Individuals Who Build Solutions Across Boundaries for Environmental Remediation and Nuclear Waste Disposal - 16204

This paper profiles individuals who shifted from developing solutions primarily from within one organization to across multiple organizations for decisions requiring input from multiple parties. These individuals are engineers and scientists who work as government employees or government contractors. This paper contains six areas of discussion: 1. Why individuals build solutions across organizational boundaries, 2. The results they achieve, 3. Supporting skills and personal characteristics, 4. Means to build solutions across boundaries, 5. How they enlist others to participate, and 6. The importance of a catalyst. This paper is based on three sources of information. The primary source are interviews with nine engineers and scientists with direct experience building solutions across organizational boundaries in the fields of environmental remediation or nuclear energy/waste management and disposal. The second source are selected research studies. The third source is the author's experience both as a government employee and a consultant. The author's hope is that this paper will strengthen people's desire and ability to engage multiple parties in decisions requiring their input. (authors)