To better grasp the extraregional dimension of regional clustering, recent literature has focused on the nexus between clustering and Global Production Networks, employing the notion of ‘strategic coupling’. An intricate question remains what strategic coupling means for cluster governance and leadership. How do interventions geared towards strategic coupling engage with the myriad of organically grown external links of local businesses and organisations? What kind of intelligence is required for such interventions, and how is the gathering of intelligence organised? This presentation, using evidence from a Dutch cluster initiative, adresses these and other issues.

1. Orchestrating ‘Strategic Coupling’: A Shared, Place-Based
Leadership Approach of Regional Cluster Governance
SDIN Conference | Friday March 11, 2016

2. ‘STRATEGIC COUPLING’
15-03-162 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

3. ‘STRATEGIC COUPLING’ (I)
15-03-16m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl3
 place-based local interests (space of dependence, SoD)
 build-up of localised advanced assets
 Local to Global Production Networks (spaces of engagement, SoE)

4. ‘STRATEGIC COUPLING’ (II)
15-03-16m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl4
 Positionality:
1. places plugged in urban networks (core-periphery)
2. plugged into global corporate hierarchies (control, production or relay centres)
3. places as market contexts/’fabrics’ (socio-institutional bearers of market conventions)

5. ‘STRATEGIC COUPLING’ (III)
15-03-16m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl5
 Beyond innovation as mantra/dogma:
1. a key condition for current processes of value creation and capturing
2. a feeder of attitudes of entrepreneurship and reflexivity
3. a repertoire of widely resources and practices focused on entrepreneurship and innovation
circulating amongst individual businesses and their networks

6. ENTREPRENEURIAL DISCOVERY
15-03-166 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

7. ENTREPRENEURIAL
DISCOVERY (1)
 capacity to explore and
pitch entrepreneurial ideas
and acquire support
 pre-cognitive,
intuitive and even
speculative elements
 certain hubs are
‘naturally’ endowed with ED
(connectivity threshold)
 ‘ecosystem’ change:
room for informality,
accidental
encounters and
serendipity
15-03-167 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

8. ENTREPRENEURIAL
DISCOVERY (II)
 many places face a serious
challenge to go beyond;
 established practices
and risk-averse
behaviour
 usual suspects,
channels of
communication and
decision-making
 copycat scripts, magic
bullets, and clichés
 classical, phased,
accountable policy
cycles
15-03-168 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

9. SIGNIFICATION
15-03-169 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

10. SYNERGY KNOWLEDGE
 embodied, situated, dialogical,
reflexive knowledge with
strategic and tactical
ramifications (in view of the
SoD-SoE nexus) > ‘intelligence’
 facts, data and observations,
interpreted through models,
stories and images, resulting in
visions and recommendations
 combining strategic and
communicative rationalities
 importance of local ‘peers’ (as
communicative and political
arena)
 significant rather than
substantive knowledge
(Crevoisier & Hugues)
15-03-1610 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

11. LEADERSHIP
15-03-1611 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

12. LEADERSHIP (I)
 emerging and perceiving
local SoDs, scanning and
navigating SoEs, facilitating
review, dialogue, intelligence
 “Leadership thus is a
multi-tier activity that has
the aim of creating ‘capacity
to act’ “path dependent”,
with regional protagonists
in the role of “system
thinkers, boundary
spanners, conceptualizers
and connectors” (Sotarauta
et al.) > distributed,
(de)centred
15-03-1612 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

13. LEADERSHIP (II)
 players versus relations:
“never-ending interplay
between the collective and
individual” (Sotarauta)
 openness versus rule-
setting: members, modes of
communication
 strategy versus
emergence: moderately
conservative
 inside-out versus outside-
in: SoD ><SoE
 common identity versus
individual reputations
(we<>me)
15-03-1613 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

14. THE REDMEDTECH-HIGHWAY CASE
15-03-1614 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

15. FRAMING
 scaling up existing TW-
NY collabs + Brainport (&
Leuven,Aachen)
 framing {internally and
externally}: strength in
numbers. R256: "in search of
critical mass“. 'Borrowed-
size'-strategy
 poor (sub)regional
relational anchoring
'masked' aka. compensated
by unifying brand
15-03-1615 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

16. EX-ANTE
INSTITUTIONALI-
ZATION
 building upon momentum
= national recognition &
sense of urgency ► RMT-H;
 a 'hollow' brand?
 a preemptive
representation
 a purely tactical take
on positionality
 a destabilizing force
 a ‘trickle down
conditionality’
15-03-1616 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

17. 5-DIMENSIONAL
GAME OF CHESS
 signification process = 5-
dimensional game of chess:
 the Topteam
assessment
 the HealthValley
Businessplan
 the RedMedTech
Highway Strategy
Report
 the City of Nijmegen
2020 Innovation
Agenda
 the City Region's
unified branding
attempt
 asynchronous, multi-
contextual, political
15-03-1617 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

18. LEADERSHIP –
AMBIVALENCES (I)
 CH1: mobilisation is key
 CH2: peer review “is
open source”, but
participant pre-selection +
different ranks probabilityⱷ
of inclusion | primary orⱷ
secondary appraisal
 somewhat nullified as
signification =
iterative process
15-03-1618 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

19. LEADERSHIP –
AMBIVALENCES (II)
 CH3: long-term
commitment vs. flexibility
 CH4: breaking free from
path-dependency | regional
entity vs. thematic network
| cross-border mentality
 CH5: steering clear of
sub-regional claims to
ownership | limiting overt
bureaucratic behavior |
safeguarding individual
identity
15-03-1619 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

20. CONCLUSIONS
15-03-16
 understand local action (tactical/strategic) from a relational positionality (SoD <> SoE)
 driven by ‘synergy knowledge’: situated, significant, framing, requiring ‘discovery’ and
orchestration
 RedMedTech-Highway case
 typical ‘non core’ challenge and framing
 limited ‘discovery’, top down, narrow orchestration
 more ‘players’ than relations; selected ‘peers’; poorly founded strategy; biased openness;
seeking new spatial identity
20 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

21. DOWNLOAD THE PRESENTATION : WWW.ELUCIA.NL | click:
15-03-1621 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl

22. QUESTIONS?
15-03-1622 m.ebbekink@elucia.nl | a.lagendijk@fm.ru.nl