Management of Collaboration
Impacts of Virtualization to Learning & Knowledge
Gerhard Hacker, Peter Haber and Manfred Mayr
IT Management and Economics, Salzburg University of Applied Sciences, Urstein Süd 1, Puch bei, Salzburg, Austria
Keywords: Virtualization, Communication, Self-learning, Management of Collaboration.
Abstract: The ubiquitous Internet as of today supports virtualized working spaces. But working effectively with each
other, finding the right information, gaining the needed knowledge is a complex task in a virtual
environment. A new approach of knowledge management through Management of Collaboration (MoC) is
needed to establish a virtual Communication and Collaboration (vCC) environment. Business Services
through all different platforms have to be harmonized and synchronized. The goal is building up an
innovative environment where appropriate people work together effectively on a target, learning and
reflecting from each other to gain knowledge.
1 INTRODUCTION
The basis of all progress is innovation and the
sustainability of actions. The Internet is changing
every aspect of life significantly and constant change
is taking place everywhere.
The ubiquitous Internet supports globalization
and is a significant driver for virtualization in
society and economy. New cooperation structures
arise, promoting virtual enterprises with a high
flexibility and a limited co-working timeframe
similar to a project setup. In a virtualized
environment everything is moving closer together.
There is only one click to collaborate and
communicate. In the same time, where virtually
everything moves together, we move away from
each other, as we have less personal contacts.
Therefore an extended collaboration management in
distributed self-learning entities is needed to develop
competencies in enhanced virtual communication.
The change also affects the working staff. After
the Generation X (digitally unskilled), Y (digital
immigrants) and Z (digital natives), we speak today
about the Always On (AO) generation (Quitney
Anderson, 2012). In addition the working conditions
changes also. In the past, the master and his
apprentice learn face to face, working on a work
piece. In a virtual environment as of today, the
working piece mutates to a knowledge artefact
including the intensive use of communication and
collaboration to exchange information.
The next generation workpeople are AO digital
natives. They use social networks extensively and
they expect a same kind of co-working environment
in business. A new optimized use of digital
cooperation practices has to be established, enabling
new contract-, working- and management structures
in spatially distributed flexible entities. These
flexibility and dissolution needs also a new kind of
guidance with given boundaries building a protected
area. It is also necessary to ensure that all members
use the same understanding of the various virtual
Communication & Collaboration (vCC) tools and
methods.
Applied knowledge management acts between
data and competencies. Now vCC creates a new pool
of shared commons between the actors and their
knowledge on their entities. Harmonization and
synchronization between the involved entities
becomes an indicator for effectiveness and
efficiency in co-working. Virtualization is anywhere.
Technical systems get virtualized to share
infrastructure e.g. in a cloud. Workplaces of
employees and teams get virtualized to be more
powerful and flexible. Processes get virtualized to be
more effective and efficient. Organizations get
virtualized as an answerer to the actual globalization
trend. Finally the business itself gets virtualized to
utilize worldwide emerging opportunities.
235
Hacker G., Haber P. and Mayr M..
Management of Collaboration - Impacts of Virtualization to Learning & Knowledge.
DOI: 10.5220/0004171602350239
In Proceedings of the International Conference on Knowledge Management and Information Sharing (KMIS-2012), pages 235-239
ISBN: 978-989-8565-31-0
Copyright
c
2012 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)
2 PEOPLE AND CHANGE
Through the ubiquitous Internet vCC is becoming
increasingly dominant, not only in the international
arena, but also company and group wide. Any
employee as of today is a learning bundle, an
inseparable unit of a human with his technology
interface, acting as knowledge entity, as shown in
figure 1. This changes the amount of available data
and information and the availability of knowledge,
the speed of interaction and the access to
information and knowledge significantly.
Figure 1: Human with white cube fractal in between.
On the one hand side the human being in figure 1
is in a micro, meso, macro and mundo context to
other people. On the other hand side the humans
technology interface connected to any network, to
get any information, using any service, hosted
anywhere in the world.
Equivalent to the white noise an encompassing
human-machine interface device with any form
factor, any user interaction, creating value between
the smart world and the smart grid can be modelled
as a white cube. Therefore the white cube represents
the whole emerging swarm intelligence of the whole
internet society. This huge amount of information
and knowledge is filtered through trust and
capabilities of each human in his personal
surrounding, referring on the perception made in
their own social networks.
The ubiquitous Internet as of today influences
learning, knowledge and is embedded within ethics
and sustainability. The three pillars (swim lines) of
sustainability (UN World Summit 2005) are
represented trough:
Social: Development trough lifelong learning;
Economy: Private dimensions of individual -
team –organization development, processes and
technology; impacts though changes in generation X
Y Z and Always On;
Ecology: Ethical boundaries.
Considering on virtualization and sustainability,
People Organization On Line (POOL) and Change
become a complex venture.
2.1 POOL & Change Framework
People having a tremendous impact for instance on
profit, power, projects and portfolios, therefore an
on-going change is initiated in communication,
collaboration, crowd, cloud etc. between the
different interacting entities. The entities are also
varying in their economical, social and ecological
expression. Explicit knowledge is codified, stored
and transmitted in different media. Implicit
knowledge is represented through know-how,
experiences and competences to enable
competitiveness between competitors.
The organization of funding, sourcing and
distribution processes change from in-house
fulfilment to hyper connected boundary free
systems. The workbenches transform to virtual
platforms. In addition to these in new online
platforms trust is needed to enable syndication of
unknown entities.
Seen from a systemic point of view, control from
such a wicked problem (Conklin, 2007) is an
illusion. The option is to simplify or to make it
simple. Joint learning and service programs provides
a solution: “where I think, therefore I am” (ego
cogito ergo sum, Descartes 1644) changes to:
“I communicate, so we are; we communicate, so am
I” (communico ergo sumus, Pietschmann, 2009).
Lifelong learning with self- motivated pursuit of
knowledge for either personal or professional
reasons includes single loop, double loop and triple
loop leaning (Argyris and Schön, 1994). Single
Loop Learning (SLL) covers action and
consequences. Double Loop Learning (DLL)
extends the cycle with beliefs and Triple Loop
Learning (TLL) with context. With the distinction of
the previous statements of Descartes and
Pietschmann we get a classification between
Newton Learning with technical ‘either, or’
analyses within a mechanistic thinking frame and
Schumpeter Learning with fundamental ‘both, as
well’ analyses in a dialectic thinking frame.
The impact of Big Data (META Group, 2001),
information, knowledge and competiveness are
KMIS2012-InternationalConferenceonKnowledgeManagementandInformationSharing
236
crossed with the three swim lines of sustainability.
Fast learning organizations with a high proportion to
self-learning services are needed. Education shifts
from specialists to generalists and the roles like
trainer and trainee are taken alternately.
A framework model of People Organization On
Line & Change in a generic learning and business
context is shown figure 2.
Figure 2: POOL & Change framework.
This setup requires practical solutions for vCC to
exchange information, which are also suitable for
small and medium-sized enterprises, which enables
successful project management based on e-
communication and e-collaboration (Haber, Mayr et
al, 2010). But it also requires a boundary spanning
Management of Collaboration (MoC) to protect
against losses in the stack interaction between
innovation, facilitation and execution to interact in
order to optimize effectiveness and efficiency.
2.2 Management of Collaboration
Through virtualization boundaries are lost.
Therefore a protected space with trust for
syndication of followers is needed. This virtual ba
(Japanese, a shared space for emerging relationships,
Nonaka, 1998) needs through all business services
harmonization and synchronization.
From its design principle, a lot of different
execution platforms for crowd funding, crowd
sourcing, crowd workbenches, crowd distribution
exists today. Enterprises are still using software,
platforms and infrastructure as a Service supporting
the execution to produce products, deliver services
or generate co-creations.
The innovation facilitation MoC acts as the
boundary spanning glue between the entrepreneurs
with their new ideas on the one hand side and the
development and delivery forces on the other hand
side. Here one of the key tasks is the harmonization
and synchronization of all syndicated entities.
Therefore a virtual actor in the role of a MoC
manager needs a lot of different competences
(Franke, 2005) like:
co-competition competence = avoidance of
competitions in the cooperation
identity competence = sequential and parallel
cooperation in different teams
innovation competence = working agile in a
always changing setup
intercultural competence = integrating of many
different cultures
media based communication competence = using
ICT tools and protecting others from information
overkill
cooperation competence = interlocking working
processes between networks
customer integration competence = making open
innovation possible
management competence = adjusting strategies
to dynamic requirements
self learning competence = acquiring skills
predictive to keep employability
self management competence = working against
alienation and low social embedding
transitions competence = securing against
discontinuity in earnings
entrepreneurial action competence = acting
proactive seeing chances, reducing risks
confidence competence = building trust as the
foundation of co-generation
work-learn-life balance competence = avoiding
lack of stresses and loads.
To support innovation facilitation execution as a
service in addition to the described skill set a generic
MoC architecture is needed taking into consideration
aspects of the other swim lines in respect of the
capability of the people (Curtis, 2001).
In relation to the extensive skill set the following
figure 3 shows a MoC manager with different roles.
Within the technical and social core processes the
MoC manager has to harmonize the infrastructures
and to synchronize the different activities. Therefore
he plays the role of an ICT generalist, an
intercultural facilitator and a learning coach. The
ManagementofCollaboration-ImpactsofVirtualizationtoLearning&Knowledge
237
MoC manager has also to empower the system as a
support process in the role of a visionary booster.
Figure 3: Boundary spanning MoC Manager.
The implemented MoC processes determine the
output of the system, depending on their maturity. In
relation to MoC and vCC within the different
maturity levels the following characteristics are
representative:
MoC maturity level 0 = opportunistic; the SLL
learning mode is dominating, there are no specific
MoC processes implemented, improvements happen
by random.
MoC maturity level 1 = initial; the SLL learning
mode is still dominating (are we doing things
right?), there are first specific MoC processes
implemented, improvements happen functional.
MoC maturity level 2 = enabling; the SLL
learning mode is extended with DLL bringing
beliefs into account, MoC processes are managed to
drive improvements.
MoC maturity level 3 = contribute; the DLL
learning mode is still dominating (are we doing the
right things?), MoC processes are well defined to
initiate improvements.
MoC maturity level 4 = differentiate; the DLL
learning mode is extended with TLL bringing
contexts into considerations (how do we decide what
is right?), MoC processes are predictable to forecast
improvements.
MoC maturity level 5 = transform; TLL learning
mode and optimized MoC processes to handle
wicked and super wicked problems.
Learning from the past and learning from emerging
futures is covered within the MoC maturity model
on top of the whole knowledge chain between big
data to knowledge and know how to
competitiveness.
3 CONCLUSIONS
An important aspect from MoC is the human capital
of any organization. The actual research focuses on
the described cross functional boundary spanning
MoC context using vCC to enable a self-learning
organization.
Therefore competency portfolios of individual
co-workers are required, in which their skills and
knowledge claims are retained. For the analysis
assessments in combination with real life cases in an
e-collaborative environment should be used to
identify and reproduce technical knowledge,
management knowledge, personal knowledge and
emotional knowledge of these individuals. The
education level should also be continuously recorded
and evaluated. The resulting competency portfolio
shows the used and unused potential of an individual
to develop a custom training plan.
Knowledge capacities that are strategically
important in the corporate portfolio can be used
effectively and immediately stepped up. In addition,
expertise is elicited, which is essential for the future
direction of the company. Skills and knowledge
carriers can also be involved in the training process
focused on the other employees. This training will
be in the company ideally as a hands-on training
sessions held.
A suitable instrument for this purpose is the top
pre-defined e-collaborative environment that allows
the staff in working with others to learn from others
and themselves personally. Management of
Collaboration offer companies a new approach to
knowledge management in combination with
lifelong learning.
REFERENCES
Conclin, J., Basadur, M., VanPatter, GK., 2007.
Rethinking Wicked Problems, NextDesign Leadership
Institute. New York.
Curtis, B., Hefley, W., Miller, S., 2001. PeopleCapability
Maturity Model® (P-CMM®), Carnegie Mellon
University. Software Engineering Institute. Pittsburgh.
Version 2.0.
Gray, 2010. Studie Homo Connectus, Google.
Ernst, C., Chrobot-Mason, D., 2010. Boundary Spanning
Leadership: Six Practices for Solving Problems,
Driving Innovation, and Transforming Organizations.
McGraw-Hill. New York.
KMIS2012-InternationalConferenceonKnowledgeManagementandInformationSharing
238
Franke, G., 2005. Facetten der Kompetenzentwicklung.
Bertelsmann Verlag. Gütersloh.
Haber, P., Mayr, M. et al, 2011. Virtual Project
Management Guidebook, a Working Tool for
international Project Managers. University of Applied
Science. Salzburg.
META Group, 2001. 3D Data Management: Controlling
Data Volume, Velocity and Variety. Stamford.
Nonaka, I., Konno. N., 1998. The concept of ba: Building
Foundation for Knowledge Creation. California
Management Review Vol. 40, No.3
Pietschmann, H., 2009. Die Atomisierung der Gesellschaft
Ibera Verlag. Wien.
Quitney Anderson, J., 2012. What is the likely future of
Generation AO in 2020. Elon University. North
Carolina
Schavan, A., et al, 2007. Gestaltung der Arbeit in
virtuellen Unternehmen. Bundesministerium für
Bildung und Forschung (BMBF). Bonn. Berlin.
UN General Assembly, World Summit 2005. Resolution
A/60/1.
ManagementofCollaboration-ImpactsofVirtualizationtoLearning&Knowledge
239
