Designing Resilient Watershed Partnerships:
Structural Properties, Life-Cycles, and the
Longevity of Watershed Partnerships
Mark T. Imperial, Ph.D.
Master of Public Administration Program
University of North Carolina Wilmington
imperialm@uncw.edu
http://people.uncw.edu/imperialm/
Tomas Koontz, Ph.D.
School of Environment and Natural Resources
Ohio State University
Koontz.31@osu.edu
Presented at SECOPA 2008,
Orlando, FL September 24 – 27, 2008
Master of Public Administration Program
Research Questions
• Our objective is to develop testable propositions that
determine:
– How collaborative organizations evolve?
– The structural properties of collaborative organizations that
influence their ability to endure over time
• We build on theory in organizational theory,
networks, collaboration, and institutional rational
choice to develop theoretical propositions
– Understanding the structural properties of collaborative
organizations and their evolutionary dynamics (i.e., life cycles)
should advance our understanding collaborative environmental
management (CEM)
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Research on Watershed Partnerships
• Emphasis on “lessons learned” rather than theory
testing or development
• Dominated by case study and cross-sectional research
• Lack of consistent definition of a “partnership” or
systematically comparing their structural properties
• Lack of attention to their dynamic properties, yet
there is often a succession of different partnerships in
watersheds over
• Failure to distinguish between networks and
organizations as alternative strategies of improving
watershed governance
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Collaboration and Networks
• Collaboration is any joint activity by two or more organization
intended to create public value by working together rather than
separately
– A Network relationship designed to improve governance of larger
interorganizational network in the watershed
– Different than hierarchy (i.e., organization) and markets which are the
other strategies for governing a watershed’s interorganizational network
• Wide range of collaboration at the operational and policymaking levels that may or may not be interrelated in a
watershed
– These activities are governed by networks of formal and informal
relationships based on trust, reciprocity, and social norms
• Our focus in this paper is when these relationships produce a
new organizational form
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Collaborative Organizations
• When organizations (and individuals) embrace a
collaborative process, make joint decisions, and begin
to act as a single entity
– “Second order” organization whose membership is typically
comprised of other organizations, although individuals may be
members
– While networks are an important, relations among members end
up being governed by formal and informal rules that give rise to
a distinct organizational structure
– The structure exhibits some element of intentionality, acquires
resources, develops a boundary sand exerts its own control over
resources, and has a structured set of exchange processes
– Membership has consequences and its members have a distinct
identity and take actions on behalf of the new entity
– Might even acquire its own staff and dedicated resources that or
deployed to advance the collaborative organization’s strategy
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What is the life-cycle of
a collaborative Organization?
• Draw on literature of organizational life-cycles
– Wide range of multi-stage models – we rely on a simple fourstage summary model
– Adopt a less controversial view that stages represent clusters of
issues and problems that an organizational system must confront
– The problems suggests a sequential ordering of organizational
development but the time spent at each stage could vary
considerably
– Development does not have to proceed linearly – older
organizations might change their structure in ways that revert to
solving problems associated with earlier stages
– While life-cycles end in death, the death and decline stage are
not included because not all organizations die and most die an
early death.
– Death and decline are explained by different theories
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Organizational Life-Cycles of
Collaborative Organizations
• Entrepreneurial stage
–
–
–
–
–
Innovation
Lots of ideas
High creativity
Entrepreneurial activities to acquire needed resources
Relatively little planning and coordination compared to later
stages
– Formation of a “niche” in the watershed’s network
– Organization develops its identity and ideology to distinguish
itself from others in the network
– Heavily influenced by “champions” and entrepreneurial
founding members
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Organizational Life-Cycles of
Collaborative Organizations
• Collectivity stage
–
–
–
–
–
High cohesion among members
Sense of family
Face-to-face communications
Informal communication and organization structures
Investment in resources may exceed returns but growing support
for its overarching strategy and future ability to secure needed
resources
– Champions and entrepreneurs are still needed but increased need
for a coordinator and facilitator to manage communication
process and for fixer/brokers who can keep the group focused on
its strategy
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Organizational Life-Cycles of
Collaborative Organizations
• Formalization and control stage
– Marked by the institutionalization of organizational strategy and
its structure embodied by its rules, procedures, and routines
– Flexibility is reduced to create a more stable system of
interactions
– Conservatism reigns
– Emphasis shifts to production, efficiency, and maintenance of
the organization and its ability to achieve its goals
– Coordinators and facilitators continue to play an important role
– Need for someone to play role of devil’s advocate to avoid group
think, fixer/brokers who can help with institutionalization
problems, and unsnarlers who can navigate through growing
internal and external bureaucratic constraints
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Organizational Life-Cycles of
Collaborative Organizations
• Elaboration of structure stage
– Decision making is often decentralized to organizational subunits
– Focus begins to shift towards boundary expansion by
modifying goals, strategies, processes, or targeting new
clients
– Adaptations and emergence of new subsystems are common
– Leadership needs may switch back to champions and
entrepreneurs with the vision and drive to lead these
expansions in the organization
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Implications of Life-Cycle Model
• Governance of collaborative organization changes over
time
– Early emphasis on trust and norms is replaced more formalized processes
and rule structures
• Organizational members have different measures of
organizational effectiveness at different life-cycle
stages
– Entrepreneurial stage: acquiring necessary resources
– Collectivity stage: trust, relationships, and internal processes
– Control and elaboration of structure stages: efficient production and
investment in organization specific processes
– Since researchers examine partnerships with different structures and lifecycle stages, this explains the variation in “lessons learned” and
“success” factors
– Cross-sectional research can ignore importance of life-cycles and issues
related to creation and death
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Structural Inertia Theory
• Structural inertia theory
– Applied to a wide range of organizations and networks
– We argue that it also applies to the collaborative organizational form
• Diversity in organizational forms is greatest during
creation
– Once resource commitments are made they are difficult to recover
– Resources are required to sustain interactions
• Tends to be some stability in structures when viewed
over time
– Researchers refer to this as structural inertia
– Inertia is not a symptom of “bad” management but is actually a byproduct of an well designed organizational system that exploits the
synergies of members and their resources
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Structural Inertia Theory
• Basic theoretical arguments
– Environment that an organization operates in creates a selection process
that favors organizations with structures that are difficult to change
– This doesn’t mean that organizations don’t change but that they respond
relatively slow to threats and opportunities and tend to make peripheral
rather than core changes
– Modern world tends to favor organizations that have
• Capacity for reliable performance and account rationally for their
actions
• Reliability and accountability also depend on the organizations
ability to reproduce its structure consistently
• Organizations with high levels of all three factors are more likely to
survive than those with low levels
• Older organizations will tend to have higher levels of all three
factors than new organizations
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Structural Inertia Theory
• Accountability is a critical issue
– During early stages of an organization potential members and resource
contributors want assurances that the investment of resources will not
be wasted
– At the same time, too much emphasis on accountability or poorly
designed monitoring systems can create disincentives for joining and/or
contributing resources to the organization
• Institutionalization encourages reproducibility but is
a “two-edged” sword
– Institutionalization can lower the transaction costs associated with
exchange processes because members no longer need to expend
resources to reproduce the structure
– However, the process of institutionalization makes organizations
resistant to change
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Propositions
P1: Collaborative organizations with high reliability are more
likely to survive than organizations that are unreliable.
P2: Collaborative organizations with high accountability are more
likely to survive than organizations that are unaccountable or
have poorly designed accountability systems that create
incentives for nonparticipation.
P3: Older collaborative organizations will have higher reliability
and accountability than younger collaborative organizations.
P4: Collaborative organizations that have reproducible structures
(i.e., institutionalized rules, routines, and procedures) are more
like to survive than collaborative organizations with nonreproducible structures.
P5: Older collaborative organizations are like to have more
reproducible structures (i.e., institutionalized rules, routines,
and procedures) than younger collaborative organizations.
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Structure of
Collaborative Organizations
• We argue that organizations as structured systems of
routines and competencies, which refer to the
repetitive patterns of activities by individuals and
groups within the organization
– Our approach borrows heavily from the institutional rational choice
literature
– Rules are explicitly or implicit attempts to achieve order and
predictability
– Prescriptions that forbid, permit, or require actions or outcomes and the
sanctions or rewards associated with following the rules
– Formal or informal and wide variation in level of formality
– Operate configurationally in that the way one set of rules operates can
affect another
– Hierarchical, polycentric, or nested rule structures are all possible
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Boundary Rules
• Configuration and interaction between member and
strategy rules generates the boundary that
distinguishes the collaborative organization from
other network members
• Member Rules
– Who can or cannot be a member
– Different types of members (member, associate member, ex
officio)
– Members are organizations but individuals might be included
– Voluntary or required by a higher-order set of rules (e.g., state
statute)
– Rules pertaining to expansion or expulsion of members
• Selection of members will influence and constrain the
strategic options of the collaborative organization
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Boundary Rules
• Strategy Rules
– Specify shared definitions of a problem or set of problems within
the domain of the organization
– Specify the responses to problems that are legitimate or
illegitimate – what it can or cannot do, what are its roles or
processes
– Specify how it will acquire resources needed to accomplish these
tasks
– Specify the relationship between the collaborative organization
and other members – relationship to the “turf” of network
members
• Strategic choices are likely to influence the
membership structure of the collaborative
organization
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Decision Rules
• Shape the processes by which organizational members
develop norms and make decisions
– Rules are likely to evolve towards formality and complexity and
may have a path-dependent quality
• Preference Aggregation Rules
– Consensus is common but formal structures may have more
complex voting systems
• Distribution of Power Rules
– Equality, voting vs. nonvoting, creation of executive boards,
centralized vs. decentralized
• Distribution of Roles/Responsibility Rules
– Officers, sub-units, work groups, specialization of functions
• Distribution of Participation Rules
– Width: degree each member participates in each decision
– Depth: degree each member can influence a specific decision
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Coordination Rules
• Preference aggregation rules typically give rise to
coordination rules that define mutual exchange rights
among members
• Exchange Rules
– Set up the operating procedures that govern resource exchanges
between the member and the collaborative organization or between
members
• Monitoring Rules
– Created to govern exchange process and ensure that members
follow through on commitments
• Dispute Resolution Rules
– Specify how conflicts among members will be resolved
• Enforcement Rules
– Sanctions for noncompliance of rewards for compliance
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Propositions
P6: Collaborative organizations that have formal rules are
more like to survive than collaborative organizations
that rely on informal rules.
P7: As a collaborative organization increases the scope of
its membership, it is more likely to have formal rules
than if it has a small membership.
P8: As a collaborative organization increases the
complexity of its membership, strategy, decision, and
coordination rule structures, it is more likely survive if
it formalizes these rules than if it relies on informal
rules and norms.
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The “Liability of Newness”
• Organizational theory demonstrates that new
organizations suffer from a “liability of newness”
– Younger organizations have a higher propensity to die (regardless of
life-cycle stage) than older organizations
– We argue that collaborative organizations are likely to have a similar
liability and new organizations will have a higher likelihood of failure
than those that are older
– We are not interested in those created with the express purpose of being
dissolved once some task or set of tasks is completed
• Liability of newness arises from a combination of
internal and external factors
• Internally, fundamental changes in core rules and
organizational routines robs the organization of its
history
– Resets the liability of newness clock back to zero
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The “Liability of Newness”
• Process of acquiring external legitimacy often takes
time and is important for any organization’s survival
– Some minimum level of legitimacy is needed to acquire
resources (e.g., membership, public or political support, money,
etc.) needed to survive
– Collaborative organization must be perceived as a legitimate
response to watershed problems
– As organizations grow older they tend to develop stronger
exchange relationships, become part of the hierarchy, and have
their actions endorsed by powerful actors
– Older organizations tend to be more legitimate
– One way younger organizations offset their liability of newness
is to acquire legitimacy
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The “Liability of Newness”
• Literature is less clear on the relationship between
organizational change and death rates
– Net affects appear to depend on time
– Changes may prove to be adaptive but only after enough time
passes to repair the problems incurred as a result of the
disruptive aspect of the change
– Older organizations learn to change by changing and develop
modification routines so certain changes are more likely to be
repeated over time
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Propositions
P9: Older collaborative organizations are likely to be viewed by members
of the network as more legitimate than younger collaborative
organizations.
P10: Collaborative organizations with formal rules structures are likely to
be viewed by members of the networks as more legitimate than
collaborative organizations that rely on informal rule structures
P11: Collaborative organizations with higher levels of legitimacy are more
likely to survive than collaborative organizations will low levels of
legitimacy.
P12: Young collaborative organizations that acquire high legitimacy by
adopting formal rules or by other means will have a higher rate of
survival than those with low legitimacy.
P13: Younger collaborative organizations that make major changes to their
membership, strategy, decision, and coordination rule structures will
increase their risk of death.
P14: Older collaborative organizations that make major changes to their
membership, strategy, decision, and coordination rule structures
increase their risk of death to that of a younger organization.
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Implications
• Important differences between networks and
organizations as strategies for improving
watershed governance
– Collaborative organizations are a hybrid form that
shares important features of network and hierarchical
governance strategies (markets are the third)
– Important to understand their structural characteristics
and recognize that watershed partnerships can differ
significantly.
– Understanding these differences is critical to theory
building
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Implications
• Need to understand how to design and manage
collaborative organizations because they get things
done and improve network governance
– Connect subset of network in stable, ongoing set of interactions
repeated over long time periods
– Creates multiplexity by connecting some network members in
new ways
– Serves as a hub within the network – a forum for making
collective decisions and achieving direction, control, and
coordination among network members
– Generates trust that is then used to govern other network relations
– Generates particular form of organizational learning –
“collaborative know how” that is used to facilitate other
collaboration among network members
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Implications
• Theory related to the structure and survivability of
collaborative organizations is important if we want to
craft institutions (e.g., watershed partnerships) that
endure over long time periods
– Addressing watershed problems requires sustained efforts over
long time periods to avoid “random acts of environmental
kindness”
• Paper helps reduce the knowledge gap related to the
life-cycle features of a collaborative organization
– Just as the architect needs to understand how to build a building,
collaborative public manager needs to understand how
collaborative organizations form and develop
– Life-cycle literature draws attention to important structural features
as well as the managerial problems during different stages
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Implications
• Important implications for research
– Collaboration, network, and watershed researches
tends to focus on exemplary activities with a record
of achievement
– Need to balance the functionality with an
understanding of the dysfunctional to understand why
they fail to work or die an unexpected death
• Theory development also a requires greater
precision in how we define and systematically
compare these institutions and governance
arrangements
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Questions?
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