Interorganizational Information Exchange

Interorganizational information systems-information systems that connect two or more organizations-require collaborative agreements among independent companies and organizations. Such agreements can be successful only if all parties have a clear idea of the goals, benefits, costs, and risks of working together.

The creation of collaborative agreements requires many joint meetings in which the parties make their goals and objectives clear and decide how best to share information and other resources. During your career, you may be asked to participate is such meetings. You should understand a few basic guidelines before participating.

First, when you meet with employees of another company, realize that you must apply stronger limits on your conversation than when you meet with employees in your own firm. For all you know, the company you are meeting with may become your strongest competitor.

In general, you should assume that whatever you say to an employee of another company could be general knowledge in your industry the next day. Of course, the goal of such meetings is to develop a collaborative relationship, and you cannot accomplish that goal without saying something. The best strategy, however, is to reveal exactly what you must reveal and no more. Before you meet with another company, you and your team should have a clear and common understanding of the purpose of the meeting.

Your team needs to agree beforehand on the topics that are to be addressed and those that are to be avoided. Relationships often develop in stages: Two companies meet, establish one level of understanding, meet again with another level of understanding, and so forth, feeling one another out on the way to some type of relationship. You may be asked to sign a nondisclosure agreement. Such agreements are contracts that stipulate the responsibilities of each party in protecting the other's proprietary information.

Such agreements vary in length; some are a page long and some are 30 pages long. You need to understand the policy of your organization with regard to such agreements before the meeting starts. Sometimes, companies exchange their standard nondisclosure agreements before the meeting so that the respective legal departments can review and approve the agreements ahead of time. In your remarks, stick to the purpose of the meeting.

Avoid conversations about your company or about third parties that do not relate to the meeting topic. You never know the agenda of the other party; you never know what other companies they are meeting; and you never know what other information about your company they may want. Realize that a meeting isn't over until it's over. The meeting is still underway in the hallway waiting for the elevator. It's still underway at lunch. And it's still underway as you share a cab to the airport.

By the way, the only two topics in an elevator should be the weather and the number of the floor you want. Don't embarrass yourself or the employees of the other company by discussing in a public place anything other than the weather. All of these suggestions may seem paranoid, but even paranoid companies have competitors.

There is simply no reason, other than carelessness or stupidity, to discuss topics with another company that do not relate to the matter at hand. Your company will assume enough risk just setting up the interorganizational system. Don't add to that risk by making gratuitous comments about your or any other company

Discussion Questions

1. Suppose you are asked to attend a meeting with your suppliers to discuss the sharing of your sales data. You have no idea as to the specific purpose of the meeting, why you were invited, or what will be expected of you What should you do?

2. Suppose you flew 1,500 miles for a meeting and at the start of the meeting the other company asks you to sign a nondisclosure statement You knew nothing about the need to sign such an agreement. What do you do?

3. Some companies have an open, democratic style with lots of collaboration and open discussion. Others are closed and authoritarian, and employees wait to be told what to do. Describe what will happen when employees from two such companies meet. What can be done to improve the situation?

4. Suppose during lunch an employee of another company asks you, "What are you all doing about social networking monitoring?" Assume that this topic has little to do with the purpose of your meeting. You think about it and decide that it doesn't seem too risky to respond, so you say, "Not much." What information have you conveyed by this statement? What is a better way to respond to the question?

5. Suppose you are in a joint meeting and you are asked, "So who else are you working with on this problem?" Describe guidelines you could use in deciding how to answer this question.

6. Explain the statement, "A meeting isn't over until it's over." How might this statement pertain to other meetings-say, a job interview?

7. Reread this guide in the context of a virtual meeting, say a Webinar. Webinars can be recorded, and you never know for sure who is in the meeting. How do the principles expressed in this guide change in the context of a Webinar?