Perceptions of information flow and sharing in non-profit organisations: a relational capital perspective

Relational capital represents the information and knowledge embedded in relationships external to an organisation. It is about the information flow and sharing between the organisation and its external stakeholders. The primary goal of this paper is to report preliminary findings collected from 15 Australian non-profit senior executives through qualitative in-depth interviews. The findings revealed that the understanding of relational capital among the participants, in particular their perceptions of information flow and sharing, was substantially different to that in the literature as put forth by scholars in the field. This paper argues that non-profit organisations must develop a better understanding of the relational capital concept or may run a risk of under developing their relational capital. Accordingly, the key contribution of the paper revolves around the participants’ relational capital perceptions and the attempts to drive a pivotal attitudinal shift towards a more realistic balance approach of the development of relational capital which, if approached properly, can enable non-profit organisations to attain strategic advantage in the long term.