O USO DE COMUNIDADES DE PRÁTICA VIRTUAIS (VCOPS) PARA FINS DE INOVAÇÃO SEGUNDO PERCEPÇÃO DE SEUS MEMBROS/USING VCOPS FOR INNOVATION AS PERCEIVED BY ITS MEMBERS

• Published in: Perspectivas em gestão & conhecimento Vol. 7; p. 109
• Main Authors: Wilbert, Julieta Kaoru Watanabe, de Oliveira, Isabela Cristini Gonçalves, Steil, Andrea Valéria, Dandolini, Gertrudes Aparecida, de Souza, João Artur
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: Portuguese
• Published: João Pessoa Universidade Federal da Paraiba, Centro de Ciencias Sociais Aplicadas 01.03.2017
• Subjects: Communities of practice; Innovations; Public sector
• ISSN: 2236-417X

Virtual Communities of Practice (VCoPs) have attracted the interest of researchers for their potential use in the context of innovation. Some authors mention this possibility, yet there are still few reports of VCoPs being used as facilitators of innovation processes. Among them, research in the public health sector are prominent. They demystify the popular belief that the lack of competition in the public sector does not encourage their organizations to adopt practices that promote innovation. After noting that innovations through VCoPs occur in a large Brazilian company of the public sector, the issue was examined further by investigating the perception of VCoPs' members in this organization about the potential of its use for the purpose of innovation. The study was guided by the interpretive paradigm. The data collection was carried through interviews with nine members of VCoPs that generated innovations in the company. The analysis involved the structural codification of the data and subsequent categorization. The result showed that the respondents realize that VCoPs have a great potential to support innovation processes and they identified three conditions for this to occur: the organizational context, the dynamics of the communities, and the behavior of the people (members and moderators). The article affirms, in the context of the current study, some points that are presented in the international literature for being conditions that promote the use of VCoPs for innovation, for example, the broad support of the organization to VCoPs, the availability of appropriate technology, and the presence of members and moderators active and open to innovation.