Technology and Organizations

A few months ago I wrote a post called “Group Mind and Memory with Duct Tape and Twine.” My goal there was to highlight some easy actions and tools for supporting teams. In that post I was focused on helping virtual teams overcome some of their weaknesses in terms of having common ground across the members, as well as some other meeting basics. Here I’d like to hit on the flip side, how can we do better by integrating technology into our face to face meetings?

John Sawyer, Maggie Neale, and I have written about hybrid teams: teams that meet face to face but also make use technology support. I have a hard time imagining a setting where some form of technology wouldn’t provide value in a face to face meeting – even if the technology is just a piece of paper (a weak option as it’s hard for everyone to see) or a white board (better). Seems pretty easy to take team notes on a big piece of paper or a white board, but I’ve attended a number of face to face meetings recently where no notes were taken that were visible to the participants. “Poof” went many of the ideas – for those of you on Macs, think about the animation and sound when you drag an icon off the taskbar – “poof,” it’s gone.

Sure, some individuals were taking notes, but in these instances none of those notes are available to the meeting participants. The leader in each case was clearly taking some notes, but in all the instances I’m thinking about they were also the main meeting facilitator, meaning their main focus wasn’t on note taking.

Frankly I don’t like my ideas going “poof,” so I emailed the leaders with the ideas I thought best. This made the best of the situation from my perspective, but isn’t the best group outcome as I know I filter my notes as I go.

I’ll quote from my earlier post about the benefits of notes that are visible to the meeting participants: “If the team rotated who took notes (perhaps using the agenda as the base for the notes) – and more importantly, took notes in a way that all could see them as they were being taken, they would gain at least four benefits. First, the real time nature of the notes provides a visualization of what one member thinks is being said. The rest of the team can then chime in with corrections, elaborations, agreement to action items and the like. There is stronger engagement as the team is going to be held to their immediate agreement about the outcomes of the meeting. Second, once the meeting is over, value added work can begin, rather than spending time typing up notes from work that has now past. Third, since the team lead isn’t trying to take notes and run the meeting, both activities should be of higher quality. Fourth, the minutes are a living document versus an attachment that seems to just get archived and not looked at again.”

As I watched our process over these meetings, another benefit to “group” notes came to mind – progress can be dynamically tracked. If we get bogged down or aren’t addressing the goals of the meeting it will be more apparent through the artifact of the notes. The notes begin to serve as a way to hold the meeting participants to their goals. Without the group notes, the conversation can digress without evidence to the contrary.

The benefits of agendas, having materials available in advance, and note taking are as old as meetings (what do you think those cave drawing are?). Let’s move into the 21st Century and make use of the technologies that are available to us. In each of my example meetings we had access to projection systems and could easily have used a projected agenda as a template for our notes. Yes, as noted by an astute colleague of mine, agendas and notes could provide so much structure that they hamper creativity, but in each of these cases I would have been willing to take that risk over the ideas going “poof” and us having to cover the same ground again in the future. Let’s help our meeting leaders by offering to set up the computer and take the notes.

Cary J. Calderone, Esquire argues in his blog “Document Retention Hot Topics” that software, hardware, personnel, and training need to be jointly managed for successful document retention policies. (Document retention policies encompass the rules and regulations around how companies manage their records and communication – call a stock broker and listen to the notice of recording that comes on before you are connected; or, think Enron/Arthur Andersen and document shredding.)

You can’t change just one thing when organizations are involved. Technology, practices, and policies need to be managed in concert for successful implementation and valuable outcomes. This legal example shows the reach of this perspective. (Earlier I presented an example from McKinsey on gaining value from technology trends.) If you adopt a new technology, consider how organizational practices or structures might be jointly adapted to gain full value. If you change a practice or restructure, think about how technology adaptations might support the change. Pulling one thread in the fabric of the organization requires other threads to shift as well, otherwise listen for a ripping sound as stressed people and systems struggle to perform.

Meet Teppo Raisanen, visiting researcher (from Finland) at Stanford. He works in the Persuasive Technology Lab at the Center for Study of Language and Information. As part of his work, he is writing and implementing tools (mashups) on Wikipedia to help users better comprehend what they read. One of the tools he showed me was a double-click word translator. You could double click on any word in Wikipedia and it would translate it into the language you had set. Teppo’s motivation was to enable non-English-as-first-language readers to use Wikipedia, get translation when they need it, while not breaking their “flow” as they are working to comprehend the given material. Teppo was interested in talking to me as he thought there might be a cross-over with his ideas around comprehension and my ideas about how technology features trigger sensemaking about the technology.

I was excited about his work as it raised issues of how people come to understand:

1. Knowledge management tool features and capabilities
2. How the tool can be used in a given context
3. The focal knowledge the tool and context were designed to support

As is often discussed in this blog, technologies alone do not have effects. Effects come from the combined/intertwined aspects of the technology, the organization, and related processes. What occurred to me as I talked to Teppo about implementing his tool was the staging: there are actually at least three stages of comprehension needed if we want technology tools for knowledge management to work. The three stages noted above are an excellent starting point as you plan implementation of knowledge tools, collaboration tools, or other workplace technologies. My concern, however, is that it is a rare setting where all three types of comprehension are considered. Yet without attention to all three it is unlikely that great value will result from a knowledge management tool implementation. Not impossible – especially when the need is so great that the users will put in extra effort – but much less likely.

Examples would be appreciated of success stories. Have you been involved in a knowledge management tool implementation where time/effort was made to clarify/discover the features of the tools, how those features might intertwine with the given organizational setting, and then how the tool/setting combination helped with comprehending the specific focal knowledge?

Speaking of mashups – create your own Dilbert cartoon punchlines

“..43 Folders, Merlin Mann’s family of websites about stuff like personal productivity, life hacks, and simple ways to make your life a little better.” Lifehacker “features tips, shortcuts, and downloads that help you get things done smarter and more efficiently.” Both of these blogs provide great tips on a variety of topics – often stretching how you might think about using the technology you have and use everyday (i.e., duct tape and twine).

In this post I apply the same perspective to helping groups get things done just a little bit easier – without having to learn or buy new tools. Recently I posted about the kinds of things groups might gain from visualization of their processes. The more I thought about it, the more I thought there might be lower hanging fruit – actions that are a touch easier to apply and still may provide great benefit in your teams.

Scenario One. A friend of mine runs a weekly conference call managing a medium sized project. She sends out an email including the agenda and an email attachment of the prior meeting’s minutes. She runs the call and takes careful notes as the meeting progresses. After the call she spends at least 90 minutes creating the post meeting notes (minutes), formatting, and the like.

Good for her and the team that they have an agenda for the call. Basic team meeting 101 – otherwise how can people have access to the material they will need to contribute, when they need to contribute it? Where I think there is low hanging fruit is in the minutes: If the team rotated who took notes (perhaps using the agenda as the base for the notes) – and more importantly, took notes in a way that all could see them as they were being taken, they would gain at least four benefits. First, the real time nature of the notes provides visualization of what one member thinks is being said. The rest of the team can then chime in with corrections, elaborations, agreement to action items and the like. There is stronger engagement as the team is going to be held to their immediate agreement about the outcomes of the meeting. Second, once the meeting is over, value added work can begin, rather than spending time typing up notes from work that has now past. Third, since the team lead isn’t trying to take notes and run the meeting, both activities should be of higher quality. Fourth, the minutes are a living document versus an attachment that seems to just get archived and not looked at again.

Free tools that might make this work: Any wiki (depending on your need for privacy, you might pay a monthly fee – see WikiMatrix for a list of many options), or Google Sites.

Certainly there are caveats: For example, how comfortable will people be at having their initial typos and typing speed observed? In this last sentence I had to backspace for corrections twice (coffee hasn’t kicked in yet…) For this issue I do think there will need to be some social adjustments as well as the technical and practice ones. See my comment on “alpha drafts” – short version is that perhaps we can adjust our expectations for real time versus finished product.

Scenario Two. My colleagues and I were running a four-hour workshop at this year’s HICSS conference. We had about 50 people in the audience and were hoping for an interactive event. We’d also put together a wiki (with multiple pages so multiple people could contribute at the same time) with the idea that people would add to the wiki as the discussion progressed. It became clear that this wiki mode wasn’t working (I have successfully used this “live” wiki approach at another conference, but it didn’t work this time – another possible post topic). Instead of forcing the wiki, I started taking notes on the presentation PowerPoint slides. We had created a simple set of slides to lead the discussion so it was easy to just add the notes from the computer running the presentation – and then all the room could see them and elaborate. It was then a simple task to cut and paste those notes into the wiki after the session ended.

Three take away points and a question:

1. Simplify the meeting process by doing note documentation during the meeting rather than taking up time after the fact – yes it may make the meeting a bit longer, but I think the benefits will outweigh the cost.

2. Engaging participants in the live creation of a single set of notes enhances engagement, and provides an opportunity for elaboration, action item creation, and error correction.

3. When the notes are a live work product they are more likely to be recycled – the whole group created them (generating greater commitment and understanding) and will be more likely to effectively search for the content when needed.

Question: Given the ubiquitousness of powerpoint and projection in large meetings, why ever use a flipchart or whiteboard? Flipchart sheets, for example, are then either transcribed (adding effort), or thrown away. While they provide the value of the “at the moment” representation of the group’s thinking, their value sharply decreases after the meeting. Electronic notes can work face to face or in a virtual setting, can be searched and archived without additional effort. (For smaller meetings or cases where you don’t have access to projection, a variety of products let you easily – and in some cases for free – take a picture of the notes on the whiteboard, chalkboard, flipchart, marble tablet that you were using and through OCR have that material transformed into searchable notes. I’m just beginning to use Evernote (free) for this purpose.)

Thank you to Michael Griffith (my brother and Director, Application Development Group for the U of A College of Medicine) for comments on an earlier draft.

Team situational awareness has been a common topic in this blog, but tonight I’d like to expand beyond the team. Monday, Craig Meek, founder and CEO of iVistra gave a great talk at Santa Clara University’s Leavey School of Business (Thanks go to Mary Furlong for inviting Craig to speak with us). His topic was data visualization and entrepreneurship. Certainly those are important topics, but what got me in the room was his connection to the America’s Cup. iVistra provided the online real-time 3D graphics and tracking for the 32nd Cup. Sailing may have been the hook, but once I saw the capability he was providing to his clients, I quickly started thinking about how data visualization relates to situational awareness.

The basics as I see them:

Teams have trait and state characteristics. Traits include fundamentals like transactive memory (knowing who knows what, and how to coordinate as a result) and absorptive capacity (knowing how to effectively recognize and bring new information into the team). These are critical to the team’s DNA, and while they develop over time, they are relatively stable. States include real time status indications. In my last team situational awareness post I used the tennis ballkids’ signaling with their hands as an example of their showing the state of whether or not they had any balls available.

Data visualization has two parts: The underlying conceptual model which causes certain data to be collected and then the conceptual model which results in the presentation of particular relationships. Think of this as choices around what kinds of sensors to install in your car (speed, engine temperature, but not how much the driver’s seat is reclined) and then how to present that information (analog versus digital; in the dash, or in a heads-up display).

I’ve been writing about team situational awareness as this state information is important to effective teamwork, and has varying challenges for teams that are collocated versus virtual. iVistra’s tools highlight the value of situational awareness for broader organizational systems. Their custom designed systems (software, sensors, communication links) provide organizations with the ability to track and understand complex systems like supply chains, trucking systems (speed, driver drive times, maintenance schedules), trains (position, operational and financial information), and assets (e.g., portable generators, their charge levels, and locations such that problems can be solved most efficiently). Yes, these systems exist – think of NASA’s Houston Mission Control Center, or WalMart’s renowned inventory tracking and control systems (using a set of computer systems described by CNBC as second only to the United States Pentagon’s, CNBC “The Age of Walmart”, 2004).

What’s new is that these systems aren’t requiring computer systems rivaling NASA or the Pentagon’s. They are available to the rest of us. The trick is how to know the states that matter, and how to relate them in important ways, given the traits of the team or organization. This is evidence-based management in real time.

I asked Craig how his clients come to integrate their new knowledge with new organizational practices that can extract the most value. He suggests that it’s an evolution. iVistra provides business analysts that work with the company to develop requirements based on their experience in the field. The system is designed and implemented to those requirements, and then it is an on-going process to tune organizational activities and opportunities for new streams of data.

I expect the organizations that understand this as process – rather than as a technology purchase – will be gaining the greatest benefit. I know that the America’s Cup teams work very hard to collect baseline data, test new techniques and equipment, and then use the results of these experiments to fine-tune their campaigns. This is a formalized, but very innovation focused, approach.

Part II will look at the form of visualization.