Communities of practice: control or autonomy?

The purpose of this paper is to address the question of how two seemingly opposite principles – managerial control and autonomy – simultaneously affect, positively and negatively, managers’ motivation to develop together innovative practices in a community of practice (the Custoprog community).

A single-case study was conducted in the Custoprog community, during which 22 semi-directive interviews with Custoprog members were conducted over a period of eight months. Members are all EuroAirport middle managers of EuroAirport (a Western Europe international airport).

The findings highlight how Custoprog members experience the conflicting situation of enjoying some autonomy (granted by top management), while being subjected to some degree of managerial control. Our results focus on how these two opposite principles (control and autonomy) simultaneously (positively as well as negatively) affect the motivation of Custoprog members to develop innovative practices together.

The study is limited by the scope of the sample. Further research conducted in multiple communities of practice (CoPs) may therefore be useful for comparability purposes, and to generalize our results.

We provide a set of practical recommendations to steer CoPs effectively, by achieving a delicate balance between control and autonomy.

Our investigation contributes to understanding the strategic benefits of using CoPs as an informal means of developing and diffusing customer-related innovative practices.