Unfolding the Process of Working with a New Group of Stakeholders: A Case of Public Procurement of Innovation in the City of Guelph

Date

2020-03-17

Authors

Talebi, Alireza

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

University of Guelph

Abstract

In 2016, the City of Guelph launched a program (CAP) for public procurement of innovation (PPI), containing three projects to engage a new group of stakeholders (start-ups) to address complex procurement issues. By composing three papers related to this program the objective here is to explore and explain the process of working and engaging with start-ups in the context of PPI projects. In the first paper, Collaborative Value Creation framework is used as a theoretical foundation to examine value creation in the context of temporary collaborative projects for PPI. The results indicate the evolution of collaboration in program phases. The case demonstrates that the values are interrelated and built upon each other as the program progresses. In order to better describe the process of working with a new group of stakeholders, in the second paper, I describe how governance evolves during the four phases of the CAP projects. The results demonstrate that a multi-level perspective is a more appropriate framework to study the governance of projects in PPI, since several aspects of governance interact at different levels and that agents and opportunities change at each stage. The results support the notion of a multilevel perspective on socio-technical transitions and provide evidence that, even in the instance of temporary PPI projects, governance is layered. In the first paper, it is noted that including start-ups as a new group of stakeholders in projects is a challenging task, requiring capabilities to be developed. Therefore, in the third paper, the goal is to identify and explain the mechanisms in developing capabilities to work with a new group of stakeholders given the context of the PPI projects. Developing capabilities for engaging start-ups in the PPI process is an instance of engaging external stakeholders in projects. I use a theoretical framework suggested by Behnam et al. (2018) embracing four capabilities to incorporate stakeholders in projects. The data analysis demonstrates three capabilities – namely, networking, competence mapping, and relational. The data also showed the extension of the competence mapping and relational capabilities. Lastly, CMO (context-mechanism-outcome) configuration is used to explain capabilities generated by the interaction of context and mechanisms in three stages of the projects.

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Keywords

Capabilities, City of Guelph, Civic Accelerator Program, Collaboration, Context, Governance, Innovation, Local government, Mechanism, Outcome, Project, Public procurement, Realist evaluation, Realistic evaluation, Stakeholders, Start-up engagement, Start-ups, Startups, Value creation

Citation