Synchronous and Asynchronous Collaboration Technology Use in Teamwork

As project teams have become dispersed and communication technology has evolved, organizations have increasingly moved towards usage of synchronous communication technologies such as video/web/audio conferencing and instant messaging to facilitate collaboration among team members although usage of asynchronous communication technologies such as electronic mail, wikis, blogs, social networks, and fax continue to play an important role in the exchange of information within teams. Little however is known about the influence of a team member’s task characteristics and extent of usage of such contemporary collaboration technologies on the member’s task outcomes. To explore this gap in literature, this paper draws upon media richness theory to understand the impacts of a project team member’s task characteristics and extent of usage of contemporary collaboration technologies on the member’s task outcomes. This paper also has practical implications that guide the adoption and use of collaboration technologies in organizations

Theoretical Insights for Developing the Concept of Social Technologies

Purpose—Social technologies continue to grow in popularity in society. Even though the term “social technology” is most commonly used to refer to new social media such as Twitter and Facebook, a redefinition of this concept based on the original definition is needed. Nowadays the concept of “social technology” has several aspects, which destabilize the dominant image of technology. It emphasizes the social sciences and the humanities as shapers of society, reconsiders the strength of “soft technologies.” The aim of this paper is to provide rich insight into the concept of social technologies’ and to develop the meaning of social technologies in information and knowledge society by analysing new needs and application forms of social technologies.Findings—the research contributed to the understanding of the concept of social technologies. Based on the analysis and synthesis of the scientific literature, a theoretical framework for defining social technologies was developed.Research limitations/implications—the research is limited in a few aspects. For a deeper understanding of social technologies and for developing technological perspectives in social sciences a broader theoretical, as well as empirical, research is necessary. In order to generalise the research findings, further research should include different dimensions from the perspective of other sciences

Social Media Usage and Cultural Dimensions: an Empirical Investigation

Cultural attributes of employees affect organizations in several different ways through their impact on organizational goals and decision-making processes. Social media create ample opportunities for organizations to improve competitiveness and efficiency of marketing and communications. We empirically investigate the impact of employee cultural dimensions on social media usage at work and at home. Such a study has not been undertaken before to the best of our knowledge and this would be the first study to connect cultural dimension characteristics of individuals with social media usage. Specifically, we investigate the effect of Power Distance (PD), Uncertainty Avoidance (UA), and Individualism-Collectivism (IC) on the use of popular social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Skype, and LinkedIn. Our results show that certain cultural dimensions predict higher or lower levels of use of specific social media platforms. We provide implications of our results on research and practice

Explaining multidimensional Facebook benefits: A task-technology fit approach

Facebook has emerged as the most popular Social Network Site (SNS). The literature has studied extensively the factors that explain the use of Facebook. Despite this, not equal attention has been devoted to explaining the benefits of Facebook use. The few studies have considered impacts as one-dimensional; however, the literature shows that benefits could be conceptualized as an aggregate construct. Besides, little is known about using the Task-Technology Fit model (TTF) to assess Facebook. In addressing this gap, this study aims to develop and empirically test a model that explains Facebook benefits in a multidimensional way using a task-technology fit approach. Data collected from 240 Facebook users was analyzed using partial least squares technique (PLS). The results support the model empirically. This research integrates benefits, use, and task-technology fit into a single model to provide a more comprehensive perspective of Facebook use. Also, a multidimensional view allows us to consider both utilitarian and hedonic benefits as dimensions of value that can spawn greater continued use

What Influences Employees to Use Enterprise Social Networks? A Socio-Technical Perspective

The adoption of enterprise social network (ESN) for greater employee engagement and knowledge sharing practices within organisations is proliferating. However, ESN investments have thus far not resulted in expected gains in organisational benefits due to underutilisation by employees. Limited understanding of the implications of ESN use leads to a paucity of recommendations for effective use within an organisation. This research-in-progress paper seeks to determine the factors influencing the use of ESN among employees in a large Australian utility organisation, with the aim of contributing to a practical understanding of the key success factors of the use of this new workplace social platform. Our preliminary findings indicated that the employees’ ESN behaviour tends to be influenced by socio-technical factors, including technological (i.e. platform and content quality), organisational (i.e. top management support and ESN facilitating conditions), social (i.e. critical mass and communication climate), individual (i.e. perceived benefits, knowledge self-efficacy and time commitment) and task (i.e. task characteristics) factors. This paper concludes that a successful implementation of ESN in an organisation involves the nexus between these five factors and provides several recommendations about how ESN use can be enhanced

Promoting The Use Of Online Social Technology As A Case-Based Learning Tool

Social technology is proliferating and influencing different aspects of society. However, very few studies have examined the use of such a technology for a case-based learning pedagogy. This preliminary study investigates the use of social technology as a case-based learning tool to improve the effectiveness of case-based learning in the classroom. A total of 116 students in a public university in Thailand were formed into teams and spent two weeks discussing a Harvard business case via the social technology Edmodo. After the experiment, an online survey was conducted with these participants to assess the efficacy of using Edmodo for solving this case. The Task-Technology Fit (TTF) theory was used to assess the impact of case-based learning and the tasks that the students had to carry out. The findings of this preliminary study suggest that the TTF theory could be used as an effective theory to help better understand not only the user behaviour but also the usefulness of online social technology as a case-based learning tool. However, the theory may not be able to fully capture the complexity of online social technology adoption in the case-based learning context. Theoretical and practical implications are drawn from the findings of this preliminary study

IT\u27S WHAT YOU WRITE and HOW YOU WRITE ABOUT IT: THE POLICING FACEBOOK EXPERIENCE

This study focuses on social media use by law enforcement agencies. Based on media richness theory, we examined how the responses to Facebook messages posted by five police departments vary by type of cue, image vs. text, and across different content categories. Our findings suggest that although messages with richer information, namely more visual and verbal cues, receive more likes, topics such as Accident, Traffic and Announcement receive significantly fewer likes. Moreover, the presence of pictures in announcement messages reduces the number of likes. In addition, although people comment on messages about Property/Pets, they are much less inclined to comment on other topics. Our study contributes to media richness theory by demonstrating the importance of considering the nature and context of a communication, as represented by the content category, and to law enforcement agencies\u27 practice by offering recommendations for how to measure public engagement and design strategies that will better leverage social media

Promoting the Use of Online Social Technology as a Case-based Learning Tool

Social technology is proliferating and influencing different aspects of society. However, very few studies have examined the use of such a technology for a case-based learning pedagogy. This preliminary study investigates the use of social technology as a case-based learning tool to improve the effectiveness of case-based learning in the classroom. A total of 116 students in a public university in Thailand were formed into teams and spent two weeks discussing a Harvard business case via the social technology Edmodo. After the experiment, an online survey was conducted with these participants to assess the efficacy of using Edmodo for solving this case. The Task-Technology Fit (TTF) theory was used to assess the impact of case-based learning and the tasks that the students had to carry out. The findings of this preliminary study suggest that the TTF theory could be used as an effective theory to help better understand not only the user behaviour but also the usefulness of online social technology as a case-based learning tool. However, the theory may not be able to fully capture the complexity of online social technology adoption in the case-based learning context. Theoretical and practical implications are drawn from the findings of this preliminary study

Do good things and talk about them: A Theory of Academics Usage of Enterprise Social Networks for Impression Management Tactics

Enterprise social networks provide benefits especially for knowledge-intensive work as they enable communication, collaboration and knowledge exchange. These platforms should therefore lead to increased adoption and use by knowledge-intensive workers such as consultants or indeed researchers. Our interest is in ascertaining whether scientific researchers use enterprise social networks as part of their work practices. This focus is motivated by an apparent schism between a need for researchers to exchange knowledge and profile themselves, and the aversion to sharing breakthrough ideas and joining in an ever-increasing publishing and marketing game. We draw on research on academic work practices and impression management to develop a model of academics’ ESN usage for impression management tactics. We describe important constructs of our model, offer strategies for their operationalization and give an outlook to our ongoing empirical study of the use of an ESN platform by 20 schools across six faculties at an Australian university

The Efficacy of Social Learning Technology on Case-based Learning: A Task-Technology Perspective

The use of social technology in classroom has shown various results. This paper focuses on using social technology as a case-based learning tool. A total of 116 students in a public university in Thailand were formed into teams, and spent two weeks in discussing a Harvard business case via the social technology; Edmodo. After the experiment, an online survey is conducted with these participants to assess the individual learning performance in case-based learning via social technology. Task-technology fit (TTF) was also used to assess the impact on learning performance and the tasks that the students perform by using Edmodo as a learning tool. Our findings suggest that social technology be used as a fit learning tool to improve students’ understanding of business cases. We concluded that the higher perceived task-technology fit for the social technology, the better learning performance in both near and far knowledge for the students