Stephen M. Fiore, Ph.D. University of Central Florida Cognitive Sciences, Department of Philosophy and Institute for Simulation & Training Fiore, S. M. (2015). Collaboration Technologies and the Science of Team Science. Symposium on Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science. Board on Behavioral, Cognitive, and Sensory Sciences Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education, National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, Washington, DC. This work by Stephen M. Fiore, PhD is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-­‐NonCommercial-­‐
NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License 2012. Not for commercial use. Approved for redistribution. Attribution required. ¡
Part 1. Collaboration Over Time and Space §  Foundations ¡
Part 2. Attending to the Psychological Issues §  Why Do We Care §  Leading and Managing ¡
Part 3. Attending to the Technological Issues §  Tools for Communicating, Coordinating and Doing Science ¡
Part 4. Addressing the Challenges Why do we care? ¡
Web-­‐based collaborations greatly enhance ability to leverage: §  Intellectual capacity for science §  Reach and impact of technologies and data Why this is a problem (Cooke & Hilton, 2015) ¡
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1) Alters the dynamics of interaction §  Difficulty inherent in communicating and collaborating across disciplines exacerbated by lack of co-­‐location 2) The problem of infrastructure §  Misuse and lack of use of collaboration technologies drives down efficiencies of virtual collaborations. §  Technologies designed in the absence of theory can often create more problems than they solve Cooke, N. J. & Hilton, M. L. (Editors). (2015). Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. ¡
Computer Science and Development of Collaboration Technologies §  Rise of distributed teams and “collaboratories”
§  1991 issue of Communications of ACM ▪  NSF-­‐funded collaboratories are experimental and empirical distributed research environments ▪  Domain scientists work with computer, communications, behavioral and social scientists ▪  Design systems, participate in collaborative science, and conduct experiments to evaluate and improve the systems. Kouzes, R. T., Myers, J. D., & Wulf, W. (1996). Collaboratories: Doing science on the Internet. IEEE Computer, 29(8), 40-­‐46. Rosenberg, L. C. (1991). Update on National Science Foundation funding of the “Collaboratory”. Communications of the ACM, 34 (12), 83. ¡
Mapping this new problem space (Olson & Olson, 2000) §  Sociotechnical conditions §  Attending to the Psychological Issues §  Attending to the Technological Issues Olson, G. M., & Olson, J. S. (2000). Distance matters. Human Computer Interaction, 15, 139-­‐178. Why does “Distance Matter”? ¡  (Lack of) Awareness of impact on collaboration §  (Lack of) Understanding of international and local contexts ▪  Impact on social dynamics (e.g., lack of understanding norms, politics) ▪  Impact on coordination (e.g., time zone differences, work week and hours available to project) Cooke, N. J. & Hilton, M. L. (Editors). (2015). Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. Why does “Distance Matter”? ¡  (Lack of) Awareness and impact on collaboration §  (Lack of) Understanding of organizational context ▪  Challenges arising from regulations and institutional practices ▪ Intellectual property, data rights and management Cooke, N. J. & Hilton, M. L. (Editors). (2015). Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. Leading and Managing at a Distance ¡  Structural Supports §  Adopt shared leadership practices ▪  Acknowledge distributed expertise and leverages lack of co-­‐location §  Transparent Rewards ▪  Make explicit and acknowledge contributions of distributed team members §  Manage Information Flow ▪  Need to be ensure input is elicited ▪  Leverage/utilize distributed expertise ▪  Do not let team members fade away in the distance Cooke, N. J. & Hilton, M. L. (Editors). (2015). Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. Leading and Managing at a Distance ¡  Create Common Ground §  Shared knowledge is critical to success ▪  Science teams needs shared mental model of problems to be solved §  Awareness of expertise foundation of success ▪  Need to ensure team members know who knows what §  Above helps team manage interdependencies ▪  Scientific complexity and spatial boundaries DO NOT mix ▪  Use task division strategies to leverage co-­‐location ▪  Minimize requirements for coordination at a distance Cooke, N. J. & Hilton, M. L. (Editors). (2015). Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. Synchronous or near Coordination Infrastructure Communication Information Repositories Coordination Asynchronous Olson, G. M., Zimmerman, A., & Bos, M. (Eds.) (2008). Scientific Collaboration on the Internet. Cambridge, MA, MIT Press. Olson, J.S. (2015). Technologies and Social Practices to Help Distributed Teams. National Science Foundation Sponsored Workshop on Fundamentals of Team Science and the Science of Team Science (June 2), Bethesda MD. Communication ¡  Email/Texting ¡  Audio/Video Conferencing ¡  Chats/Blogs/Wikis ¡  Virtual Worlds Olson, G. M., Zimmerman, A., & Bos, M. (Eds.) (2008). Scientific Collaboration on the Internet. Cambridge, MA, MIT Press. Olson, J.S. (2015). Technologies and Social Practices to Help Distributed Teams. National Science Foundation Sponsored Workshop on Fundamentals of Team Science and the Science of Team Science (June 2), Bethesda MD. Coordination ¡  Shared Calendars ¡  Meeting Support ¡  Large Visual Display ¡  Workflow Diagrams ¡  Resource Scheduling Olson, G. M., Zimmerman, A., & Bos, M. (Eds.) (2008). Scientific Collaboration on the Internet. Cambridge, MA, MIT Press. Olson, J.S. (2015). Technologies and Social Practices to Help Distributed Teams. National Science Foundation Sponsored Workshop on Fundamentals of Team Science and the Science of Team Science (June 2), Bethesda MD. Information Repositories ¡  Cloud based storage ¡  Ease of access ¡  Ease of manipulations Olson, G. M., Zimmerman, A., & Bos, M. (Eds.) (2008). Scientific Collaboration on the Internet. Cambridge, MA, MIT Press. Olson, J.S. (2015). Technologies and Social Practices to Help Distributed Teams. National Science Foundation Sponsored Workshop on Fundamentals of Team Science and the Science of Team Science (June 2), Bethesda MD. Computational Infrastructure ¡  System Architecture §  Private, secure machines §  Massive data §  Standard office machines/servers §  Cloud services ¡  Each with their own behavioral consequences §  Who oversees and manages? §  Who edits/alters? §  Who shares/distributes? Olson, G. M., Zimmerman, A., & Bos, M. (Eds.) (2008). Scientific Collaboration on the Internet. Cambridge, MA, MIT Press. Olson, J.S. (2015). Technologies and Social Practices to Help Distributed Teams. National Science Foundation Sponsored Workshop on Fundamentals of Team Science and the Science of Team Science (June 2), Bethesda MD. ¡
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Conclusion. Research in geographically dispersed science has found that communicating progress, obstacles and open issues and developing trust are more challenging relative to face-­‐to-­‐face teams and larger groups. §  These limitations of virtual collaboration may not be obvious to members and leaders of the team or group. Recommendation 4 §  Provide activities shown by research to help all participants develop shared knowledge (e.g., a common vocabulary and work style). §  Include team professional development opportunities that promote knowledge sharing §  Consider the feasibility of assigning tasks to semi-­‐independent units Cooke, N. J. & Hilton, M. L. (Editors). (2015). Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. ¡
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Conclusion. Technology for virtual collaboration designed without understanding of users’ needs and limitations and even when a suite of appropriate technologies is available, users often do not recognize and use its full capabilities. §  These related problems may thus impede such collaboration. Recommendation 5 §  Leaders need to carefully evaluate needs of the project §  Evaluate ability of participants to embrace new technologies §  Promote human-­‐centered collaboration technologies §  Provide technical staff, and encourage use of the technologies by providing ongoing training and technology support Cooke, N. J. & Hilton, M. L. (Editors). (2015). Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. Thank You! Stephen M. Fiore, Ph.D. University of Central Florida sfiore@ist.ucf.edu