6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology Class 3 Systems Support to Work Groups Asper School of Business 9.614 Information Age Organizations.

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

Class 3

Systems Support to

Work Groups

Asper School of Business9.614 Information Age Organizations

Part-Time MBA, April 2002Instructor: Bob Travica

Asper School of Business - MBA Program6150 Management of

Information Systems & TechnologyApril-June 2009

Instructor: Bob Travica

Updated April 2009

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

Outline

• Workgroup Concepts

• Group Support Systems (Types, examples)

• Team-Based Organization, Virtual Team

• Evidence in cases

• Messages for change leadership

2 of 10

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

Workgroup Concepts

• Workgroup:- Collection of people working together on a specific task. An organization in small with shorter life.

- task, goals, division of labor (roles)

- composition, communication, leadership

- synergy vs. losses (free ride, groupthink, extremeness)

- place (collocated vs. distributed teams)

- interdependence (sequential, parallel, reciprocal)

3 of 10

• K

ey a

spect

s:

- cohesion (rational, emotional factors)

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

Workgroups Types (Some)

• Project Teams (R+D, marketing, civil construction, public accounting industry, software developers; disband when project ends; Boeing-Rocketdyne)• Groups embedded in organizational structure (managers at CFFI, cases in slides 6 & 7)

• Communities of practice/learning (informal, peers, knowledge creation/sharing driver; Daimler-Chrysler)

4 of 10

• Network-like gatherings (Open Source movement)

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

Types of Group Support Systems

• Time & Space-based typology of GSS (Fig. 13-1, p. 475)

• Functionality/Purpose based typology of GSS:

1. Communication for collaboration and knowledge sharing (e.g., private email, el. bulletin boards; slides 6 & 7)

2. File Sharing, Application Sharing (Boeing-Rocketdyne, Open Source)

3. Workflow Support (e.g., procurement process; slide 6, Boeing-Rocketdyne)

4. Decision Making (group brainstorming and selection via GDSS; CFFI case, Burr-Brown)

5. Project support (most of the above; Boeing-Rocketdyne)

5 of 10

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

• Organization: Help Desk in a U.S. software firm

• GSS: Incident Tracking Support System using Lotus Notes software (a database of problem solving procedures + communication support).

• Effects: Opportunistic changes in distribution of work (division of work: front-line, back-line, and intermediary staff) Unexpected reluctance of front-end workers to involve back-end Self-motivated learning in free time

W. Orlikowski, “Evolving from Notes: Organizational change around groupware technology”, 1996.

GSS for Workflow Support

6 of 10

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

GSS for Collaboration and Knowledge Sharing

• Organization: Hoffman-La Roche, pharmaceuticals, Switzerland

• GSS: Cosis – proprietary, a laptop & Lotus Notes-based database and communication system for maintenance of medical instruments

• Users: Maintenance workers (300, globally) enter daily the content of their visits to a full text database. All can read the database.

• Effects:

Cosis improved practices of sharing experience, war stories…

Keys to success: Compact user group, evolutionary system.

C. Ciborra, “Mission critical: Challenges for groupware in a pharmaceutical company”, 1996.

7 of 10

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

• Basis in project-driven organizations

Team-Based Organization

• Emphasizing teamwork in functional organization (education, cultural change)

• Virtual Team (kind of virtual organization; different or same organization - Boeing-Rocketdyne; learning to work together and to use technology; selective use of functionality, intellectual property)

8 of 10

• Using technology for team support (management challenge: aligning social & technical)

6150 Management of Information Systems and Technology

Mini-cases

• Daimler-Chrysler

• Burr-Brown

• Boeing-Rocketdyne

• Open Source Movement (programming code is open to any developer complying with ground rules – not proprietary )

9 of 10

Messages for Change Leadership

• Challenge of predicting outcomes from implementing GSS; groups dynamics hard to predict/control

• Train/cultivate people for teamwork and GSS (facilitate “buy-in”=adoption)

• Be vigilant about outcomes of using GSS, continuous management care needed

• GSS is an enabler to group work not a total solution to an organizational problem

• Define problem clearly and match it with appropriate GSS (if any)

• Eliminate alternative technologies to ensure adoption of the target GSS

• Have complete strategy of implementing GSS, don’t stop at first obstacles (CFFI)