strategizing Across Organizations

Capitalizing on big opportunities and solving systemic problems will require organizations to come together to develop strategies as a group.

- Rafael Ramirez, Trudi Lang, Matthew Finch, Gail Carson, Dale Fisher

BUSINESSES NONPROFITS, POLICY makers, and others frequently find it helpful to come together in networks of organizations to tackle large-scale challenges, such as COVID19, extreme weather events, humanitarian disasters, or supply chain disruptions. But devising strategy in such meta-organizations is far different from strategizing within a single organization and much more difficult. Anew approach to collaborative strategy can help leaders in individual organizations work with others to achieve both shared and individual strategic priorities.

Meta-organizations a term coined by Goran Ahrne and Nils Brunsson) can range from tightly organized and well-established trade groups like the International Air Transport Association to loosely structured, short-lived groups like the U.K.’s Brexit Business Taskforce.