Platform evolution in large inter-organizational collaborative research programs

We examine the role of platform sponsors and program managers in evolving a platform to stimulate inter-organizational collaboration in large research programs. Through a 5-year longitudinal case study, we analyzed a large inter-organizational collaborative research program in England, underpinned by the CLAHRC platform, sponsored by the NIHR. The research program attracted clinical academics in universities and clinical practitioners in a range of healthcare providers to collaborate in an ensemble of projects to drive evidence-based care for patients with long-term health conditions. Program managers struggled to facilitate collaboration through the platform, despite a highly decentralized governance approach. Our study identifies three mechanisms through which the platform sponsor and program managers revised the platform's governance strategies to enhance collaboration: (i) they instituted “interruptive events,” which routinely stopped projects, and analyzed if and why organizations struggle to collaborate; (ii) they expanded, rather than restricted, access rules for collaboration through “platform renting”; (iii) they re-distributed, rather than re-centralized, governance, to reduce unnecessary interdependences across collaborators attracted by the platform.