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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2014 May 30.
Published in final edited form as: Soc Sci Med. 2014 Jan 31;106:119–127. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2014.01.025

Table 3.

Comparison of boundary-spanning mechanisms vs. boundaries in the CLAHRCs.

Boundaries\boundary-spanning mechanisms CLAHRC A Description of use CLAHRC B Description of use
Organisational Within teams Co-located ‘core’ of project teams Knowledge broker roles located on the ‘edge’ of the project team. These individuals naturally belong in another environment, but for their CLAHRC roles they compromise their own approach to work to fit in with the project team. They enact a role to connect the project team to their ‘home’ context, and act as facilitators for knowledge flow between these settings. Members of project-teams remain based in their original work-places Team members are able to innately connect insight from external communities to inform and influence the form of the CLAHRC programme of work.
Between teams and core management Distinct CLAHRC positions CLAHRC organisation creates distinct CLAHRC positions - members move to the space of other parts of the CLAHRC to interact (e.g. central management to a project meeting), and then go back to their ‘home’ environment and main CLAHRC role Multiple overlapping roles Those in leadership position concurrently hold multiple positions across CLAHRC – Naturally facilitates that the vision of core management is an integrated part of the work of clinical teams
Between initiative and external stakeholders Designated activities With the detail of work-programme plans (focus & design) largely set at the beginning, activities such as stakeholder workshops are developed specifically for the purpose of CLAHRC work. They principally are formed from new connections, and create a time and space where CLAHRC members can meet with new external communities. Activities drawn from routine practice Teams draw upon pre-existing connections from its members with external communities, meaning that the CLAHRC work is not seen as separate activities. This facilitates work-programme plans to evolve over time as project work progresses.
Professional Designated knowledge broker positions Knowledge broker positions were created to second individuals from external communities to spend a proportion of their working week working with CLAHRC project teams. Hybrid roles Many members of CLAHRC also continued to hold pre-existing roles with external organisations, with insight from these organisations naturally influencing CLAHRC project work.
Epistemic Homogenous ‘core’ team composition & formal boundary spanning positions Project work follows the style of one community’s approach, with team leaders re-enforcing depth of expertise through providing technical (scientific & methodological advice), meaning that most team members can naturally work within the dominant (clinical-academic) approach. It is through explicit boundary spanning mechanisms (e.g. through broker roles and designated events) where different types of knowledges are considered and translated. Heterogeneous team composition Although there is no dominant approach to project work, (which is informed by the culture of different communities), team members’ expertise is closely related (e.g. academic and practitioner allied health) meaning that there are only small epistemic differences within teams. The role of team leaders helps to coordinate the varied expertise to produce one coherent work-programme.