Research teams as complex systems and implications for reseach governance

The recent increase in research collaboration creates the need to better understand the interaction between individual researchers and the collaborative team. The paper elaborates the conceptualisation of research teams as complex systems which emerge out of the local interactions of individual researchers operating in their local research groups, and which exhibit different dynamics: the local, the global dynamics, and the contextual dynamics. This conceptualisation provides unique insights on research governance of distributed teams: (1) the internal operations of some teams are more sensitive to external events than others (2) conflicts emerge as a mismatch of governance structures at the different levels in which a team operates; (3) teams of high complexity have additional coordination needs, which can be fulfilled by the use of ICTs. Recommendations are drawn for both science policy and research management.