A Chaordic View of Collaborative Networked Organisations

Collaborative Networked Organisations (CNOs) are a new challenge for flexibility and competitiveness in 21 centuries business life. Unfortunately, up until now the actual use of a Chaos and Complexity (C&C) lens in the modeling of CNOs was rather limited. The purpose of this paper is to develop the contours of a C&C theoretical foundation for CNOs, especially with respect to the organisational and managerial aspects. In this paper we propose a chaordic view, in which the basic reconfigurability process of a dynamic virtual organisation or CNO is seen as renewal (routine change), and the creative processes which take place within the virtual organisations breeding environment are seen as an opportunity for non-routine or leap-like change (creation of real novelty). It is argued that in an effective CNO approach both routine and nonroutine change processes should be balanced with one another to keep flexibility, creativity, and competitiveness at acceptable high levels, not only occasionally, but constantly.