Coherent Action: Linking Role and Work Contributions to Each Other Through Real-Time Dialogue

In this chapter, we look more closely at the dialogical dimension of collaborative action. Specifically, we address the issue of how organizational coherence, even culture, is created through real-time dialogue. For this purpose, we distinguish four configurations of teamwork that give rise to collaborative action in successively more complex forms: coordination, cooperation, co-constructing, and co-modeling. We point out that, pragmatically, discussions for the sake of achieving collaborative coherence are characterized by asymmetry. By this, we mean that in every team, a downward momentum tends to push destabilization away until only familiar and unambiguous—and thus largely meaninglessly abstract—views of projects and goals remain, while an upward momentum tends to further the development, testing, and supplementation of new ideas. An oscillation toward and away from important focal ideas of a discussion is seen as constituent of how coherent action arises: there is a continuous dance between upward and downward dynamics. Overall, we propose ways to facilitate and enhance those dialogue processes in each of the We-Spaces that create organizational coherence grounded in collaborative action.