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“Cross-sector collaborative projects bring together diverse stakeholder organisations to work on complex social and environmental issues. Questions remain about what kinds of cross-sector organisational forms might be necessary for systemic change and how collaboration is achieved in projects focused on systemic thinking and acting. We analyse a cross-sector multi-stakeholder platform (MSP) as a form of ‘temporary organisation’ and identify key processes in creating a collective identity that enable progress to be made in the start-up phase of a project focused on systemic change. Our findings draw from an ethnography of an MSP on sustainable human nutrition, a new project managed by a well-known platform-convening organisation. Our findings demonstrate the development and use of a system map by participants as a powerful ‘boundary object’ to facilitate collaboration among nine diverse organisations including nature and human welfare focused NGOs, food retailers and food producers. Our study demonstrates how the use of this boundary object facilitated the creation of a collective identity within the temporary organisation of the MSP. This was achieved through three processes realised in their interactions with the boundary object: creating a shared understanding of the system; changing mind-sets; and creating a sense of ownership of the issues. The findings also highlight the importance of participants’ understanding and identification of their part in the system they seek to change and the role and nature of boundary objects that facilitate this.”