Facilitator-in-a-Box: Process Support Applications to Help Practitioners Realize the Potential of Collaboration Technology

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Briggs, Robert O.; Kolfschoten, Gwendolyn L.; De Vrede, Gert-Jan; Lukosch, Stephan; Albrecht, Conan C.
• 署名单位: California State University System; San Diego State University; Delft University of Technology; University of Nebraska System; University of Nebraska Omaha
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEMS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0742-1222
• DOI: 10.2753/MIS0742-1222290406
• 发表日期: 2013
• 页码: 159-193
• 关键词: TEAM PERFORMANCE; decision-making; systems; diversity; culture; satisfaction; guidance; IMPACT; gss

摘要

The potential benefits of collaboration technologies are typically realized only in groups led by collaboration experts. This raises the facilitator-in-the-box challenge: Can collaboration expertise be packaged with collaboration technology in a form that nonexperts can reuse with no training on either tools or techniques? We address that challenge with process support applications (PSAs). We describe a collaboration support system (CSS) that combines a computer-assisted collaboration engineering platform for creating PSAs with a process support system runtime platform for executing PSAs. We show that the CSS meets its design goals: (1) to reduce development cycles for collaboration systems, (2) to allow nonprogrammers to design and develop PSAs, and (3) to package enough expertise in the tools that nonexperts could execute a well-designed collaborative work process without training.