ted talk – painter – voss team results
DESCRIPTION
Practitioner Implications of NSF-VOSS - Comparative Study of Virtual R&D OrganizationsTRANSCRIPT
PRACTITIONER IMPLICATIONS
ofNSF-VOSS
‘Comparative Study of Virtual R&D Organizations’
b yD o u g A u s t r o m , B e t t y B a r r e t t , B e t s y M e r c k ,
B e r t P a i n t e r , P a m P o s e y, R a m Te n k a s i
N A T I O N A L S C I E N C E F O U N D A T I O N G R A N TV O S S : V I R T U A L O R G A N I Z A T I O N S A S
S O C I O -T E C H N I C A L S Y S T E M S
STS DESIGN for COORDINATION
of VIRTUAL (Distributed) Work
STS RT TED Talk on ‘Innovations in Practice’Boston, MA October 2013
October 2013
2
Background: 3 Observations about the emerging work world
“From Virtual Teams to VIRTUALITY in TEAMS…where a mix of face-to-face and technology-mediated interactions are used…and prevalent in modern forms of teamwork.” – Dixon & Panteli, Human Relations, 2010
“In the new order of business…with more and more decentralized decision-making…we need to move from command-and control to Coordinate-and-Cultivate.” – Tom Malone, The Future of Work, 2004
“Coordination is the major challenge of global projects…the fundamental problem is that many of the mechanisms to coordinate work in a co-located setting are absent or disrupted in distributed work” – James Hersleb, Global Software Engineering, 2007
STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237 October 2013
3
Foreground:Meaning & Significance ofCoordination in OrganizationDesign
1. “Coordination focuses on the activities that need to be done and the relationships and dependencies among them…[so as] to enable a group of people to produce good results.” - Tom Malone, The Future of Work
2. “Choice of best coordination architecture can lead to at least 20% improvement in time/cost performance.” - Moser & Halpin, 2009: Decade-long study of Global Projects
3. “As the amount of task uncertainty increases, (and therefore, information processing increases), the organization must adopt coordination mechanisms which increase its information processing capabilities.” - Jay Galbraith, Organization Design: An Information Processing View
October 2013STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237
4
HIGH Uncertainty LOWER Uncertainty
October 2013STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237
Model of Six Stage Continuum of R&D Work
Pure Research
Work
DON’T KNOW
WHAT
we are looking for
DON’T KNOW
HOW
to carry out the research
Applied Research
Work
DON’T KNOW
WHAT
(i.e. end state or
objective)
KNOW
HOW
to carry out the research
Exploratory Developmen
t Work
KNOW
WHAT
DON’T KNOW
HOW
to achieve it
Advanced Developmen
t Work
KNOW
WHAT
DON’T KNOW
HOW
IN DETAIL
to achieve it
Start-Up (pilot plants, beta testing) Developmen
t Work
KNOW
WHAT
KNOW
HOW CONCEPTUALL
Y
to achieve it
Scale-Up (volume &
costs) Development
Work
KNOW
WHAT
KNOW
HOW OPERATIONALLY
to achieve it
R1
R2
D1
D4
D2
D3
5
HIGH UNCERTAINTY
LOWER UNCERTAINTY
October 2013STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237
DON’T KNOW
WHAT
we are looking for
DON’T KNOW
HOW
to carry out the research
DON’T KNOW
WHAT
(i.e. end state or
objective)
KNOW
HOW
to carry out the research
KNOW
WHAT
DON’T KNOW
HOW
to achieve it
KNOW
WHAT
DON’T KNOW
HOW
IN DETAIL
to achieve it
KNOW
WHAT
KNOW
HOW CONCEPTUALL
Y
to achieve it
KNOW
WHAT
KNOW
HOW OPERATIONALLY
to achieve it
‘R1’ ‘D4’
TASK UNCERTAINTYContinuum for Knowledge Work
6
COORDINATION Across the Continuum of Task Uncertainty
October 2013STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237
R1 D4
Drive Problem SolvingShape and Reinforce
Converge Convey
Standardization Rules
Based
Mutual Adjustment
Peer-to-Peer Hierarchical
Exploration Prescriptive
Uncertainty
Mystery Heuristic Algorithm
Certainty
STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237
Key Deliberations: ‘Choice Points’ in Knowledge Work processes
Key Deliberations are patterns of exchange and communication in which people engage to reduce the equivocality (or uncertainty) of a problematic issue
The salient elements of a deliberation include the Topic, Forums, and Participants
Examples of Key Deliberations in NSF-VOSS Comparative Study of Virtual R&D projects… • What Experiment(s) to run• How to Design the experiment• What Diagnostic instruments
to use• Who will have Access to the
data• What software Feature(s) will
we develop• What is the Scope and
time/cost Estimate of this work
October 2013
STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237 8
Knowledge Work Barriers:Examples in our study of Virtual R&D Projects
Lack of available knowledge Technical procedures in two different laboratories were discovered to be
incompatible and initially prevented development of inter-dependent experiments
Lack of common frame of reference Scientists from different disciplines interpreted the same data very
differently or were accustomed to very different research procedures
October 2013
Failure to share knowledge Use of standardized data collection was seen by some researchers
in different research institutions as an imposition over other data more suited to their own unique research interests
Failure to utilize knowledge Corporate intelligence about particular vendor competencies was
not utilized by an individual division in their vendor selection procedures
October 2013
Most Significant COORDINATION MECHANISMS to Mitigate Barriers In Different Types of Virtual (R&D) Work
10
STRUCTURES(Roles, Organization
Design)PEOPLE
(Skills, Relationships, Values,
Communications)
TECHNOLOGY(Collaboration Tools, Media)
PROCESSES(Standards, Schedules,
Plans)
STRATEGIES(Mission, Collaboration
Agreements)
Sociotechnical Systems Framework For Designing Coordination of Virtual
Work
October 2013STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237
STSR VOSS TEAM Supported by NSF-VOSS Award #0943237 11
STS Design for Coordination of Virtual Work OPEN DISCUSSION
October 2013