities (Sheppard & Tuchinsky, 1996).

Three Explanations of the Interrelationships Between Internal and External Communication

Figure 1 contains a classic panel representation of the interrelationships between internal and external communication over three points in time (see Finkel, 1995; Williams & Podsakoff, 1989). In this research report we will examine possible configurations of relationships, or paths in a classic path analytic sense, for three contrasting models: functional specialization, communication stars, and cyclical. Each explanation predicts different key paths in Figure 1, where a and b paths represent the stability of internal or external communication at consecutive or lagged periods respectively, a paths represent the cross-sectional interrelationships between internal and external communication at any one time, d paths specify relationships between internal and external communication across consecutive points in time, and e paths represent the lagged interrelationships between internal and external innovation communication from Time 1 to 3.

Functional Specialization

Since organizations must adapt to their environments, a number of formal structures and associated functional roles are created explicitly to deal with them (Galbraith, 1974). For example, boundary spanners (e.g., department heads, customer service representatives) maintain external communication contacts because of their formally assigned roles At-Twaijri & Montanari, 1987; Burk, 1994; Friedman & Podolny, 1992; Grover, Jeong, Kettinger, & Lee, 1993; Keller, Szilagyi, & Holland, 1976; Lysonski & Johnson, 1983; Schwab, Ungson, & Brown, 1985; Singh, Goolsby, & Rhoads, 1994; Stevenson, 1990). Boundary spanners are responsible for making communication contacts with external information sources and supplying their colleagues with information concerning the outside environment, all while maintaining an organization's autonomy (Adams, 1976; Aldrich & Herker, 1977).

Boundary spanners play an important role in the diffusion of ideas between and within organizations (Albrecht & Ropp, 1984; Cziepel, 1975; Daft, 1978; Ghosal & Bartlett, 1987; Schwab, Ungson, & Brown, 1985). Nowhere is this more true than in the health care environment (Robertson & Wind, 1983). Boundary spanners are the mechanism that operationalizes environmental cues to the internal organizational structure (Jemison, 1984; Lozada & Calantine, 1996; Spekman, 1979). A substantial proportion of the boundary spanning literature has implicitly adopted a two-step communication process (e.g., Katz & Lazarsfeld, 1955), with an emphasis on information flowing through boundary spanners who act as opinion leaders in their organizations. However, in new organizational forms most individuals engage in some boundary spanning behavior, rendering more traditional organizational boundaries increasingly arbitrary (Starbuck, 1976). While the literature suggests various types of boundary spanning communication activities, few studies simultaneously have examined internal (between organizational units) and external (with other organizations) communication patterns over time, especially in relation to innovation processes (Goes & Park, 1997). Inherent in functional specialization is that individuals will concentrate on either internal or external communication, depending on their formal position. A more structured way to represent the functional specialization approach is as follows:

H1: A functional specialization model posits