Groupware & Cooperative Work

Citation  Author: Jonathan Grudin  Homepage:  Human Interface Laboratory – MCC  Published 1990 as a book chapter  Currently at U. of California, Irvine  J. Grudin, "Groupware and Cooperative Work: Problems and Prospects", The Art of Human-Computer Interface Design, B. Laurel (Ed.), 1990, Reading, MA: Addison- Wesley, pp J. Grudin, "Groupware and Cooperative Work: Problems and Prospects", Readings in Groupware and Computer-Supported Cooperative Work: Assisting in Human-Human Collaboration, R.M. Baecker (Ed.), 1993, San Mateo, CA: Morgan Kaufmann, pp (Republication of book chapter.)

Key Points  What is groupware?  How does groupware differ from single- user applications?  Why has groupware failed?

Problems with developing Groupware  Usual interface design problems. In addition, members with different backgrounds use the same groupware application  Must support different and potentially shifting roles  Must study social, political, motivational and economic factors  Difficult to study groups

5 Factors leading to Groupware Failure  Some people do additional work and don’t benefit  Violates social taboos & threatens existing political structures  Doesn’t allow for exception handling and improvisation  Can’t attain meaningful, generalizable analysis and evaluation  Our intuitions for multiuser applications are not reliable

Electronic Mail: Groupware Success?  Equitable balance in work and benefits between sender/recipient (labor/management)  Conversational format compatible with social practices  Asynchronous informal nature makes exception handling flexible  Cost and benefits difficult to evaluate  Our intuitions for are improving

Organizational Change  Groupware will tend to undermine the traditional hierarchical authority structure  Successful groupware may be those that clearly benefit subordinates: enables lateral communication  Adhocracy: organizational structure that is able to fuse experts from different specialties into smoothly functioning project teams e.g. university research

Discussion Points  Will ethnographic studies in the workplace help to produce better groupware? Are these studies practical & economically feasible or too time-consuming & obstructive?