The value of boundary spanners for (inter-)organizational performance: a systematic review on activities, antecedents and outcomes

Boundary spanning is considered to be a core activity of today’s public management. According to the literature, boundary spanners are of vital importance for enhancing (inter-)organizational performance and innovation, for... [ view full abstract ]

Boundary spanning is considered to be a core activity of today’s public management. According to the literature, boundary spanners are of vital importance for enhancing (inter-)organizational performance and innovation, for establishing inter-organizational collaboration and for dealing with complex cross-boundary issues. The concept of boundary spanning has its roots in organizational literature and is increasingly used in public administration. However, we lack a comprehensive overview, interdisciplinary assessment, and conceptualisation of boundary spanning activities (BSA), their antecedents and impact. We therefore conducted a systematic literature review based on the PRISMA approach (Moher et al., 2009), using the search terms ‘boundary spanning’ and ‘boundary spanners’ in study title and/or abstract. This resulted in an analysis of 249 empirical articles reporting on boundary spanners, their activities, antecedents and/or outcomes. Literature in various fields are included in this analysis. In this way the public administration literature on boundary spanning is enhanced by a.o. incorporating the insights from business administration, marketing and organizational psychology on boundary spanning. The first contribution of this paper is theoretical: conceptualizing different BSA and providing a comprehensive definition. Furthermore, given the fragmented field on antecedents and outcomes of BSA, our second contribution is to provide an overview of different types of antecedents reported in the literature as well as various outcomes of BSA. We conclude our paper with a theoretical framework and research agenda for next steps in investigating which antecedents are impacting on BSA and in turn influence (inter-)organizational outcomes.