“From Continuous improvement to Collaborative improvement: Scope, Scale, Skill and Social Networking in collaborative improvement”

More than ever, companies are challenged to improve their performance and respond quickly and accurately to changes within the market. As competitive battlefield is moving towards the level of networks of organisations, the individual firm is an inadequate entity for identifying improvements. Therefore the concept of continuous improvement must be applied and used in inter-organisational settings, leading to the concept of collaborative improvement. However the process of applying and transferring CI to inter-organisational settings is fraught with intraand inter-organisational change issues and working practices. For companies to be able to effectively manage and organise the process of collaborative improvement knowledge and understanding on the process itself is needed. Introduction It is increasingly argued that the process of Continuous Improvement (CI) is becoming more complex. Market developments, including rapidly changing market demands, intensified international competition, and rapidly changing technology developments, (Kotler, 2000; Teece et al., 1997) are altering the rules of the game. These changes have created and imply large external dynamics for organisation. Not only have these dynamics created a situation in which companies have to respond quickly and accurately on changes within the market and constantly have to improve their performance, it also created new imperatives of competition between companies, increasingly moving from the level of the individual firm to that of a network of organisations. This results in questions for organisations and managers how to manage and organise network interactions on individual, organisational and network level (see also Groen et al., 2001). Continuous Improvement (CI) is a consolidated concept in managerial theory and practice and is considered vital in today’s business environments, but is mainly dealt with in the context of stand-alone companies. As firms are forced to re-examine, at a strategic level, the way they do business in order to add value and reduce costs it becomes clear that the individual firm is an insufficient entity for identifying improvements (Harland et al. 1999). Therefore CI must be applied and used in inter-organisational settings. In managing and organising the process of CI in the network, it is important to pay particular attention to the processual elements that influence the successful management and organisation of it. A deep knowledge and