Supporting Virtual Research Teams - How Social Network Sites Could Contribute To The Emergence Of Necessary Social Capital

Virtual Teams in enterprise contexts have been well researched. However when concerned with scientific research studies often focus on a macro level ignoring the individual perspective of scholars. I report in this paper on observations made in two case studies on research collaboration, one concentrated on a large research network and one on the situated context of IS scholars involved in collaboration. I find that the characteristics of virtual work in enterprise and academic contexts differ notably. Whereas literature on virtual teams in enterprise contexts proclaim a strong need for the support of relational and cognitive Social Capital, in academic contexts rather structural Social Capital seems to be missing. I further propose to consider Social Network Sites as a tool to support research collaboration, as this IT-artefact seems to positively affect the emergence and maintenance of structural Social Capital

Analysing Research Collaboration On The Micro Level - The Perspective Of Individual Scholars In The IS Discipline

Virtual organisation of work is not unproblematic. An extensive body of research exists on topics like virtual teams in enterprise contexts. Similarly, in a scientific context many studies analyse collaboration among scholars. However, most studies here focus on the macro level (e.g. policy issues and the organisation of research projects). The role of the individual scholar in this is vastly ignored. I present observations from a qualitative study investigating research collaboration in taking the perspective of individual scholars in the IS discipline. I explore the different contexts of interaction in which scholars execute collaboration, and also the emergence of scholars’ individual social networks. Further I analyse tool usage, specifically focusing on Social Software, which, comparable to enterprise contexts, is gaining increasing attention in the academic context. Based on my observations I present two sets of propositions aiming at the emergence of a scholar’s professional social network and an adequate usage of tools for supporting collaboration