Chapter 14

Supporting Communication and Collaborative Work

Chapter 14 describes the support provided by IT to enhance communication within and between organizations. Special attention is given to the support of collaborative work--the work of team members who may be in one or several locations. To compete in the 1990s, it is necessary to provide quality, timely, and inexpensive communication. Several technologies are described in the chapter, including video teleconferencing, E-mail, EDI, work flow, group DSS, voice technologies, and other groupware products. The chapter also describes telecommuting, which can utilize the above technologies, and information superhighways, which enable nationwide and worldwide communication.

[ Update | Exercises | IT@Work ]

Update

Will the real groupware please stand up.

Simple word association: your psychiatrist says "groupware," you say "Lotus Notes." At least that’s how most IS managers would have responded up until about a year ago. Nowadays, an equally common response might be "Intranet" or "Company Web." In fact, Getting in touch with your inner web is what CIO’s Tom Field recommends to the people running corporate IS departments these days. So what’s the deal?

Lotus Notes and browser/server-based intranets both have the capabilities and features that lead them to be classified as groupware. They allow individuals and teams to communicate, plan, and coordinate their actions even when they are geographically dispersed, often working in different time zones. While some say they are not really mutually exclusive systems, others argue that they represent competing paradigms in the groupware arena. For example, Notes is centralized and proprietary, intranets are decentralized and multi-vendor.

In The Internet saga continues..., Fortune’s David Kirkpatrick explains how Lotus and its new parent, IBM, are developing a strategy based upon blurring the distinctions between Notes and intranets, while at the same time playing on the fears of lack of standardization that currently plagues the intranet arena. On the other hand, Datamation asks the question, Will intranets lay waste to groupware? (12/96) Perhaps the best approach is the attempt to find a balance between Notes and intranets, as proposed by CIO magazine in Open to Debate.

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Exercises

Surf the Internet to find material regarding EDI and the Internet. Find articles, case studies, and vendors.
1. Join a newsgroup whose interest is EDI on the Internet. Identify the major issues of concern.
2. Find the benefits and limitations of EDI on the Internet.
Enter the Web sites of Ventana Corp. and the Center for the Management of Information Systems at the University of Arizona. Find recent development of GDSS and capabilities of Group Systems V in its most recent version.
Find an MBA (or business undergraduate) student of a university in a different country. Discuss electronically a topic of mutual interest.
Enter the Web site of Picture Tel. Find information on their most recent products. Check if any of their products is suitable for the Internet and or the Intranet. Communicate electronically with the company to clarify the capabilities of their Internet-related desktop teleconferencing products.
Surf the Internet to find software and vendors of workflow for the Internet. Download an available demo. Explain how the software will work with the Internet vis a vis the Intranet.
Surf the Internet to find recent material on the Intranet - Internet - Lotus Notes connection. After reviewing the material, write a short report about the future of Lotus Notes.
Find material on how the Internet (Intranet) facilitate telecommuting. Find two case studies and analyze them.

IT@Work

Bull-Integris

Fiber Products Division - BASF

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