Boundary activities and readiness for ... - Projekti-Instituutti

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categories, based on the activity type. Still, boundary activities representing
all ten types could be found in all three cases, with one exception: in case
Center, no intentional enclosing activities could be found. Next, the most
visible case-specific differences in the occurrences of boundary activity
types are described.
In comparison to the other two cases, Center demonstrated a larger
proportion of instances of positioning and negotiating activities (18% of all
described activities in case Center, compared to 10% in Chain and only 5%
in Bureau). A significant part of the early program activity in Center was
formed of negotiations between the program’s key actors and the managers
of the line organization. Another type of boundary activity that was
relatively more common in Center was informing (36% in Center, compared
to 28% in Chain and 21% in Bureau). As an example, Center’s program
manager spent a lot of time attending various meetings, seminars, and
events where he presented the main ideas behind the program.
Compared to the other two cases, case Bureau demonstrated a larger
proportion of instances of legitimating and committing activities (18% in
Bureau, while only 10% in Chain and just 4% in Center). Illustrating this
finding, in Bureau the program activities were started with a current state
analysis and a series of planning workshops that, according to the
program’s key managers, aimed at legitimating the changes. Case chain, for
its part, demonstrated a larger proportion of instances of enclosing
activities (6% in Chain, while only 2% in Bureau and none in Center). These
enclosing activities consisted of active efforts to keep the confidential
program plans within a small group of people.
A familiar trend across the three cases could also be observed in the
number of distinct boundary activities (see Table 14). Case Chain
demonstrated more than three times as many distinct boundary activities
as Center and almost twice as many as in Bureau, indicating that in Chain a
significantly larger spectrum of different activities were employed to
manage the program’s boundaries. Similar boundary activities were found
across the cases, and in some instances a similar activity was reported in all
three cases. As an example, informing activities in all case organizations
included reporting to the management group about the program as well as
organizing briefing sessions about the forthcoming changes to the
personnel. Resource seeking in all three cases included a search for suitable
project managers, and positioning activities included negotiation meetings
between the key program actors and the top managers of line operations.
The complete lists of distinct boundary activities in each case are not
presented due to confidentiality reasons.
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