| Lead Investigator : Virginia Acha |
Project Investigator: Dr Linus Dahlander and Professor David Gann |
Timescales: Dec 2006 - May 2007 June - Nov 2007 Second Survey - revision of survey instrument Dec 2007 - May 2008 June 2008- Nov 2008 Dec 2008 - Mar 2009 Final reporting |
Project Outline:
Our research design aims to answer the following questions: - Collaboration. Collaboration is bounded by the nature of the task and how the task is designed. The challenge is made more difficult in highly novel research, where uncertainty frustrates detailed design. Many virtual teams unravel because task design is either poorly understood or because there is no agreed and aligned 'map' of the project, its component tasks and lines of authority. We are exploring how task design and ICT shape the process of research.
- Communication in collaboration. Distance collaboration and distributed work face the challenges of communication, co-ordination and shared understanding. Past research tells us the ICT facilitates collaboration but only as a complement to face-to-face interactions, for certain things at certain times. The LambdaRail "big pipe" terascale computing for real-time, high definition communication and remote access to experimental facilities at a speed that is a different scale of possibility. We will determine the real impact of high performance computing technologies and 'virtualization' in distance collaboration on non-routine, novel tasks.
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Proposed Methods: Multi-model research method of quantitative and qualitative methods. Survey and social network analysis to explore the broad motives and patterns of collaboration across all of the Alliance collaborators. Qualitative research of four selected projects across themes, to better reveal the drivers and blocks to collaboration and the use of collaboration tools.
The research will be conducted over two years, which captures the time frame for the individual projects studies. The research began in December 2006. |
Key Messages from Our Research so far… Collaboration is often defined as working together to achieve an agreed goal. However, this generalised definition masks the significant differences in the nature and form of collaboration across agents and settings. These differences frustrate a generalised policy that collaboration is more efficient in time and resources than working independently. |
Future Plans A first paper from the research is under draft now, and we will look to build further work on the nature of collaboration, innovative task design and communication. With Markus Perkman, we are exploring the potential for a symposium on the nature of collaboration for the Academy of Management 2008. |
Member Profile Dr Virginia Acha is a Research Fellow at the Tanaka Business School at Imperial College London, which she joined last year from her post at SPRU (Science and Technology Policy Research) at the University of Sussex and CENTRIM (Centre for Research in Innovation Management) at the University of Brighton. Virginia was also a Research Fellow at the London Business School for the Leverhulme Programme on the Socioeconomic Impacts of ICT, Digital Transformations. Virginia's current research interests include collaboration, task design and governance in innovation. She is considering these issues at the sectoral level (negotiated boundaries between firms), at the firm level (innovation task design in open innovation practices), at the project level (Alliance research) and at the individual level (new technology-mediated collaborative spaces). These current projects have their roots in her past research on framing, knowledge bases and the oil and gas sector. She defended the DPhil in 2002 at SPRU, which was titled "Framing the Past and the Future: The Development and Deployment of Technological Capabilities by the Oil Majors in the Upstream Petroleum Industry". From her doctoral work, Virginia was awarded a highly competitive Post Doctoral Fellowship from the UK Economic and Social Science Research Council. Virginia also has an MPhil in the Economics of Developing Countries from Cambridge University and a BA (Phi Beta Kappa) in Economics and Spanish from the College of William and Mary. |
Links to other researchers www.atlanticcalliance.org |
News and upcoming events |
Outputs: Journal Contributions – Refereed Conference Contributions – Refereed |
Working/Work in Progress Papers |
