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72 MANAGING KNOWLEDGE WORK AND INNOVATION

In the next sections two contentious episodes that nearly caused the derailment
of Uni’s ERP project are described. These episodes have been selected because they
illustrate the kinds of factions that one might typically come in contact with during
large software projects where multiple stakeholder groups and knowledge workers are
involved in the implementation. The first episode adopts an internal-external perspec-
tive which is important to consider in light of the growing trend for contractual rela-
tionships between client organizations and external experts such as software vendors.
Whereas the second episode concentrates on the goals of knowledge workers who
share broadly in the university mission but also have unique aims, goals and ways of
working.

>> UNI-CONSULTCO CONFLICT

The Uni-ConsultCo strategic partnership was created to benefit both parties through
the development of a higher education ERP suite. This product would form the basis
of Uni’s administrative infrastructure and would help ConsultCo enter an untapped
vertical market. ConsultCo sought the industry expertise of Uni in order to help the
software vendor modify their government/public sector ERP product to meet univer-
sity needs. The result would be the creation of a new product which both Uni and
ConsultCo would continue to fine-tune over time through migrations to new releases
of the ERP product. Through coordinated action Uni and ConsultCo were expecting
to achieve this common aim because alone neither had all the necessary skills to cre-
ate a higher education enterprise solution.
However, during the first two years of the project ConsultCo failed to become
enrolled in the project to the extent that Uni expected – being largely absent from
the project site:
I had a sense that [ConsultCo] didn’t even staff this thing for a year . . . when I
asked questions at a cocktail party like . . . ‘how big is your staff now?’ [I’d learn] . . .
it’s up to two people. They would catch themselves and say ‘No, no, no . . . We’ve
got seven now’. Then they’d reveal things like ‘we assigned our first person in
April ’98’.
Uni felt the level of resources provided by ConsultCo were inadequate and a misrepresen-
tation of their partnership agreement and struggled to move forward because of this:
. . . Without the [ConsultCo] guys here with us we were still talking philosophies and
strategies . . . and had not even set up the system and figured out the decisions that
needed to be made.
The lack of resources provided by ConsultCo was understandable, given that Uni
represented one client within a small vertical market which had limited growth
opportunities; and they staffed the project to reflect this. ConsultCo approached
development as a modification to their government package which they wanted to
do in the most efficient manner possible so that they could see the highest return
on investment given the market potential. Over time, those on the Uni team came
to realize this:

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