Preconditions for Trans-Organizational Collaboration Support in Industrial Environments Toni Koskinen, Heini Korpilahti, & Marko Nieminen [Firstname.Lastname@hut.fi] Information Ergonomics Research Group Helsinki University of Technology P.o.Box 9210, FIN-02015 HUT, FINLAND
Overview Research Focus Introduction: Collaboration Network of Process Industry Case Study Settings: Collaboration Support for Process Industry Results: Preconditions for Transorganizational Collaboration Support Conclusions & Future Work
Collaboration Framework of Process Industry Production Plant C Production Plant B External Service Expert Center Production Plant A External Service Expert Center
Research Focus (besed on the case study) to identify preconditions for constructing collaboration support for process industry RQ: What kind of socio-technical preconditions for ICT-mediated collaboration support enable fluent interaction, communication, and knowledge sharing in distributed industrial settings? Level of analysis: Global level. Global trends that can affect the collaboration and cooperation settings of organizations Network level. Macro-preconditions. Common preconditions for the collaboration network consisting of n number of organizations Micro-preconditions. Preconditions that can be identified from the collaboration activities of smaller groups. In addition, this level includes preconditions of a single organization not the whole network of organizations.
Discovering Network Level Preconditions: Case Collaboration Support for Process Industry Industrial context: process industry Research approach: action research, participatory research Research methods: UCD principles & methods TM results applied to organizational activities of companies involved with the project 2003-2004 2004-2005 2005-2006 1st project year data gathering 2nd project year prototype construction 3rd project year evaluation time TechMedia: Technology Mediated Knowledge Services for Distributed Industrial Environments
COMET-Prototype
Network Level Macro-preconditions (1/2) Legal agreements for collaboration (flexible) agreements that take into account the emerging needs and opportunities of new businesses Commitment through participation making the goals for collaboration visible enable people to participate on defining and implementation of the collaboration tools and practices Adaptation to global trends: evolving practices and systems important to have a capability to act in rapidly changing situations rather than fixing every detail of collaboration from technological perspective Communication and control Communication practices between different organizations describe the typical artefacts of the collaboration network and the way how they should be delivered Organizational goals and business models expected benefits (financial, knowledge acquisition, )
Network Level Micro-preconditions (2/2) Common artefacts, equally contributing topics common artefacts, that need to be prepared in close collaboration discussion should contribute quite equally to the work of different members Continuous content production lead users not so work related topics Assignment of roles (to all organizational levels) everyone should be able to contribute (based on their own work context) ICT applied in context purpose of use existing practices Support for awareness social awareness & action awareness
Preconditions for Trans-Organizational Collaboration Support in Process Industry (Macro-preconditions) Legal agreements for collaboration, Commitment, Adaptation to global trends, Communication and control Organization 1 Network level Organization 2 (Micro-preconditions) Common artefacts, equally contributing topics, Awareness, Understanding, Feedback and feedthrough, ICT applied in context, Continuous content production, Assignment of roles, Organizational goals and business models (Continuous probing for new businesses, services, and tools) ICT-mediated Collaboration Channels: Formal artefacts (reports, plans, etc.) Informal communication (questions, confirmations, notifications) Organization 3 Global trends Changing market situations, Changing (inter)national economy, Taxation policies, Cost-of-labor etc.
Conclusions & Future Work to successfully define, construct, and maintain trans-organizational collaboration support preconditions should be identified and constantly monitored for changes Without proper definition and agreement of: network level macro-preconditions, a collaboration network does not evolve systematically and lacks the means of handling problematic situations network level micro-preconditions a collaboration network lacks both focus and content Future work: evaluate the applicability of these results in other traditional industrial sectors e.g. casting industry. create recommendations and practices, how these preconditions could be systematically taken into account.
Further Information: /techmedia Project participants: Technical Development Centre of Finland (TEKES) Metso Corporation, Metso Automation, Metso Paper Fortum Service Nokia Inc. Descom Idean Research Jyväskylä Science Park RecIT Solutions VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland University of Jyväskylä Helsinki University of Technology Thank you!