Value enhanced collaborative working: case study of a small management advisory firm

This paper seeks to propose a conceptual framework to promote value-enhancedcollaborative working (VECW) for a small management advisory firm. The research methodology was qualitative. It involved acomprehensive review of literature leading to a better understanding of collaborative workingrequirements in a small firm context and the barriers to derive value from collaborative working.Initially, exploratory observations helped to identify issues of collaborative working in the case studyorganisation. Following the exploratory observations, a detailed case study was undertaken. Theemphasis was on semi-structured interviews under a guiding questionnaire along with fieldobservations to produce a conceptual framework for VECW. The research enables an understanding of the apparent failure of a particular small andmedium-sized enterprise (SME) management advisory firm (case study organisation) to derive valuefrom its collaborative working model. The study identifies major issues that affect the long-termrelationships of the organisation with their collaborating stakeholders and recognises the commonunderstanding required by the stakeholders working in collaboration. Further, in order to solve theseissues, the research develops a conceptual VECW framework within the current context. The majorcomponents of the conceptual VECW framework consist of process, people and tools factors to give astructured approach to agree common goals, share risks and rewards, provide faster and clearercommunications and information transparency between collaborating stakeholders. Owing to the nature of the study (case study), current paperis based on the findings of a single SME management advisory firm. Hence, further research fororganisations of similar size and providing similar services would be required to investigate therobustness of the approach. Most studies on collaboration are concentrated on either larger organisations orproduct organisations. Here, the attempt is to understand the collaboration among small firmsproviding professional services. The research paper is an important milestone on an ongoing researchto produce a detailed framework eventually to be presented to the industry for evaluation to ensure itscontribution to the industry as well as increasing the knowledge on the subject.