Understanding the job requirements for collaboration technology support through a hybrid IT-end user job classification model: the case of collaboration engineering and facilitation

  • Authors:

  • Gwendolyn L. Kolfschoten;Fred Niederman;Robert O. Briggs;Gert-Jan de Vreede

  • Affiliations:

  • Delft University of Technology, Delft, Netherlands;Saint Louis University, Saint Louis, Missouri;University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, AK;University of Nebraska at Omaha, Omaha, NE

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 2006 ACM SIGMIS CPR conference on computer personnel research: Forty four years of computer personnel research: achievements, challenges & the future
  • Year:
  • 2006

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Abstract

Group Support Systems (GSS) refers broadly to supporting electronically mediated face-to-face and distributed teams throughout organizations performing a wide range of tasks. While the value of GSS has been shown in numerous field studies, their adoption and diffusion remains limited. One explanation for the limited dispersion of these systems is the difficulty faced by facilitators who lead and manage the technology, processes, and people involved with these tasks. Successfully fulfilling the roles of facilitation is complex and difficult. In this study we present a general IT-end user job classification model that we use to examine the various roles that facilitators typically play and discuss these in terms of the skills needed for their performance. We use the model to compare the 'traditional view' on GSS facilitation with that of Collaboration Engineering that proposes different skill sets to overcome organizational dependence on dedicated facilitators in GSS contexts.