looking outward: changing organizations through collaboration

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LOOKING OUTWARD:CHANGING ORGANIZATIONSTHROUGH COLLABORATIONCatherine Augustine a & Scott Rosevear ba University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, Michiganb University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MichiganPublished online: 03 Aug 2006.

To cite this article: Catherine Augustine & Scott Rosevear (1998) LOOKINGOUTWARD: CHANGING ORGANIZATIONS THROUGH COLLABORATION,Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 22:4, 419-433, DOI:10.1080/1066892980220408

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LOOKING OUTWARD: CHANGING ORGANIZATIONSTHROUGH COLLABORATION

Catherine AugustineUniversity of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Scott RosevearUniversity of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Community colleges have long relied on informal and unstructured collaborationsas a tool for both survival and success. Now that businesses and other organizationsare entering into very sophisticated networks and alliances, community collegeswill need to move into more structured forms of collaborations. As the pace ofcompetition increases as we move into a complex knowledge industry, communitycolleges need to find alternatives to traditional closed operations and limited col-laborations. This article describes the need for more complex collaborative relation-ships with external constituents and examines how these collaborations will affecttoday's community colleges. Existing forms of collaboration will be described astraditional, centralized, unstructured modes of collaboration. Although thesecollaborations will continue to exist in the future, as the community college envi-ronment becomes more complex, more structured collaboration will become increas-ingly more common. Examples of some of the emerging types of structured col-laboration will be discussed as will the different ways in which administrators,staff, and faculty will react.

Static Community College and Transformation Community Collegehave been successful for years in meeting the needs of their local com-munities. Traditionally, the majority of each institution's students havebeen potential or current workers in the locally dominant industries.Recently, however, there have been significant changes in their localmarkets. First, industry has demonstrated a desire for higher skilledworkers in order to remain competitive. Second, a steady migration ofHispanic residents into both communities has created a larger andmore diverse population of students. Each institution is approachingthese changes differently.

Static's Tech Prep program was designed 10 years ago to preparestudents to work in local industries. Static has maintained complete

Address correspondence to Catherine Augustine, University of Michigan, 2108 Schoolof Education Building, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1259. E-mail: [email protected]

Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 22:419-433, 1998Copyright © 1998 Taylor & Francis 419

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420 C. AUGUSTINE AND S. ROSEVEAR

control over the course content, instructors, and scheduling, but it hastried to accommodate the special requests of industry. Despite thechanging education and training needs of local companies, Static be-lieves that its strong presence in the local market will secure enroll-ments in the Tech Prep program. Furthermore, despite industry's owndesire to improve its technological infrastructure, Static is unwilling toinvest the resources necessary to integrate technology in its coursesand internal processes. It currently has two courses in the Spanishlanguage and is planning on working with a delegation of Hispanicleaders to organize a "Heritage Day" on campus. The institution, how-ever, has no plans to add any special programs to assist the Hispanicresidents in their transition into the local community.

Transformation Community College is responding differently to thechanges in its market area. Recognizing that it is not prepared to meetthe changing needs of corporate customers or the increasingly diversepopulation in its community, Transformation believes it risks losing itsmarket share to institutions or organizations that could better adapt tothese changing conditions. Transformation, therefore, has made thedecision to become more involved with organizations and residents inits community. It is revamping its training programs by allowing indus-try to have significant input into course content, instructional delivery,evaluation, and scheduling. As a result of this collaboration, programswill be more customized to meet the critical needs of local companiesand will secure future enrollments.

Transformation is also partnering with a technology provider to notonly incorporate technology into its internal processes but also todevelop the capability to deliver programs via distance education tech-nologies. Although collaborating with the technology partner hasmeant that Transformation has limited control over quality standards,hardware, and other technical issues, the collaborative allows the in-stitution to make less of an investment in acquiring advanced technol-ogy. It will continue to utilize its technology partner as a consultant oninstructional strategies, including introducing new methods of coursedelivery. It will also work with educators and leaders from the Hispaniccommunity to develop an innovative curriculum that will prepare His-panic students for jobs and special programs for all students to becomemore aware of the rich cultural heritage different populations have tooffer. Transformation is committed to collaboration to better respond tochanging community needs.

In this article, the need for collaborative relationships with externalconstituents and how these collaborations will affect today's com-munity colleges will be examined. Extant forms of collaboration will bedescribed as traditional, centralized modes of collaboration that willcontinue to exist in the future. However, as the community college

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CHANGING ORGANIZATIONS THROUGH COLLABORATION 421

environment becomes more complex, structured collaboration will be-come increasingly common. Examples of some of the emerging types ofstructured collaboration will be discussed as will the different ways inwhich administrators, staff, and faculty will react. Community collegeshave long relied on collaboration as a tool for both survival and success.Now that businesses and other organizations are entering into verysophisticated networks and alliances, community colleges will need tomove into more structured forms of collaboration.

Organizational theory maintains that institutions will implementstrategic responses, including collaboration, to adapt to environmentalconditions. Oliver's (1990) review of the literature on collaboration ad-vanced the notion that collaborations are formed for multiple reasons,each of which is determined by either external or internal conditions.Necessity, asymmetry, stability, and legitimacy are reasons dictated pri-marily by external conditions; efficiency is influenced by internal condi-tions; and reciprocity is driven by the properties of the collaboratingorganizations. For example, a community college may establish a col-laborative to garner a competitive advantage or niche in the increas-ingly crowded knowledge industry (asymmetry); share resources suchas facilities, market research, or groups of learners (reciprocity); reducethe costs of building a technology infrastructure by partnering with atechnology provider (efficiency); share risks in innovative venturessuch as distance learning initiatives (stability); or be associated withthe prestige or reputation of another institution or organization, suchas a research university or Fortune 500 company (legitimacy).

Research suggests, therefore, that community colleges may havedifferent reasons for engaging in collaboration as a strategic responseto the changing conditions of the environment. Community collegeshave traditionally favored using collaboration as a tool to limit environ-mental threats and take advantage of market opportunities. It is likelythat as the community college environment becomes increasingly com-plex, institutions will form more decentralized, loosely structured col-laborations to interact with the multiple partners involved in this newreality. As changes in the external environment reshape the resourcesavailable to institutions (such as finances, technological infrastructure,and services to meet student needs), community colleges will respondby implementing strategies that will increase their stability and legit-imacy in the marketplace.

UNSTRUCTURED COLLABORATION

Community colleges have collaborated with external constituents sincetheir inception. Most colleges receive some form of funding from localconstituencies and are therefore committed to meeting the needs of

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their communities. Colleges have focused on finding creative ways torespond to those needs, often entering into collaborations with localbusinesses; primary and secondary schools; local, state, and federalgovernmental agencies; senior citizen groups; rotary clubs; televisionstations; high technology firms; and many others.

Key internal benefits of collaboration have been acquiring neededresources, recruiting students, and placing graduates in the workforce.In terms of acquiring resources, collaborative endeavors have givencommunity colleges the opportunity to access necessary technology,space, and personnel. For years, college courses have been taught off-site at hospitals, laboratories, hotels, and machine-shops, giving learn-ers the opportunity to use the equipment in their classes that they willbe using in future jobs. Career-oriented courses are often taught bypart-time staff drawn from the field, ensuring that students are ex-posed to current practices.

Collaborations have also been an effective way for community col-leges to recruit learners. Tech-prep programs are one example of thistype of collaboration. Instituted throughout the country in the early1980s in response to the Perkins Vocational and Applied TechnologyAct, tech-prep programs are designed to interest high school studentsin a career and provide them with an educational path that will takethem through at least the first two years of college (Pollard, 1991).Upon high school graduation, the student enters the community collegeand continues in his or her chosen field, while supplementing the careercourses with general education courses designed to help students gainan understanding of the historical, societal, and ethical aspects of achosen field. The purpose is to prepare the learner not just for the firstjob but for life-long learning. Community college administrators andinstructors collaborate with high school representatives in establishingcurricula in order to institute these programs.

Cooperative training is an example of collaborating for workforcepreparation. Students in cooperative programs take a job in their fieldwhile they attend college, receiving credit for supervised and evaluatedwork performance. These cooperative experiences often evolve into full-time employment. Community college faculty and academic admin-istrators collaborate with business owners and human resources per-sonnel in placing students and in establishing mutual guidelines forwork experience.

External forces also generate collaboration. Local businesses andindustries have looked to community colleges to meet some of theirtraining needs for the past two decades (Kopecek & Clarke, 1984).Colleges are also asked to assist in writing grants and in designing andexecuting research on community needs. In small towns across the

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country, the local community college pool or gym is relied on as a keypart of the community's recreational options. Community colleges havebeen asked to play a role in working with welfare recipients and inpromoting economic development, including providing small businessincubators and contributing to urban enterprise zones—work that al-lows community colleges to contribute to local and state economicdevelopment initiatives.

Whether these collaborations have resulted from internal or exter-nal forces, all of the cited examples reflect unstructured collaboration.This form of collaboration is flexible and low risk, allowing the com-munity college to maintain the majority of control over the collabora-tion. Faculty retain control of the teaching/learning process, and ad-ministrators determine that the direction is consistent with theinstitution's mission. Off-site courses are taught either by full-timefaculty or by part-time instructors who are guided closely by a chair ordean. In providing space, which is given over to community organiza-tions, staff and organizational policy control the continuation of ar-rangements. Even tech-prep programs provide community college fac-ulty with the right to change the curriculum at any time.

Whereas unstructured collaboration will remain important, new ini-tiatives in partnering will evolve into structured collaboration. As com-petition intensifies and market rules change, community colleges willseek to work in networks made up of partners committed to a commonproduct or outcome. Faculty, staff, and administrators will be forced torelinquish much of the traditional control they have held over col-laborative activities. This loosening of control will affect the environ-ment in which faculty, staff, administrators, and learners interact.

STRUCTURED COLLABORATIONResearchers and administrators have argued that higher education isbecoming increasingly complex and uncertain (Brand, 1993; Moore,1995; Peterson & Dill, 1997; Pickens, 1993). Colleges and universitiesare interacting with a growing number of societal forces, thus movingpostsecondary education toward a knowledge industry. This industrycuts across traditional boundaries and includes organizations not pre-viously considered part of higher education, thus increasing the pace ofcompetition. Community colleges will be forced to respond to the chal-lenge of negotiating the complexities of an emerging market that in-cludes information technology, changing learner needs, economic de-velopment pressures, new competitors, greater diversity, and increasedglobalization. These forces do not work in tandem; they work spon-taneously and simultaneously and demand different responses fromcolleges.

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Information Technology

The incredible diffusion of information technology is creating vastlearning networks that connect learners to knowledge banks indepen-dent of time and distance. Organizations across all industries are im-plementing information technology as the emergence of a global marketputs pressure on organizations to deliver products faster and betterthan their competitors. To succeed in tomorrow's markets, communitycolleges need to incorporate information technology into their systemsand processes, wire their campuses for access to the information super-highway, and take technology into account in their curriculum andprograms. Digital learners will expect faculty to use technology in everyaspect of teaching and content delivery. The need for assistance indesigning courses to take advantage of the benefits technology offerswill result in an increased demand for instructional designers. Com-panies that require their workers to be skilled at using cutting edgetechnologies will expect community colleges to provide this training, orthey will seek alternative providers.

Community colleges will need to formulate and implement far-sighted strategic technology plans in order to remain competitive in thefuture. They will be faced with incorporating high quality computersystems and moving quickly to deliver courses and programs via theInternet. Achieving these technology goals in an environment of limitedresources will require creative collaborations with external partners.Some community colleges will find it necessary to outsource their com-puting capabilities in order to maintain currency, flexibility, and theability to respond quickly.

Changing Learner Needs

Community colleges are increasingly expected to deliver education andtraining that meets the changing needs of learners throughout theirlifetimes. Learners are requiring new knowledge more often and morequickly, and companies are expecting their employees to be betterskilled and prepared for the workplace. As a result, it is likely thatthere will be a growing demand for competency-based training ratherthan seat-based learning. How well community colleges adjust to thisdemand will influence the amount of contract training (a traditionalrevenue source) institutions are likely to acquire.

In addition to pre-baccalaureate students, community colleges willneed to take steps to address the needs of post-baccalaureate, graduate,and professional degree recipients who will require new skills for eithertheir current jobs or for career changes. Learners will seek convenienteducation that allows time for family or professional demands. Finally,

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as career spans increase, community colleges will be expected to be asource of education for people who will continue to work into their 70sand 80s. To adjust to these changing demands, faculty and administra-tors will need to build collaborations as a method of adopting newmodes of delivery and content in order to effectively service the diverseneeds of learners.

The Northwestern Michigan College University Center is an exam-ple of such a collaboration. Northwestern Michigan College (NMC) and12 four-year colleges and universities from throughout the state ofMichigan have joined forces to offer bachelor degree completion pro-grams, graduate degrees, certificates, and courses to residents of north-western Michigan, a geographically isolated area of the state. Thisunique collaboration was formed in response to a local market studythat indicated that advanced education was unavailable for thosewho were not willing or able to relocate or commute to a four-yearinstitution.

Learners attend courses at the NMC University Center, a facilitycontaining regular classrooms as well as classrooms wired to an inter-active television system (ITV). Some courses are taught by faculty whotravel to Northwestern Michigan College, whereas others are taughtvia ITV, allowing learners to receive courses from faculty at the par-ticipating institutions located miles away. Learners are provided withconvenient and affordable alternative access to four-year institutions,limiting the disruption to their personal lives. Although learners in theUniversity Center pay the tuition charged by the institution that offersthe course in which they enroll, by taking the first 60 credit hours ofdegree preparation at Northwestern Michigan College, students canconsiderably reduce the cost of a four-year or graduate degree.

There are multiple benefits of the University Center for all partners.NMC can attract a larger number of students who have fewer barriersto pursuing college degrees. Four-year colleges and universities haveaccess to learners who would be unlikely to enroll in their courses andprograms. Local businesses and community organizations have in-creased access to the research capacity of the 12 colleges and univer-sities and access to the ITV classrooms for teleconferencing and busi-ness meetings. The University Center will attract new residents andbusinesses to northwestern Michigan, as the local community is en-riched by a higher skilled workforce.

Economic Development Pressures

Community colleges have always been considered key drivers in theeconomic development strategies of states and municipalities. Globaliz-

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ation of the economy has increased the pressure for states to havestrong, competitive economies, and community colleges are viewed as ameans to better prepare learners for the workforce so that states canretain and attract new jobs. As a result, states gain property and corpo-rate tax revenues, which enrich their economies.

An important strategy that community colleges can use to supporteconomic development programs is through structured collaborationthat encompasses higher education, government, and business. A hu-man service model of education and training, based on just such acollaboration, exists in Salem, Oregon. Chemeketa Community Collegehas partnered with more than 20 public and private community organi-zations to improve and expand services to welfare recipients (Neuen-dorf, 1997). Welfare applicants are referred to the College by the state'sAdult and Family Services agency. Partner agencies are housed to-gether to jointly help clients with a range of services: self-assessment,job search techniques, and training to be able to qualify for a job. Often,the clients also need help in dealing with drug abuse, physical andmental health problems, housing needs, and child care. Chemeketa hasbecome a hub in a network of organizations geared toward creatingsuccess for the customer.

New Competitors

The globalization of competition for knowledge transfer is creating newcompetitors for community colleges. Private training providers haveexisted for some time, but now companies from such fields as telecom-munications, multi-media, and entertainment, as well as governmentagencies are implementing programs and services intended to dissemi-nate knowledge to both internal and external learners. IBM, Motorola,and Disney, for example, are steadily building the expertise and in-frastructure necessary to deliver knowledge to wide audiences. Thesenew providers of education and training are emerging competitors forcommunity colleges, signaling the need to break down barriers to neu-tralize the impact of these competitors.

Community colleges are starting to respond to this new competitionthrough collaboration. For example, Burlington County College (BCC),in New Jersey, has entered into a joint venture with the New JerseyInstitute of Technology. Together, the two institutions obtained $11million in state funds to build a Technology and Engineering Center(TEC) on land purchased by county government in a rural area with noaccess to engineering programs within a 100-mile radius (Pokrass,1997). Both institutions share the goal of increasing access to engineer-ing programs, thus increasing enrollment at each school. The two in-stitutions have designed, built, and are now operating the TEC, which

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houses a wide range of academic programs at the associate, baccalaure-ate, and master's degree levels in fields such as electronics engineer-ing, computer information systems, engineering management, andmathematics. The 52,000 square-foot building includes multimediaclassrooms; a technical library; a full-service bookstore and cafeteria;as well as state-of-the-art engineering, graphic imaging, and computerlabs.

Graduates of BCC are guaranteed that their credits will transfer tothe university, attracting new students who are interested in obtaininga baccalaureate degree but who cannot afford to move or commute tothe university. The university has gained access to learners in a newgeographical location. Because this joint venture is unique to the area,the two partnering institutions have created a competitive advantageover surrounding community colleges and universities.

Diversity and Globalization

The changing demographics of learners include rapidly growing popu-lations of minority groups that will become powerful forces of change asthey represent a significant market of learners that community collegesmust be prepared to serve better. As countries throughout the worldbecome interconnected through modern technology, globalization ofmarkets and knowledge will affect the knowledge industry as well.Community colleges need to establish better ties with minority andinternational communities to develop multicultural programs to serveminority students or risk losing institutional viability with thesemarkets.

Paradise Valley Community College in Arizona has created a col-laboration to better serve diverse and international markets. The Inter-national Studies Council has formed a Center for International Studiesthat provides a comprehensive series of internationally oriented collegecourses; content courses taught using distance learning and open entry/open exit modalities; non-credit internationally oriented seminars,workshops, and modern language instruction for college students, areabusinesses, and the general public; and faculty/staff development semi-nars and programs designed to enrich staff knowledge of other cultures.The Center has built partnerships with regional colleges and univer-sities, foundations, and businesses, including all 10 Maricopa Com-munity Colleges, two school districts, three technological institutes inMexico, two Canadian community colleges, two Mexican universities,the Thunderbird School of Graduate Management, the World TradeCenter, the East-West Center, the Hands across the Border Founda-tion, Sumitomo Corporation, the Spanish Work-Out Corporation, theAsian Business Corporation, and the Asian Consulting Corporation,

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Inc. (Global Perspective, Nov. 1994). The International Studies Councilhas been acclaimed for the bridges it has built and for the excitingopportunities it is providing to its boundaryless community.

The common chord among these approaches to collaboration is acommitment to a network comprised of organizations with a commonpurpose. Organizational units affiliate with external organizations influid combinations that are mutually supportive and respond to andanticipate the needs of the marketplace. The network organizationposes a challenge to the way community colleges are organized, becauseit calls into question whether the ultimate approach to building vitalityis the individual college or the network of organizations involved incollaboration. As attention in community colleges turns from unstruc-tured to structured collaboration, the web of relationships between col-laborating organizations may become more important than the struc-ture of the college (Alfred & Carter, 1997a). At Central Arizona College,for example, a seamless educational network involving K-12 schools,the community college, and a regional university has been developed tofacilitate student movement through the baccalaureate degree. Theproperties of this "network" may become more important to studentsthan those of the individual institutions because of their impact on therange and quality of services provided.

The network concept also suggests that educational outcomes andbenefits through a network of organizations may be more powerful thanvalue produced by a single institution. The value generated by a collegeis limited to the quantity and quality of its internal resources, whereasthe value produced through a network of organizations geometricallyexpands in relationship to the multiple resource capabilities of each.When allowed to emerge, the network concept enables community col-leges to develop an organizational design that has the flexibility torespond to an ever-growing range of client needs.

NETWORKS AS COLLABORATION: THE MICHIGAN VIRTUALAUTOMOTIVE COLLEGE

The Michigan Virtual Automotive College (MVAC) is a structured col-laboration that goes beyond prior examples in terms of levels of de-centralization and maybe indicative of the future direction of collabora-tion. This new collaborative arrangement among the University ofMichigan, Michigan State University, the state's regional universities,community colleges, the state of Michigan, and the Michigan automo-tive industry was conceptualized as a response to market opportunitiesin the state of Michigan. MVAC will utilize rapidly developing informa-tion technologies to establish multiple distance learning platforms to

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meet the education and training needs of the automobile industry. It isexpanding the boundaries of higher education in the state of Michiganto capture a large market of adult learners.

MVAC is a complex collaborative set up as a separate nonprofit en-tity designed to interface with higher education, government, and in-dustry. Its founding and governing partners are the state of Michigan,Michigan State University, and the University of Michigan, but MVACwill bring together a mix of Michigan colleges and universities, includ-ing community colleges and private training providers to delivercourses, programs, and instructional modules to auto industry workers.All employee groups are included as potential learners—entry-levelworkers, skilled tradespeople, engineers, and executive management.MVAC will deliver or broker different courses that give learners accessto certificates and degrees. Eventually, it will coordinate research thatsupports the auto industry by creating a forum for experts from highereducation and industry to experiment and develop new knowledge.

This collaborative effort may be a model for educational delivery inthe 21st century. MVAC will enable colleges and universities to becomemore responsive to the rapidly changing education needs of societyand to remain competitive in the emerging postsecondary knowledgeindustry. It is a model that signals the increased blurring of boundariesbetween traditional higher education, government, and industry.MVAC is much more embedded in multiple environments than tradi-tional institutions and, for this reason, will not be compatible with theestablished culture of colleges and universities.

Collaborating with MVAC provides community colleges with the op-portunity to respond to a number of environmental pressures. Access toMVAC's distance learning technologies will allow them to limit thecosts of developing a comprehensive technology infrastructure. Theavailability of distance learning technologies provides access to largermarkets of learners outside their local service areas. Colleges can uti-lize MVAC's faculty development programs to assist instructors indesigning and delivering a distance learning-based curriculum. MVACwill also act as a bridge to industry, leading to a better understanding ofthe education and training needs of corporate customers. Finally, col-laborating with MVAC will enable community colleges to work withstate government to address the human resource needs of Michigan.

NETWORKS BRING NEW CHALLENGES

Unstructured collaboration will continue to be a viable alternative, butnetworks, such as the MVAC, will concurrently decrease the amount ofcontrol colleges have over the collaborative activity, as well as over

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leadership, management, and the teaching and learning process. Howwill leaders, managers, and faculty be expected to respond?

Implications For Leaders

As the collaborations entered into by community colleges become moredecentralized, leaders will need to focus on four priorities. They willneed to explicitly define and advance their institution's core competen-cies; establish trust in their collaboration partners; empower their staffto work toward the goals and benefits of collaboration; and becomeadept at managing meaning in the organization.

In effective collaborations, each partner must decide which activitiesreflect its own distinctive competencies and learn to advance them(Jarillo, 1993 in Limerick & Cunnington, 1993). Leaders must clearlydefine their institution's core competencies and only enter into collab-orations that either circumvent these core competencies or strengthenthem. After leaders have ensured that the institution's core competen-cies will remain intact and they decide to enter into a network, theymust learn to establish a trusting relationship with their partners. Aslevels of control become more dispersed, the level of trust between thepartners becomes very important to the success of the network. Forcollege leaders, this means building a long-term, trusting relationshipwith leaders of other, perhaps even competitive, organizations.

After community college leaders have learned to trust their partners,they must trust both their own and their partners' employees to man-age the network. Substantial autonomy is necessary to enable networkmanagers to respond more quickly to problems and opportunities,thereby raising its chances of success (Badaracco, 1991). One of themost difficult tasks for a leader is to provide incentives for employeesto work for the success of the network, not merely of the parent(Badaracco, 1991). College leaders must go beyond setting the founda-tion for the network to creating a culture in which employees feel safe toinvest their time and energy into making the network work.

Although community college leaders are encouraging staff to supportand work for the goals of the network, these leaders must constantlytend to the management of vision, values, identity, and meaning. Theentire college community must understand why the network makessense and, more important, how it fits into the larger set of core compe-tencies and core values held by the college.

Implications for Managers

Managers of networks will need to possess strong skills in four areas:building strong interpersonal relationships based on trust with their

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partners; protecting their institution's core competencies; maximizingvalue for their institutions through managing the network; and en-hancing learning through effectively evaluating the network. Networkmanagers need to build strong interpersonal relationships with theirpartners. In Spekman, Isabella, MacAvoy, and Forbes's 1996 study,trust, communication, perspective taking, rapport building, and com-mitment emerged as key characteristics of successful interpersonal re-lationships among collaboration partners. Managers of networks mustalso remain flexible as they consider the needs of many diverse "own-ers." The people from each institution who are managing the networkon a day-to-day basis must learn to trust each other and each other'sinstitution, just as the leaders do. Network managers must learn toview control in a totally new way related to who is best qualified tomake the relevant decision (Lewis, 1992).

Network managers must also enhance learning. They must learnfrom collaboration and be able to apply their learning to initiatives.Part of this learning will come from actively evaluating the collabora-tion. Evaluation will become increasingly important as networks areformed to meet needs for a limited time-span. Not only will managersneed to be skilled at evaluating, but they will also need to be able toevaluate the collaboration jointly, with the partners, or agree on anexternal evaluator whose judgment all collaboration partners cantrust.

Implications for Faculty

As community colleges begin to enter into networks, faculty may beaffected in three ways. First, competency-based curriculum will proba-bly become essential. Second, customization networks may replacesome traditional full-time faculty positions. Third, faculty may experi-ence a decline in autonomy over courses and the curriculum.

As institutions begin to engage in networks, it will become importantfor faculty to be able to articulate the outcomes of their courses. Knowl-edge of course competencies will facilitate the process of rearranginglearning times, places, and mediums, as new forms of collaborationemerge. As instructors focus more and more on competencies, it maybecome apparent that many career-preparation and retraining coursesare changing more rapidly, due to the fast-paced external environment,than the institutions can effectively manage. Institutions may formnetworks of customization to replace some of the more traditionalmethods of teaching career and occupational education. Experts incareer fields could teach the career courses at their work sites. Generaleducation faculty could work with the contracted instructor to ensurethat general skills are also taught.

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As these changes evolve, traditional faculty may lament the loss ofcontrol over their classroom activities. Although autonomy of time,place, and medium may diminish, it is important to ensure that individ-ual creativity is still allowed to flourish. In fact, individual creativitymay increase as faculty discover new opportunities to collaborate withexternal organizations.

CONCLUSIONAs the pace of competition increases due to movement toward a newknowledge industry, community colleges will be forced to find alterna-tives to traditional closed operations and limited collaborations. Col-leges like Transformation Community College, which aggressively pur-sues collaboration and then is willing to submit substantial control ofresulting networks to external partners, will emerge as front-linelearning providers, embedded in the communities they serve. As net-works bring great potential to our community colleges, they will requirenew ways of leading, managing, and teaching. They will also requirechanges in culture to embrace new ways of designing and deliveringservices with external partners. As all types of organizations inevitablymove toward forming networks, the colleges that can adapt to thesechanges will emerge as highly sought-after partners.

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looking outward: changing organizations through collaboration

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