CAVEAT Exemplar: Participatory Design in aNon-Profit Volunteer Organisation

  • Authors:

  • Brenda McPhail;Terry Costantino;David Bruckmann;Ross Barclay;Andrew Clement

  • Affiliations:

  • Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto, 140 St. George Street, Toronto, ON, Canada M5S 3G6 (Phone: 416-978-3111;Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto, 140 St. George Street, Toronto, ON, Canada M5S 3G6 (Phone: 416-978-3111;Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto, 140 St. George Street, Toronto, ON, Canada M5S 3G6 (Phone: 416-978-3111;Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto, 140 St. George Street, Toronto, ON, Canada M5S 3G6 (Phone: 416-978-3111;Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto, 140 St. George Street, Toronto, ON, Canada M5S 3G6 (Phone: 416-978-3111

  • Venue:
  • Computer Supported Cooperative Work
  • Year:
  • 1998

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Abstract

This paper reports a university course-based casestudy undertaken with a volunteer organisation. Ourgoals were to explore the use of participatory designin a non-profit volunteer setting; to reflect on theexperience of learning and applying participatorymethodologies; and to create a prototype, usingoff-the-shelf database software, that could become asustainable organisational information system. Wefound system design methodologies that stresscooperation and consensus especially appropriate whenworking with volunteers, who expect control over theirwork in exchange for their time and effort. The FutureWorkshop was particularly valuable in developing groupinsight into work and consensus around systempriorities. The study resulted in a prototype whichhas evolved, through in-house refinement, into aworking system.