Conceptualizing the Collaborative Toolbox: A Dimensional Approach to Collaboration

This study explores the circumstances under which certain collaborative tools are adopted, and whether some tools are typically used in combination with others. We share the view of other scholars that collaboration practice is ahead of scholarship. Accordingly, we ground our analysis and conclusions on the observations provided by a sample of public managers who participate actively in collaborations. Findings from interviews with managers about the use of collaborative tools in their jurisdictions demonstrate that certain tools are used together, and that collaborations can be understood along three dimensions—structure of the collaboration, shared governance arrangements, and commitment of both parties to the collaboration. For researchers, this finding provides a foundation to comprehend, compare, and analyze collaborations across myriad policy domains. For practitioners, this result illustrates that collaborative tools are not interchangeable and are typically employed in three coherent groupings. For researchers and practitioners, the findings dispute common assumptions that greater collaboration (i.e., employing more tools) is productive and suggest that the emphasis might be more usefully placed on selecting and using the appropriate and parsimonious combination of tools to generate public value.