Knowledge sharing in a distributed community of practice: a case study of ePractice.eu

Knowledge sharing in a distributed community of practice: a
case study of ePractice.eu

This article aims to explore and describe the attempt of
the European Commission to establish a Community of Juliane Jarke
Practice amongst European eGovernment practitioners
through the ePractice.eu project. The focus of the Student MA
European Commission's attempt lies hereby in the Philosophy,
facilitation of eGovernment good practice exchange University of
Hamburg
throughout Europe.

Theory, namely the concept of Boundary Objects and
the Communities of Practice approach, was used as an Keywords
initial guide to design the case study and the data
Distributed Community of
collection. Data was collected through the author’s
Practice, good practice
participation at workshops, the examination of relevant exchange, knowledge
eGovernment online forums and the conduction of sharing, boundary objects,
semi-structured interviews. ePractice.eu, eGovernment,
EC
The used theory enabled to gain a better understanding
of the relevant issues in the process of building such a
distributed Community of Practice. The case study Since knowledge is
shows that eGovernment practitioners see themselves perceived as being
rather as members of a local community or a small situated and embedded into
community focussed around a specific topic or practice, the conduction of
technology than as members of a European workshops and the emphasis
on transferability of good
eGovernment Community of Practice. The concept of practice cases are leading
boundary objects helped to identify the diverse in the right direction.
perceptions of different actors and lead to
recommendations on how to manage them in order to
better facilitate the good practice exchange in Europe.

European Journal of ePractice · www.epracticejournal.eu 1
Nº 1 · November 2007

1 Introduction
This article aims to explore and describe the attempt of the European Commission to establish a
1
Community of Practice amongst European eGovernment practitioners through the ePractice.eu project .
Knowledge exchange and transfer, especially the sharing of good practices in the field of eGovernment,
is meant to be furthered through the ePractice.eu project which consists of a mixture of on-line (e.g.
web portal) and off-line (e.g. workshops) activities and devices.

The rationale for setting up such an initiative lies in the European Commission’s conviction that “the
sharing of good practice is a core activity in realising the European Commission’s targets for the
information society. It helps to ensure the wider deployment of good practice in ICT-enabled services
across the European Union, to the benefit of citizens, public organisations and business” (EC call for
2
tenders (S 177-187995), 2006, 2) .

In this article the following questions will be addressed in order to give a rich picture about the way
knowledge sharing in a distributed Community of Practice in the public sector could be facilitated:

(1) What are the most prominent Boundary Objects3 and how are they regarded by the
eGovernment practitioners and the ePractice.eu team? In order to understand the different
perceptions and interests of eGovernment practitioners and the ePractice.eu team relevant
Boundary Objects are examined.

(2) What concept of knowledge is used within the ePractice.eu project? This question is explored in
order to conceptualise the project's approach of knowledge sharing. It is furthermore crucial to
analyse the eGovernment practitioners' perception in order to judge the appropriateness of the
approach chosen by ePractice.eu.

(3) What perception of knowledge and knowledge sharing can be found amongst eGovernment
practitioners and what are perceived to be the key success factors that enable or key barriers
that hinder the successful portability of good practice examples?

(4) To what extent have (distributed) Communities of Practice4 evolved in the European
eGovernment community?

The research on which the article is based on was accomplished within a 3.5 months time frame from
5
May to September 2007. The research design and conduction was independent from the European

1
For a thorough case description see http://www.epractice.eu/cases/epractice. It should be noticed that the
activities of ePractice.eu concerning knowledge sharing are not solely focusing on eGovernment practitioners but also
practitioners from eHealth and eInclusion. However these communities have not been regarded in this case study.
2
For more information about eGovernment policy and the ePractice.eu project please consult:
http://www.epractice.eu/document/3253, http://www.epractice.eu/document/3915,
http://www.epractice.eu/document/3927 and http://ec.europa.eu/egovernment.
3 Boundary objects were originally developed by Star & Griesemer, 1989. They are an analytical concept that
describes objects that are adaptable to different viewpoints and therefore have different meanings in different
environments but are at the same time robust enough to maintain identity across those environments and are therefore a
means of communication within and between different these different environments.
4 The concept of Communities of Practice was first introduced by Lave & Wenger, 1991 as a concept of
collective learning. Communities of Practice are formed through relations among people that perform the same or similar
activities over a period of time. Wenger defines Communities of Practice as “groups of people who share a concern or a
passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly” (Wenger, 2007). It has to be
recognised that Communities of Practice are different from networks since they are about something and not solely
defined as a set of relationships.
5
The research project was a MSc Dissertation at Lancaster University Management School. Within the
dissertation Actor-Network Theory (ANT) provides a frame to explain the development of the socio-technical network
with its interest struggles between different actors. However this article focuses on the notion of Boundary Objects. The
interested reader is invited to ask for the whole dissertation.


Commission and any other organisation such as consultancies. Main source of data have been semi-
structured interviews. I have conducted a total of 18 interviews: 2 interviews with Commissioners
responsible for the ePractice.eu project and the eGovernment Observatory; 5 interviews with
consultants (3 with current project involvement) and 11 interviews with eGovernment practitioners from
different European countries. Due to time, language and money constraints a focus was laid on
practitioners from UK and Germany or practitioners with very good knowledge of English. Furthermore I
have examined relevant documents published by the European Commission and observed the web
forum, workshops and presentations.

2 Boundary Objects
Boundary objects are an analytical concept that “have different meanings in different social worlds but
their structure is common enough to more than one world to make them recognizable, a means of
translation” (Star & Griesemer, 1989, 393). Star & Griesemer distinguish between four types of boundary
objects: (1) repositories of things, (2) ideal types, (3) coincident boundaries and (4) standardised forms.
(5) Visionary objects have been amended to this concept by Briers & Fong Chua (2001).

Boundary objects are not only means of communication between and within Communities of Practice,
they also play an important role when networks are evolving (Hildreth et al., 2000). Because boundary
objects are both “adaptable to different viewpoints and robust enough to maintain identity across them”
(Star & Griesemer, 1989, 387) they help to negotiate the common ground and understanding between
different actors of evolving networks. In that respect boundary objects are perceived through different
passage points or convictions based on individual interests that lead into the new network and are
object to continuous negotiation between the various actors.

In the following analysis I will examine (1) workshops, (2) good practice cases, (3) eGovernment
community, (4) eGovernment Awards, (5) target audience and (6) the ePractice.eu portal itself as most
prominent and diverse boundary objects of the eGovernment practitioners network.

According to an illustration by Star & Griesemer (1989) I have developed the following overview shown in
Illustration 1. On the ground layer it depicts the various interests of the interviewed practitioners such as
gaining recognition, improving service delivery, receiving eGovernment news, learning, meeting people,
working in an international environment or project funding acquisition. The next layer shows various
passage points through which the practitioners or other actors perceive the boundary objects. The
passage points listed in the overview include (1) aim to deliver better and more efficient services to
citizens through the use of ICT, (2) knowledge sharing will improve effectiveness and efficiency in
eGovernment or (3) knowledge sharing and learning can take place through good practice cases. The
third layer shows the boundary objects that are going to be discussed in the following.

Depending on their interests actors perceive and construct boundary objects differently. Their passage
point into the network will therefore differ.


BOUNDARY OBJECTS

good
eGovernment ePractice eGov target
practice workshops
community portal Awards audience
cases

PASSAGE POINTS

aim to deliver better knowledge sharing and face-to-face meetings
knowledge sharing will
and more efficient learning can take place are essential in order to
improve effectiveness and
services to citizens through good practice build a notion of
efficiency in eGovernment
through the use of ICT cases community

INTERESTS
enjoy working with
recognition / improving project
eGov news learning meet people international
reputation services acquisition
project partners

Illustration 1: Passage Points and Boundary Objects

In the following each boundary object will be introduced and then analysed according to the statements
the practitioners made in their interviews; these statements are followed by the corresponding
statements of the ePractice.eu team (involved consultants from P.A.U. Education and the European
Commission).

2.1 Workshops

Workshops are coincident boundaries which are described as “common objects which have the same
boundaries but different internal content” (Star & Griesemer, 1989, 410). A workshop has the same
boundaries in terms of time, place, scheduled activities such as presentations and involved actors for
every actor, yet its content differs depending on the actors' role. The differences concerning internal
content can not only be found between practitioners and the ePractice.eu team but also amongst the
practitioners themselves.

The interviewed practitioners view workshops foremostly as means of networking amongst each other
to nurture existing contacts as well as build up new ones for potential project collaboration. “The people
that go to the workshops have an interest in building and nurturing their networks, to bring themselves
6 7
in a good position for further project funding acquisition” (PRA 7).

A further networking aspect targets the European Commission: “It is very useful to have the opportunity
to talk to the people from the Commission in order to find out what they are thinking concerning the EU-
funded projects [...] to get the flavour behind the words” (PRA1).

Another important aspect of the workshops is learning: Learning was given as a reason not only within
the interviews I've conducted but was also stated by almost all participants of workshops I've attended.
Mostly people were eager to know whether others were facing the same problems as they do and how
others were approaching these problems.

6 PRA stands for practitioner
7 It has to be noticed that the workshops which the practitioners reflected upon within the interviews were not
limited to the ones ePractice.eu is conducting. Other workshops such as the ones of the North Sea Region Programme
offer explicit networking opportunities in form of speed dating sessions for project partner search.


On the other hand, as reasons for non-attendance the following were named: (1) language, (2) money
for the travel expenses and (3) a different level of development in eGovernment amongst participants.

The ePractice.eu project team wants the networking aspect to work for the portal and its community
itself. The workshops are regarded as an essential part of ePractice.eu exchange concept, namely the
off-line. In order to gain results such as stronger notion of community, stronger relationship to the portal
and new member acquisition, the workshop conduction is integrated into online pre- and post-
workshop activities. However the ePractice.eu team's challenge lies in the ability to interest people in the
ePractice.eu workshops or the co-branded workshops in order to reach practitioners and make the
networking aspects of workshops work for ePractice.eu.

2.2 Good Practice Cases

As a boundary object a good practice case can be classified as an ideal type. Star & Griesemer (1989)
define ideal types as something that “does not accurately describe the details of any one locality or
thing. It is abstracted from all domains and may be fairly vague” (410). Like the workshops, good
practice cases are boundary objects not only between the practitioners and the ePractice.eu team but
more importantly also amongst the practitioners as a means of communication.

When asked what a good practice case is and how good practice is constituted most practitioners
emphasised its role as a means of (1) learning and (2) communication rather than a means for gaining
reputation, recognition or awards.

Concerning the good practice case's functionality as a learning tool most practitioners criticised the
spinning of information in a case description in order to make it look good. What is perceived as a truly
good practice case is an honest description of problems encountered, even failures, critical success
factors and lessons learnt. Only cases that can be honest are considered to be good practice cases
(PRA1,3,5,9). “The problem you have with most best practice sites is that people will spin the
information. They basically put the best things on: the achievements. They won't talk to us about - what
is just as interesting to us in order to understand the knowledge - what went wrong and what were the
hard things to do. It is good that you might save re-inventing solutions, but actually what you definitely
don't want to do is re-invent problems. And therefore you need to understand both sides of that”
(PRA1).

Another often mentioned must-have-feature is the transferability of good practice cases: Only what is
transferable can be relevant and therefore worth reading. “Nothing should be labelled best practice if
there is no route for others to follow. It is only best practice if you show how others can take it up and if
you show that it is sustainable” (PRA2).

As a means of communication PRA4 and PRA7 point at the immense importance of good practice
cases in order to motivate people. People can be motivated by telling them stories about how others did
it and sceptics can be convinced by showing how far others have gone successfully. PRA1 pointed out
the importance of cross-referencing and the description of the roles of involved stakeholders together
with their contact details.

Whereas for practitioners the notion of learning and motivation is central when defining good practice
cases, they serve a different purpose for the ePractice.eu team in form of a measure of success and
means of portal interactivity: Cases are seen (1) as indicator for “hot” topics through the monitoring of
access and rating, (2) as attractor for visitors and (3) as means of communication amongst the members
through the rating and comment functionalities.

Nevertheless the definition on how a good practice case has to be structured ideally and what it has to
include seems to be quite close. Hence by providing a case structure / template that is appreciated by
the practitioners, the ePractice.eu team ensures the success of their own interests: mainly increase in


interactivity through take-up. The willingness to adapt to the practitioners' needs can be observed for
example in the shift of emphasis towards lessons learnt and transferability of cases (EC1, PRA2, CO3).

2.3 eGovernment Community

The eGovernment community is an ideal type of boundary object. It is an abstraction from several
domains and is quite vague (Star & Griesemer, 1989). Concerning the meaning of eGovernment the
answers of the interviewed practitioners were quite diverse. Although they all agree that eGovernment is
not ICT, they disagree on whether it is on how to use ICT to improve service delivery or how to use ICT
in order to make it more efficient. Effectiveness and efficiency are not exclusive, but for some
practitioners it appears as such. Almost all British interviewees emphasised the shift from eGovernment
towards transformational government and how ICT is shaping the way government is interacting with its
citizens. “Certainly last year the agenda in England has moved to a different stage. It tends to be saying:
Let's stop talking about eGovernment and let's start talking about using technology to deliver better
services. After putting money, time and resources for the past 5 years into the eGovernment
programme the enthusiasm has shifted towards transformational government” (PRA8).

The eGovernment Community of Practice as such does not exist according to the interviews. It is rather
subgroups that are either focussed around specific technologies (e.g. smart cards) or topics (e.g.
participation). One interviewee who emphasised his impression on subgroups that are formed around
the topics created through the EU funding agendas stated: “When the EU says: 'This is the topic', then
everybody is grouping around this topic” (PRA7).

According to the interviews the eGovernment community is quite heterogeneous both in terms of job
roles and academic backgrounds as well as topics and themes. This has to be acknowledged through
the structure in the portal and is attempted to be addressed through a web log tool which ought to
monitor emerging themes and topics that might lead to sub-communities.

2.4 eGovernment Awards

The eGovernment Awards that have been held 2001, 2003, 2005 and 2007 are yet another example for
a coincident boundary. Practitioners have described them in terms of reputation gain: “Winning awards
helps a lot. It raises the profile of the project” (PRA5) but also in terms of better networking
opportunities: “Parallel to eGov Awards there were approaches to exchange knowledge on conferences
and look for co-operations. Those who have been there said: It would be a pity if we would not see us
again. We have been awarded here and in a sense we are the frontrunners of eGovernment. We should
stay in touch. This is how informal networks developed” (PRA7).

The integration of the eGovernment Awards into the ePractice.eu project will raise its profile and ensure
higher interest. This is especially relevant because the launch of the new portal was only 3 months
before the eGovernment Awards in 2007. In this respect the newly launched portal could use the
8
attention drawn to the eGovernment Awards in its full potential.

2.5 Target Audience

The portal's target audience can be seen as yet another ideal type of a boundary object. It can be seen
that it differs quite a lot between practitioners in central government and local authorities as well as in
comparison to the ePractice.eu team.

The construction of the target audience or the audience constructed to benefit most is quite interesting
in so far that most interviewees referred to a different group than themselves when asked. The ones

8 This can also be seen at the very good response rate of new users that are registering. Within the first three
months the registered users went up from 7000 to above 10000.


pointing at the local authority level (PRA4,6,8) all work at central government level, all have participated
in the portal's Kick-off workshop, but do not see themselves as primary target audience.

The practitioners working at local or federal level are constructing the target audience rather through
provided functionalities or benefits than through governmental levels.

The ePractice.eu team promotes the target audience as broadly as possible to include civil servants,
academics and consultants within the field of eGovernment, called eGovernment practitioners. Their
shared interest is the improvement of efficiency and effectiveness in service delivery. But although civil
servants at state level would claim the same interest for themselves, they do not include themselves in
the target audience.

This fits with the findings of the PPP-project were it has been stated that the portability of good practice
cases is higher at local authority level than at central government level, since national projects are wider
in scale, have higher costs, risks and political visibility (EC, 2007c). Therefore the target audience of a
Community of Practice that is primarily concerned with the sharing of good practices and their
portability is rather local government.

2.6 ePractice.eu portal

Like the workshops, the ePractice.eu portal is a coincident boundary object. The practitioners define the
portal over the benefits it might offer them. Firstly the introduction to a community of active
eGovernment practitioners is mentioned. “It strikes me the added value of the exchange portal in
contrast to google is it is introducing you to a community of people. And you might therefore be able to
receive your information through talking in a much more detailed way than it would be possible with sole
documentation over google” (PRA8). “It [ePractice] is a flag. It is a rally place, a meeting place, where
you know that anybody involved in that area will have a similar idea like yours and will be trying to
develop and to bring things forward” (PRA2).

Another benefit is perceived through the opportunity to learn from each other. “You come across
projects in other countries, you come across people that do similar things – so it can be a shared
learning experience” (PRA8).

Furthermore the enabling to take different perspectives has been identified as benefit. “Knowledge
exchange is some kind of follow-up education: Thinking different, developing new ideas, seeing that
somewhere else things work: To see: We could be so much further as we are now” (PRA7).

For the practitioners the benefits of using it constitute their perception of the portal, whereas the
Commissioners try to implement political targets and visions such as the gain of effectiveness and
efficiency through knowledge exchange within the portal and therefore perceive its purpose differently.
Finally the consultants identify the portal primarily with their two year project and the related objectives
such as building an active community through the portal.

The practitioners have mentioned quite a number of potential benefits and it is up to the ePractice.eu
team to decide which route to follow. Ideas of closed sub-communities are quite controversial as well as
the idea of a functionality that enables practitioners to search for new project partners as suggested by
PRA1.

3 Knowledge
The “exchange of good practices” and the “learning from practice” are set objectives for ePractice.eu
(EC, 2007a). In order to exchange good practices and learn from practice knowledge has to be shared
between eGovernment practitioners. In the following I examine the different concepts of knowledge that
exist among eGovernment practitioners and the ePractice.eu team members. The reason being is that


the way the sharing of knowledge is conceptualised, depends on the way knowledge itself is
conceptualised (Hayes and Walsham, 2003).

Furthermore, only through an analysis of the eGovernment practitioners’ perception of knowledge it is
possible to judge the appropriateness of the approach chosen by ePractice.eu.

3.1 Conceptualising knowledge

Among the practitioners the concept of knowledge as being situated was predominant: Explicit
knowledge which can be expressed in good practice case descriptions can not be separated from the
9
tacit knowledge one needs to understand the case. Most practitioners referred to face-to-face
communication if wanting to learn from a case.

Knowledge is been conceptualised as something embedded in a practice. It cannot be seen apart from
the specific organisational and project settings in which it was acquired. Therefore knowledge, if it ought
to be transferred from one organisation to another has to be regarded in its original, 'practical' context.
According to the findings of the PPP project the external and internal project environment has to be
taken into account if judging about the transferability of a good practice case (EC, 2007c).

When asking the practitioners what knowledge is or how they would define it all referred to a practical
usage of knowledge: “Knowledge has to be about the application of information to your particular
circumstances. So understand how this information is relevant and support things in your area” (PRA1).
Knowledge is not seen as something static, but it is constantly changing through learning. Furthermore
it has been emphasised that knowledge is linked with experience.

According to most practitioners knowledge is related to the situational context: All information has
therefore to be related and translated to the specific circumstances.

3.2 Knowledge sharing

What was relevant for good practice cases is relevant for knowledge sharing: There has to be a certain
level of trust in order to report honestly about project mistakes and problems. What is seen as the most
valuable part of knowledge sharing is the sharing of project insights and experiences concerning critical
success factors, problems and mistakes: “Knowledge sharing is avoiding hitting the same stone twice”
(PRA3).

PRA1 and PRA2 emphasised the fact that knowledge sharing can only take place on the same level of
expertise. “Knowledge exchange has to take place between equals. It takes too long to bring new
people at the same level, to the same problems you're in. So you can't really talk about the
10
problems/issues you're facing” (PRA1).

3.3 Knowledge transfer

If knowledge transfer ought to be successful the embeddedness of projects and good practices has to
be taken into account. PRA7 emphasised the need to acknowledge preconditions that are given in
every organisation. Good practices cannot simply be transferred from one setting into another, but their

9 The notion of tacit knowledge was introduced by Polanyi, 1966. Tacit knowledge is seen as highly personal and
difficult to communicate: it is embedded in the individual experience (such as the knowledge of how to ride a bike) and
concerns mental models and beliefs. Tacit knowledge refers to taken-for-granted assumptions about the world. In
contrast explicit knowledge is defined as articulable and objective. This knowledge is codifiable and therefore storable in
databases and libraries. Hence, Polanyi states that “We can know more than we can tell” (Polanyi, 1966: 4).
10 This idea of having to be equal in terms of experience and knowledge in order to share knowledge effectively
might be interesting to examine regarding Lave's & Wenger's (1991) concept of legitimate peripheral participation as a
way to become a member of a Community of Practice through situated learning. However the limits of time and space
as well as the focus of the dissertation did leave room for such an analysis and investigation.


ideas have to be translated to requirements of the organisation / setting it ought to be transferred to
PRA1 therefore suggested to develop cross cutting issues in projects rather than specific services that
are deployed differently in different countries.

Since knowledge and its transfer are embedded in a practice, practitioners said that most effective
learning takes place in project settings. “Hands on; getting hands dirty is the best way to learn” (PRA2).

3.4 Implications

Two implications shall be mentioned here: Firstly, the situated approach to knowledge defines
ePractice.eu as a means for knowledge sharing that can only be used in its full potential if the tacit
knowledge component is taken into account. This implies, secondly, that the knowledge that ought to
be shared has to be seen in regard to its practice – yet that the knowledge sharing is conducted in
Communities of Practice most successfully.

The first implication has been addressed through the increase of workshops where best practice cases
are going to be presented and discussed as a means of off-line knowledge exchange. Furthermore it
has been tried to implement certain aspects such as the need for transferability into the case
description. Transferability has been furthermore made a requirement for getting a good or even best
practice label.

The second implication is meant to be met by shifting the exchange paradigm from the focus on good
practice cases (in the eGovernment Good Practice Framework, previous project) to a focus on the
individual (in the current ePractice.eu project). This is intended to be accomplished by applying Web 2.0
technologies as well as introducing the notion of Community of Practice and following this approach
and its recommendations regarding knowledge sharing and learning.

4 Communities of Practice
Wenger et al. (2002) have written a book on how to develop a Community of Practice taking the findings
of their research and developing a practical guide. This is, however, no theory that guarantees the
successful “production” of a Community of Practice if followed. Hence it needs to be acknowledged
that Communities of Practice can only be researched when already in place and therefore
retrospectively.

Therefore my analysis does not and cannot provide sufficient evidence of whether there will be a
Community of Practice developing or just a Community of Interest or Network since ePractice.eu is in
the process of being established. Nevertheless some statements can be made upon the three pillars
domain, community and practice of which a community is constituted:

(1) Domain

The domain of interest can be described as (a) the issues around IT enabled change in public sector
organisation and IT enabled projects and (b) initiatives to further effectiveness and efficiency in service
delivery. The interviews conducted have shown that most practitioners can relate to either one of the
objectives: more effective or more efficient service delivery through the use of ICT.

Before people belong to a global community they belong to a local one (Wenger et al., 2002). In the
11 12
researched network, people belong not only to local communities such as SOCITM or V-ICT-OR but

11
SOCITM is the professional association for public sector ICT management in the UK. See also
http://www.socitm.gov.uk.
12
V-ICT-OR is a Belgian ICT association for local authorities. See also http://www.v-ict-or.be. SOCITM as well as
V-ICT-OR are members of LOLA (Linked Organisation of Local Authorities ICT Societies; http://www.lola-online.org).


also to functional small communities for example the smart card community. Furthermore, there seem
to be several networks of people planning and conducting EU-funded projects together.

The kind of job that the practitioners I have interviewed conduct varies quite dramatically. Some work in
central government and are concerned with policy-making and networking with local authorities or local
organisations (PRA4, PRA6, PRA8). Those working at a local government level differ a lot. Some work
on projects within a specific field (PRA2, PRA5, PRA11) whilst others are more in a role of an ICT
manager (PRA1, PRA7, PRA9), but are conducting projects as well.

Although all work is in the field of eGovernment, their jobs do not only vary in regard to a specific field in
eGovernment but also to their role within projects within the specific fields. The notion of boundary
objects and its analysis has shown one way to overcome differences between groups and communities,
but it also shows how difficult it is to establish a community that has a common understanding of its
domain.

(2) Community

According to Wenger et al. (2002) people that are already networking need to be found and motivated
by the potential benefits such a Community of Practice can provide. The ePractice.eu team has found
the potential members in the networks of the eGovernment Good Practice Framework as well as the
network including the subscribers of the eGovernment Observatory newsletter. All have been informed
about the new initiative and invited to participate in order to benefit from sharing.

To disseminate the new initiative several channels have been chosen: (1) the ePractice.eu portal, (2)
ePractice.eu workshops, (3) ePractice.eu newsletter, (4) the eGovernment Awards, (5) co-branding
other workshops and events.

The culture and atmosphere of the eGovernment community is referred to as collaborative and positive
by most interviewed practitioners. “Quite a nice, collaborative atmosphere. Quite nice environment to be
part of. You always have a few ideas about what you could and want to do after a workshop” (PRA2).
One practitioner spoke about a community of trust: “What you do find if you meet people and you talk
and then you find trust to talk about difficulties as well” (PRA5).

As outlined in the boundary object “target audience” the interviewees working in central government do
not regard themselves as a target group. They believe it is the local authorities that will profit and benefit
most from sharing. The practitioners working at local or federal level are constructing the target
audience (themselves as local or federal level) rather through provided functionalities or benefits as
discussed in the ePractice.eu portal section.

(3) Practice

In order to establish a common practice, common knowledge needs have to be identified. The
ePractice.eu team is addressing this for example through surveys among the participants of the
workshops, through a blog tool at the portal and the monitoring of the good practice cases.

So far the practice in the eGovernment community might be depicted in the good practice cases that
include lessons learnt. Since the Community of Practice is in the evolving stage it is difficult to describe a
particular practice. However, a suggestion by the ePractice.eu-team first defines a “sector” and then
within a “domain” of either eGovernment, eHealth or eInclusion certain “topics”. In how far and which of
these “topics” will constitute practices within Communities of Practice has to be seen.


5 Conclusion and recommendations
Within my research it could be shown that small sub-communities focussing either on technologies (e.g.
smart cards) or topics (e.g. participation) might emerge if not already in place. The key findings of the
analysis for the current state of the ePractice.eu network can be summarised as follows:

− Most interviewed actors share a common goal: to improve service delivery and citizen
satisfaction through the use of ICT.
− All interviewed actors believe in the advantages of knowledge sharing and exchange within a
known community.
− Some interviewed practitioners see their interests represented in the portal or they see
opportunities/benefits the portal might provide.
The analysis of the concept of knowledge that can be found amongst the practitioners showed that the
situated knowledge approach is predominant. This has led to the conclusion that the Community of
Practice approach is the most appropriate one in order to facilitate knowledge sharing: Since
knowledge is perceived as being situated and embedded into practice, the conduction of workshops
and the emphasis on transferability of good practice cases are leading in the right direction.

The concept of boundary objects helped to identify the diverse perceptions of different actors. Currently
it is open what role the different boundary objects will play in the future and how their translation is going
to be stabilised. Therefore the management of the boundary objects will clearly be a key success factor
for enabling the building of the Community of Practice. This management regarding the discussed
boundary objects includes:

(1) to ensure that workshops provide topics that are of interest to the practitioners and thereby to
facilitate the networking aspect of workshops through on-line and off-line devices,
(2) to acknowledge the practitioners' needs to network not only to exchange knowledge but also to
develop new projects and find new project partners through the portal's on-line and off-line
devices (such as project partner speed dating devices),
(3) to ensure that good practice cases meet the demand of the practitioners concerning honesty,
lessons learnt and transferability,
(4) to acknowledge that eGovernment as such is too broad as a topic and that practitioners see
themselves rather as members of a local community or a small community focussed on a
specific topic or technology,
(5) to ensure that the beneficial recognition of the eGovernment Awards is fully used,
(6) to focus around practitioners at local and federal government level rather than central
government because projects at the local level are much more likely to be transferable, and
(7) to let the practitioners drive the functionality of the portal and decide thereby what kind of
community they need in order to further the common objective to improve effectiveness and
efficiency in service delivery through ICT.
6 Future research
The study I have conducted lead to first insights into the field of how a distributed Community of
Practice in the public sector might evolve facilitated by Web 2.0 functionality. In order to get a better
understanding and explanation on the developing network around ePractice.eu a longitudinal study is
needed. With the gained insights from my research a questionnaire could be developed to validate the
findings.

Another interesting approach to further research would be the inclusion of practitioners from the new EU
member states. Their perception of the boundary objects and interests into the network might be quite


different from the old member state practitioners considering the different levels of the countries'
eGovernment maturity and lead to different results concerning the boundary objects and the notion of
knowledge sharing.

References
Briers, M. & Fong Chua, W. (2001). The role of actor-networks and boundary objects in management
accounting change: a field study of an implementation of activity-based costing. Accounting,
Organizations and Society, 26, (237-269).

European Commission (2007a). e-Government. Retrieved February 27, 2007 from
http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/eeurope/2005/all_about/egovernment/index_en.htm

European Commission (2007c). High-level report - Provide e-Government Good Practice Portability.
PPP project report: C517499.

European Commission, S 177-187995 (2006). Call for tenders quot;Service contract for good practice
servicesquot;. Retrieved March 17, 2007 from
http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/egovernment_research/doc/gp_call_for_tender/b_tend
er_spec_200621_en.pdf

Hayes, N. & Walsham, G. (2003). Knowledge Sharing and ICTs: A Relational Perspective. In: Easterby-
Smith, M. & Lyles, M. (Eds.). Handbook of Organizational Learning and Knowledge. Blackwell: Oxford.
(54-77).

Hildreth, P., Kimble, C. & Wright, P. (2000). Communities of practice in the distributed international
environment. Journal of Knowledge Management, 4, (27).

Lave, J. & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated Learning. Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge
University Press: New York.

Polanyi, M. (1966). The Tacit Dimension. Routledge: London.

Star, S. & Griesemer, J.R. (1989). Institutional ecology 'translations' and boundary objects: amateurs
and professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-39. Social Studies of Science, 19,
(387-420).

Wenger, E. (2007). Communities of Practice: A brief Introduction. Retrieved March 17, 2007 from
http://www.ewenger.com/theory/index.htm

Wenger, E., McDermott, R.A. & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating Communities of Practice: A Guide to
Managing Knowledge. Harvard Business School Press: Boston.


Authors The European Journal of ePractice
is a digital publication on eTransformation by
Juliane Jarke ePractice.eu, a portal created by the
Student MA Philosophy European Commission to promote the
University of Hamburg sharing of good practices in eGovernment,
http://www.epractice.eu/people/julianejarke eHealth and eInclusion.

Edited by P.A.U. Education, S.L.

Web: www.epracticejournal.eu
Email: editorial@epractice.eu

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journal, unless otherwise indicated, are
subject to a Creative Commons Attribution-
Noncommercial-NoDerivativeWorks 2.5
licence. They may be copied, distributed
and broadcast provided that the author and
the e-journal that publishes them, European
Journal of ePractice, are cited. Commercial
use and derivative works are not permitted.
The full licence can be consulted on
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