Excerpt from Information Flow in an R& D Laboratory

Several recent studies (Shilling and Bernard, 1964, Allen, 1964, 1966b, 1966c) of industrial and government scientists and engineers have shown an inverse relation between extra-organizational communication, contrasting with a direct relation between intra-organizational communication, and performance. A related study of academic scientists (Hagstrom, 1965) in which the organization (an academic department) appears to occupy a subsidiary position to a more inclusive social system ("invisible college" or academic discipline), and where the communication process measured was external to the first entity but internal to the second shows a strong positive relation between the extent of communication and performance. Moreover, in the instances in which external communication bears an unfruitful relation to performance, there is evidence that it is not this communication, per se, which degrades performance but other factors, such as lack of necessary knowledge on the part of the engineer or scientist seeking information. The internal channels are better able to compensate for this deficiency, than are external ones.

Applying the rationale of a shared coding scheme produces a rather simple and straightforward explanation. In industrial and governmental situations, the laboratory organization dominates the scene. These organizations demand a degree of loyalty and affiliation far outweighing that required by academic departments. In addition, the members of industrial and governmental organizations acquire through common experience, and organizational imposition, shared coding schemes or common ways of ordering the world, that can be quite different from the schemes held by other members of their particular discipline.

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