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Coordination

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The Problem

• What do groups do and how might they work together in more efficient manners?

• What is the role of dependencies between tasks of different group members and the way the group coordinates work?

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Shortcomings of Previous Work

• Describe the dependencies and process only in general terms

• Not enough detail about:• differences between dependencies• the problems dependencies create• how the proposed coordination processes

address those problems

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Coordination Theory

• Three contributions:• Defines coordination• Provides a modeling framework• Proposes an initial topology of dependencies and

coordination mechanisms

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What is Coordination?

• Coordination: (Successful) management of dependencies between activities

• Goals of paper• Framework for analyzing coordination in

terms of actors performing interdependent tasks

• A taxonomy of types of coordination & coordination mechanisms

• Illustrate the claim that these categories of coordination are general across domains

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Dependencies btw multiple tasks & resources

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Summary of dependencies & coordination mechanisms

Task uses resource• 1. Determine needs• 2. Identify resources

• ads

• prepared list

• only one resource

• 3. Collect information on resources• by bidding

• manager knows

• 4. Pick best• 5. Do assignment

• mark resource in use

• 6. Manage flow dependencies from acquiring resource to using resource

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Continued

Task requires multiple resources simultaneously1 Pre-assign resources to simplify coordination problem

2. Manage dependency on the fly• avoid or detect and resolve deadlock

• detect and resolve starvation

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• Assigning employee a task

• Buying a product

Equivalence of coordination mechanisms

1111

Examples of common dependencies btw activities & alternative coordination mechanisms

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Proposed topology (mapping dependencies to mechanisms)

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Restaurant Example (agents, tasks, dependencies)

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Restaurant Example (resources)

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Deep Structure of Hiring

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Decomposing Hiring

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Coordination Generator for Hiring

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Collective Intelligence Genome

• Application to crowdsourcing

Malone, T. W., Laubacher, R., & Dellarocas, C.,. (2010). The Collective Intelligence Genome. Sloan Management Review, 5(3), 21-31.

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Who & Why

2020

How

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Recombination

2222

Examples of common dependencies btw activities & alternative coordination mechanisms

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How do you evaluate this work?

• Is this an accurate description of coordination?

• Is it predictive – e.g., predicting when coordination mechanisms are used or when they are effective

• Is it practical – e.g., can we guide managers to assign tasks or developers who build coordination tools about how to behave differently?

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Comparison to Agile Programming Environments

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Solvent: Mturkers to condense text

• Decompose writing task• Identify candidates for condensation or rewording• Reward• Verify

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Solvent: Find/Fix/Verify Model

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Value of HCII Ethnography

• Readings• Health & Luff: Collaboration and control … in London

Underground Line Control Rooms (536 cites)

• Questions• What do these qualitative studies tell us about coordination

that differs from Malone Hinds• How much of the value of social empirical research derives

from impacts for design/engineering

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Health & Luff: Collaboration and control

• Questions• What have we learned new about coordination

here?• How does what H&L describe differ from the benefits of

co-location for grounding?• Can the coordination mechanisms described here map

to the Malone/Crowston or Cataldo?

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Interesting findings

• X’s work activity triggered by Y’s public actions• DIA: Hello and good afternoon Ladies an Gentlemen. Bakerloo Line Information.

• DIA: We have a slight gap in our Southbound Bakerloo Line service towards the Elephant an Castle.. Your next south bound train, should depart from this station in about another three minutes.

• DIA: The next south bound train, should depart from this station in about another three minutes.

• . . . a related announcement follows a couple of minutes later...

• Enabled by collocation & intentional awareness

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Requirement to make the private visible

• Y recognizes this dependencemakes private thought & actions public

• C: It's ten seventeen to ( ) hhhhhhh• (4.3)• C: Right (.) that's that one done.• C: hhh hhh (.) hhh• C: Two O Six (.) Forty Six• (0.7)• C: Two Two Five• 9 .. the D1A begins to tap on his chair and he and the trainee begin a

separate conversation. As• they begin to talk C ceases talking out loud...

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Shared Context: Cramton, Mutual Knowledge Problem

• Members confronted by different contexts & pressures

• Members in different organizations different value systems

• Members in different nations different calendars and deadlines

• Members in different units different workloads

• Remote members don’t recognize contextual constraints on behavior attribute problems to personal instead of situational causes• E.g., Absence attributed to unresponsiveness or laziness,

instead of competing demands or holiday.

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Specific problems