Knowledge co-creation for a complex concept on a digital platform

This study examines temporary expert group knowledge co-creation on digital platforms. Our ethnographic study focuses on digital organizing and more specifically on temporary expert team knowledge co-creation on a digital platform. Based on the rich data from micro-level digital traces, we study how a complex concept is co-designed. Temporary team’s knowledge co-creation process is supported by project leads’ weaving work and co-created digital scaffolds. The emerging concept design is a result of the cyclical knowledge co-creation process where experts apply their personal knowledge in repeating cycles leading to complex concept co-design. Experts share their personal knowledge by inspiring and informing others with the help of visual artifacts. Visual artifacts become boundary objects when others engage in a digital dialogue through articulating, asking and challenging the knowledge co-creation process supported by socio-emotional communication. Research contributes to digital organizing of expertise by providing a nuanced understanding of the knowledge co-creation process and the use of digital artifacts as boundary objects in asynchronous collaboration for complex problem solving.