Interaction quality within communities of practice: contextual factors of utilising different communication media

  • Authors:

  • Jan Kratzer;Katja Zboralski;Roger T. A. J. Leenders

  • Affiliations:

  • Innovation Management and Strategy, Faculty of Management and Organization, University of Groningen, P.O. Box 800, 9700 AV Groningen, The Netherlands.;Technology and Innovation Management, Berlin University of Technology, Strasse des 17. Juni 135, 10623 Berlin, Germany.;Innovation Management and Social Networks, Faculty of Management and Organization, University of Groningen, P.O. Box 800, 9700 AV Groningen, The Netherlands

  • Venue:
  • International Journal of Networking and Virtual Organisations
  • Year:
  • 2009

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Abstract

The quality of communication is essential for mostorganisational processes, in particular for creating new knowledge.Among other instruments many organisations utilise 'Communities ofPractice' (CoPs) to leverage knowledge more successfully. Thequality of interaction among community members is recognised as themajor success-driving factor. In an empirical investigation of 22CoPs with all 191 community members of a multinational company, weexplore how the utilisation of different communication media -face-to-face, synchronous (virtual) communication and asynchronous(virtual) communication - adds to the quality of interaction. Basedon our empirical results, three general conclusions can be drawn.First, the results of our study support theories suggesting thatmedia of smaller bandwidth can be utilised when transferringcomplex contents. Second, the interaction quality is negativelyaffected by the increasing number of CoP members. Third, the age ofCoPs appears to be an important factor for the interaction qualityof CoPs.