Collaborative Spaces at Work: Innovation, Creativity and Relations

Collaborative spaces are more than physical locations of work and production. They present strong identities centered on collaboration, exchange, sense of community, and co-creation, which are expected to create a physical and social atmosphere that facilitates positive social interaction, knowledge sharing, and information exchange. This book explores the complex experiences and social dynamics that emerge within and between collaborative spaces and how they impact, sometimes unexpectedly, on creativity and innovation.

Collaborative Spaces at Work is timely and relevant: it will address the gap in critical understandings of the role and outcomes of collaborative spaces. Advancing the debate beyond regional development rhetoric, the book will investigate, through various empirical studies, if and how collaborative spaces do actually support innovation and the generation of new ideas, products, and processes.

The book is intended as a primary reference in creativity and innovation, workspaces, knowledge and creative workers, and urban studies. Given its short chapters and strong empirical orientation, it will also appeal to policy makers interested in urban regeneration, sustaining innovation, and social and economic development, and to managers of both collaborative spaces and companies who want to foster creativity within larger organizations. It can also serve as a textbook in master’s degrees and PhD courses on innovation and creativity, public management, urban studies, management of work, and labor relations.

Fabrizio Montanari is Associate Professor of Organization Studies at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy, where he is Scientific Coordinator of OPERA, a Research Unit specialized in the study of creativity and innovation. He is also an Adjunct Professor at Bocconi University. He has been a Visiting Professor at Copenhagen Business School, Johannes Kepler University of Linz, University of Leicester, and WU Vienna. His research focuses on the relational and contextual determinants of creativity, particularly on how cities could create a breeding ground for creative ecosystems. His work appeared in journals such as Human Relations, Journal of Economic Journal, Journal of Management Studies, Organization Studies, and Urban Studies.

Elisa Mattarelli is an Associate Professor at San Jose State University, USA. She worked at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy, and was a visiting scholar at Stanford University and the University of Arizona, USA. Her research interests include team dynamics, identity processes, and technology use in distributed and knowledge-intensive organizational contexts. Her work appeared in journals such as Organization Science, Human Relations, Journal of Management Studies, Organization Studies, and Research Policy.

Anna Chiara Scapolan – PhD in Management, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice – is Associate Professor at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy. Her main research activities concern organizational behavior, human resource management, and organizational solutions for creativity and innovation. Her work appeared in journals such as European Journal of Innovation Management, Urban Studies, Organization Studies, International Journal of Human Resource Management, and European Management Journal.