Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

9-9-2006

Abstract

Collaboration in distributed settings has become a reality in organizational life. Yet we still have much to learn about issues inherent to distributed collaboration. One important area of study is the integration of Collaboration Engineering in distributed virtual teams for helping them in structuring their interaction. The field of Collaboration Engineering offers promising guidelines for process structures, but its application in distributed arenas is just beginning to be studied. We report on the design and development of a new collaboration environment for the incorporation of Collaboration Engineering principles, as well as the results of an initial study that examined leadership and process structure effects on the development of shared understanding. The paper describes the research motivation, the environment, and the results of the study, including an analysis of participants’ feedback and their message exchanges. We discuss both technical and environmental challenges for research on Collaboration Engineering in distributed environments.

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