Communities of Practice

A Special Issue of trends in Communication

Marleen Huysman, Peter van Baalen

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781317707950
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Langues et linguistique
• Subtopic: Études sur la communication

In this special issue of Trends in Communication management scholars share their ideas and research findings about the use of the community concept in the areas of knowledge management, organizational learning, innovation, and virtual learning. This fine collection of "community of practice" papers shows a variety of perspectives and applications on a new organizational phenomenon.

Jens Broendsted and Bente Elkjaer, Department of Informatics, Copenhagen Business School

LEARNING WITH ICT IN COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE

In this paper, we explore the way the use of information and communication technology (ICT) provides different conditions for learning in communities of practice. We will present a case study on the practice of software testing in the telecommunications industry. The theoretical framework applied is based on an understanding of learning as social processes of participation and interaction in communities of practice (CoPs). Added to this is an interpretation of organizational life and work as consisting of various social worlds, each with different commitments in CoPs. In general, ICT is supposed to shape conditions that enhance coherence and learning in CoPs. Our case study reveals, however, that, even though ICT may be supposed to further coherence and learning, it is the way it is actually used that determines the extent to which it succeeds in doing so. It is our position that the way ICT is used is determined by the trajectories of the sub-worlds involved in the process.

1. Introduction

Over the last decade or so there has been a tremendous interest in the issue of organizational learning, and many reviews have been made to create an overview of literature on this research field (e. g. Dodgson, 1993; Easterby-Smith, 1997; Fiol and Lyles, 1985; Henriksson, 1999; Huber, 1991; Levitt and March, 1988; Miner and Mezias, 1996; Shrivastava, 1983). Most literature on organizational learning draws upon a cognitive and individual learning theory (Cook and Yanow, 1993; Easterby-Smith, Snell and Gherardi, 1998; Elkjaer, 1999; Gherardi, Nicolini and Odella, 1998). This implies that the aim of learning is to change what goes on in the minds of individuals. Learning is perceived as the acquisition of skills and knowledge with the purpose of changing individuals’ mental representations of themselves and their environment. When the use of information and communication technology (ICT) is considered to enhance organizational learning from the view of cognitive and individual learning theory, ICT is viewed as a tool or a medium applied by individual learners to acquire, share and store information and knowledge (Brennan and Rubinstein, 1995; Masino, 1999; Roth and Niemi, 1996).

In this paper, we suggest a broader set of roles for ICT in relation to learning in organizations. We do this on the basis of an understanding of learning as a social process, which encompasses a view on learning as participation in communities of practice (CoPs) (Lave and Wenger, 1991; Wenger, 1998). If we see learning as a predominantly social process, it ceases to be something that solely takes place in peoples’ heads and becomes a process taking place between individuals and their environment. Learning as a social process involves mental modeling but also action and interaction as well as access to and participation in CoPs. It is with this understanding of learning we interpret the role of ICT in our case-study.

The case-study examines the application of an information system to support the testing of software in a company within the telecommunication industry. We analyze the social processes around this application in order to make sense of the learning that takes place here. Before doing so, we elaborate on our understanding of learning and introduce a view on organizations as social worlds (Clarke, 1991; Strauss, 1993). We argue that a social worlds perspective on organizations calls into question the rather harmonious image attached to the notion of CoPs. Thus, a social worlds perspective helps bring to the surface aspects like negotiating boundaries, conflict and power issues when dealing with learning in organizations. All this affects our understanding of ICT as a tool for organizational learning. We attempt to capture this in a theoretical framework in which learning in organizations is regarded as social processes of action, interaction, access and participation, and in which the role of technology is viewed as shaping conditions for the coherence of a work practice rather than individuals’ information and knowledge acquisition. In our case we show, however, that although the applied ICT has all the relevant features to support coherence, it is the social processes of its use that determine its capacity to enhance learning.

2. Learning as a social process

In 1991, when Lave and Wenger introduced their concept community of practice they emphasized that CoPs are made up of the internal relations between people as opposed to an externally and formally defined group of people such as a work team or a project group. They also pointed out that different CoPs might relate to each other. Thus, their definition of a CoP is as follows: “A community of practice is a set of relations among persons, activity, and world, over time and in relation with others tangential and overlapping communities of practice” (Lave and Wenger, op. cit.: 98).

Lave and Wenger’ s understanding of learning as participation in CoPs is also defined as relational activities as learning in their understanding is ‘legitimate peripheral participation’ in CoPs, i. e. in the participation patterns of community members. Thus, instead of viewing individual minds as the place where learning takes place, they argue that a situation, i. e. participation in a CoP from a particular position (e. g. newcomer versus old-timer, professional versus unskilled, etc.) opens up some possibilities for learning and bars others.

When learning is viewed as participation in CoPs, learning is ubiquitous and an integral part of everyday organizational life and work practice. Learning takes place among and through other people, and not only as individual thought processes. Rather, learning and learning possibilities emerge in actions and interactions. This view on learning also changes the content of learning. In individual learning theory, the object is to know about practices whereas in social learning theory, learning is a way of being and becoming part of the community, and in which the central goal of learning is to become a practitioner. Thus, learners not only acquire skills and knowledge – they also change and develop as individuals in the process of becoming members of CoPs. So, the learning process involves developing an identity as well as a profession or skill in addition to a sense of belonging. As Brown and Duguid argue: “The central issue in learning is becoming a practitioner not learning about practice” (Brown and Duguid, 1991: 48).

The learning content is context specific, and it is to discover what should be done when and how according to the specific organizational routines, as well as which specific artifacts to use where and how.

Learning is to acquire a ‘situated curriculum’, which means to denote the pattern of learning opportunities available to newcomers in their encounter with a specific community. To know is to be capable of participating in the specific web of relationships among people and activities. This way of looking at it also moves learning into the realm of conflicts and power. Thus, the social structure of an organization, its power relations and its conditions for legitimacy, define the possibilities for learning (Gherardi, Nicolini and Odella op. cit.).

Bringing learning into the field of conflict and power, however, also calls into question the supposedly harmonious nature of CoPs. This is why we turn to the related concept, social worlds, first introduced in American pragmatism, which explicitly brings agency and intentionality into the picture. Social worlds are defined as: “Groups with shared commitments to certain activities, sharing resources of many kinds to achieve their goals, and building shared ideologies about how to go about their business”(Clarke, 1991:131, our italics). In a social worlds perspective, there are ‘commitments’, ‘goals’ and ‘ideologies’ that ‘belong’ to somebody. There are not only relations and positions but also actions and interactions showing commitment – or the opposite. Adopting this point of view can be seen as an important correction to the concept of CoPs. We have opted in favour of combining concepts from both points of view, thus being able to integrate organizational work practice and what one might call the human intentionality. Both CoPs and social worlds are notions that may help us understand organizational work and life as it is enacted by organizational members participating in the work practice at hand in a specific organizational context. Thus, we agree with Star (1992) who draws a parallel between the concept of CoP and organizations defined as social worlds. Both are, according to Star, units “of analysis based on common activities and their attendant symbols” and include persons, actions and contexts (Star, op. cit.: 401). The two concepts ‘need’ each other, so to speak, to avoid individual voluntarism or social determinism, and they have more similarities than differences.

Both CoP and the social worlds perspective stress the concept of trajectory. In the social worlds perspective, trajectory is defined as both the course (not quite the same as a purpose or goal but rather denoting the way a phenomenon actually unfolds) of a given phenomenon, and the actions and interactions shaping this course over time. Quoting Strauss, a trajectory is: “(1) The course of any experienced phenomenon as it evolves over time (an engineering project, a chronic illness, dying, a social revolution, or national problems attending mass or ‘uncontrollable’ immigration) and (2) the actions and interactions contributing to its evolution. That is, phenomena do not just automatically unfold nor are they straightforwardly determined by social, economic, cultural, or other circumstances; rather, they are in part shaped by the interactions of the concerned actors” (Strauss, 1993: 53–54, his italics).

There is a before, during, and after in the course of any phenomenon, and time will always shape that course. It is possible to elucidate the trajectory by using the concept of a conditional matrix, which is a theoretical construct to help understand the conditions of actors’ interaction (e. g. the characteristics of the learning environment or technical artifacts) and the results derived from actors’ memberships in social worlds and sub-worlds. To quote: “Other conditions bearing on interactions can be thought of in terms of a conditional matrix, ranging from broader, more indirect conditions to narrower and more directly impacting ones. The specific relevance of conditions can be analyzed by means of tracking conditional paths” (Strauss op. cit.: 42). By applying a conditional matrix to pinpoint the unfolding of a trajectory, it is possible to connect different events and artifacts contributing to a specific trajectory. In this way, the concepts of CoP/social worlds can be used to understand organizational life. The learning process in the CoP/social worlds perspective is also to be understood through the term trajectory, as learning is viewed as a move from peripheral participation to full membership of a community (Lave and Wenger op. cit.).

When learning moves away from the acquisition of skills and knowledge to include identity development, the focus of research needs to be expanded to include aspects of these processes. Thus, in our case- study we focus on issues like the course of a project, i. e. the actions and interactions contributing to the unfolding of this course as well as the participants’ access to and participation in these actions and interactions as well as their commitment (trajectory). In our case-study ICT plays a vital role as a tool and mediator of actions and interactions. Studying learning in organizations, thus, implies not only an elaboration of the social aspects of the learning processes, but also includes the technical aspects as these together with the social aspects constitute the conditions for learning. In the next section we will discuss the role of ICT in organizational work and learning.

3. The use of ICT in work and learning

The role of technology with relation to learning in organizations has received much attention (e. g. Orlikowski, 1996; Neilson, 1997; Pentland, 1995; Robey, Boudreau and Rose, 2000; Zuboff, 1988). ICT- supported organizational learning has become an important research theme, however, mainly in relation to the notion of knowledge management (Scarbrough, Swan and Preston, 1999). We wish to explore organizational learning with the use of technology in which we regard CoP/social worlds as the unit of analysis. This implies studying the CoP/social world as it evolves over time through a trajectory according to context-specific conditions. We suggest that these conditions can take on the form of technological tools and of social relationships formed in CoP/social worlds. It is the reciprocity of the technical and the social conditions that together constitute the CoP/social worlds through the actions and interactions of its members. Conceptualizing ICT in a CoP/social worlds perspective, thus, means viewing ICT as a condition shaping and being shaped by the trajectory of the CoP/social world to which it is related.

CoPs/social worlds – or sub-worlds – however, do not exist in isolation (Clarke, op. cit.; Wenger, 1998). They overlap and are intertwined, which increases the complexity involved in studying learning in CoPs/social worlds. Thus, it is not sufficient to investigate ICT as part of a single CoP/social world or sub-world, ICT can also play a significant role as a boundary object between sub-worlds as it often provides links between them (Star, 1989). ICT as a boundary object underlines the need to view technology in connection with its effects on the formation of and the contribution to the ongoing development of the CoP/social worlds under scrutiny.

Capturing ICT as a condition for learning in and among CoP/social worlds, however, also includes taking into account the multiplicity of meanings of a given technology in different contexts, ICT is not a static object frozen in time, ICT is ambiguous, equivocal, and only makes sense in connection with practical activities (Weick, 1990; Orlikowski, 2000). Thus, the mere presence of ICT in a CoP/social world does not automatically determine the way it is actually being used (Engeström, 1990). In other words, it makes no sense to talk in general terms about the role of ICT i...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Editorial
• Knowledge Communities and Innovation
• Knowledge, Practice and the Role of Location: A Community of Practice Perspective
• Innovation by User Communities
• Learning with ICT in Communities of Practice
• Virtual Communities in Education: Culture or Cultural Artifact?
• Knowledge Sharing, Communities, and Social Capital: A Relational Base of Knowledge Management