A Holistic Framework for Effective Engineering Leadership Development Using 3D Virtual World Simulation

Problems associated with the limited success of traditional engineering leadership development are the absence of embedded real-life industry case studies in leadership development and incorrect applications of leadership strategies in the various contexts. Though recommended programs for enhancing leadership development exist, they lack an examined framework, especially when it comes to leadership development of undergraduate engineering students. In this research effort, the impact of a framework using 3D virtual world simulation and the 4-D Leadership System to enhance the leadership abilities of undergraduate engineering students at the individual and team levels based on industrial leadership case studies was investigated. The 3D virtual world simulation was used to provide experiential learning by replacing human beings with avatars that could be managed or dramatized by real people. This framework was examined and validated by a randomized pretest-posttest control group design. Paired and two-sample t-tests revealed a significant development in the average team leadership skills of the experimental group, but no significant change occurred in the control group teams. There was a reduction in the mean of individuals\u27 tests which indicated there was a small enhancement in an individual\u27s leadership skills; however, the change was small and not statistically significant. Also, the administration of the 3D virtual world leadership simulation on the undergraduate engineering students had a significant effect on a team\u27s average leadership skills. There was a small, but insignificant effect of the 3D virtual world simulation for individuals. The findings of the study supported simulation as having potential to strengthen the leadership development of undergraduate engineering students, thereby preparing them to meet industry\u27s demands for engineering leadership

Civic Identities, Online Technologies: From Designing Civics Curriculum to Supporting Civic Experiences

Part of the Volume on Civic Life Online: Learning How Digital Media Can Engage Youth.Youth today are often criticized for their lack of civic participation and involvement in political life. Technology has been blamed, amongst many other causes, for fostering social isolation and youth's retreat into a private world disconnected from their communities. However, current research is beginning to indicate that these might be inaccurate perceptions. The Internet has provided new opportunities to create communities that extend beyond geographic boundaries, to engage in civic and volunteering activities across local and national frontiers, to learn about political life, and to experience the challenges of democratic participation. How do we leverage youth's interest in new technologies by developing technology-based educational programs to promote civic engagement? This chapter explores this question by proposing socio-technical design elements to be considered when developing technology-rich experiences. It presents a typology to guide the design of Internet-based interventions, taking into account both the affordances of the technology and the educational approach to the use of the technology. It also presents a pilot experience in a northeastern university that offered a pre-orientation program in which incoming freshman designed a three-dimensional virtual campus of the future and developed new policies and programs to strengthen the relationship between college campus and neighbor communities

Team Collaboration in Virtual Worlds: Editorial to the Special Issue

Virtual worlds are Internet-based three-dimensional (3D) computer-generated environments where users interact through “avatars” – a computer-generated representation of themselves that they control in terms of appearance and behavior. In recent years, virtual worlds have evolved into sophisticated social systems where millions of people regularly collaborate. For dispersed organizational teams, they represent a viable collaboration environment in which users can integrate different communication channels and manipulate digital artifacts that represent actual team deliverables. In this editorial to the Special Issue on Team Collaboration in Virtual Worlds, we discuss past research and highlight key findings with respect to five dimensions of collaborative work: technology, people, information, process, and leadership. We conclude with a discussion of the key research challenges that lie ahead to shape the research agenda for team collaboration in virtual worlds and metaverses

Avatar Training - A Humanistic and Creativity Driven Approach

Avatar Training A Humanistic and Creativity Driven Approach This project is about the development of a program prototype for a humanistic and creativity driven approach to avatar training to be delivered in Second Life™ (SL). Specifically, the program aims at developing the skills necessary to make a presentation in, and to safely explore, SL. It was proposed to create a unique learning framework that takes into account the targeted clientele, adult professionals with no or limited experience with SL, the sensibilities of 3D immersive social virtual environment, the avatar training needs, and the possibility to weave in creativity skills practice. To that end, the resulting framework for a humanistic and creativity driven approach to avatar training integrates elements of the following four learning frameworks: 1) Dialogue Education, a framework for adult learning; 2) Torrance Incubation Model, to weave in creativity skills training; 3) Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, to inform the hierarchy of avatar training needs; and 4) Scopes’ Cybergogy of Learning Archetypes and Learning Domains to take advantage of the affordance of Second Life for immersive and experiential learning

Innovate Magazine / Annual Review 2010-2011

https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/innovate/1001/thumbnail.jp

Addressing the Challenges of Cross-Cultural and Virtual Communication in the Workplace

The move toward a more global or geographically dispersed organization, together with the technology that is being used to enable this, has dramatically changed work and the workplace in the United States and United Kingdom within the last few decades (Ouye, 2011). This is prompting leaders to communicate with teams consisting of vastly different backgrounds, languages and styles, and to essentially ‘work at the same table’ in the absence of physical cues, such as facial expressions and gestures. Leaders of such teams are challenged to create a smooth operation despite the many differences; the possibilities for misunderstandings and cultural blunders can be magnified in these work situations, and leaders would benefit from expanding their own tools and techniques to deal with these differences (Zofi, 2012). This qualitative research is guided by the question, “How are selected leaders addressing the challenges of cross-cultural and virtual communication in their workplaces?” and presents the interview results of 16 selected leaders. The research investigates and analyzes the challenges, and identifies strategies and best practices that these leaders have used to address them

The Effects of Team Surface-level Diversity on Creativity & innovation

During the last 20 years, the global marketplace has become more competitive due to increased globalization, aggressive market competition, and changing customer demands. This has forced organizations to assemble teams with diverse knowledge, skills, and abilities to remain competitive. However, previous meta-analytic investigations examining the relationship between team surface-level diversity (i.e., race or gender identity), creativity, and innovation have indicated a small negative relationship. Despite the said positive effects of team diversity, theory and empirical evidence suggests that increased surface-level team diversity leads to decreased team collaboration, team cohesion, and diminished creativity and innovation (Bell, 2007). This study explores the effects of team inclusive behaviors on surface-level diverse teams. Drawing on social identity theory, it was hypothesized that team inclusive behaviors would moderate the indirect effects of team surface-level diversity on team creativity and innovation, such that the relationships between team surface-level diversity and team creativity and innovation would be stronger when team inclusive behaviors were high as opposed to low. Undergraduate students and working adults completed an experiment to test the manipulation. Participants were randomly appointed to 1 of 2 study conditions (low or high team inclusion) and completed assignments in two to four-person teams (100 total). Results from regression analyses did not provide support for the hypothesis mentioned above. However, results from exploratory analyses demonstrated that team setting (virtual or in-person) predicted levels of team creativity. However, there was a significant interaction effect between team setting and team inclusive behaviors when predicting team psychological safety such that teams high in team inclusive behaviors will have higher levels of team psychological safety. Implications for theory and practice are further discussed

3D Collaboration Spaces for Enterprise Work: A Thought Leaders’ Dialogue and Conference Summary Paper UPENN Virtual Organizational Dynamics Design Laboratory

On February 8th, 6pm to 10pm Eastern, presenters from CCL’s Innovation Group, IBM’s Center for Advanced Learning (CAL), Stanford’s Project Based Learning Lab (PBL) and Proton Media/PPD 3D joined UPenn’s Virtual OD Design Lab for our first fully immersive 3D Peer learning Conference, hosted and supported by Proton Media in ProtoSphere. In this exciting event, the Lab team engaged thought leaders in real time dialogue about their state-of- the-art cases covering advanced uses of 3D immersive technologies for leadership and organization development, collaboration and global enterprise training

Leadership in partially distributed teams

Inter-organizational collaboration is becoming more common. When organizations collaborate they often do so in partially distributed teams (PDTs). A PDT is a hybrid team that has at least one collocated subteam and at least two subteams that are geographically distributed and communicate primarily through electronic media. While PDTs share many characteristics with both traditionally collocated and fully distributed teams, they also have unique characteristics and issues. This dissertation reports on a field study of PDTs conducted over two semesters with student participants, This research was conducted as part of a larger series of studies investigating PDTs, In these studies, participants were formed into PDTs of two collocated subteams each. The task was to produce requirements for an emergency response information system for a specified country. Study 1 varied leadership configuration but held distance constant. Study 2 varied both leadership configuration and distance. Although distance was to be measured as cultural, geographic, and temporal distance, multicollinearity issues arose and cultural distance was dropped from the analysis. Distance was measured as time zone differences which, because the subteams in a team had east-west geographic distance, captured the geographic distance as well. Data collection was through surveys and personal reflections, Personal reflections are open ended survey questions for which the subjects reflected on their experiences the previous week in a PDT. This dissertation reports on qualitative and quantitative analyses of Study 1 data and quantitative analysis of Study 2 data, In addition to bivariate analyses of the survey data conducted separately for each study, multivariate analysis using Partial Least Squares (PLS) was performed on the combined Study 1 and Study 2 data. Factor analysis resulted in the identification of three types of trust: Expertise Trust, Personal Trust, and Process Trust, Trust was measured in the first personal reflection (after one week) and in the post survey at the end of the four week project, Early trust has the dimensions of Expertise Trust, Personal Trust, and Process Trust while longer term trust is comprised of Personal Trust and Process Trust. The results partially support the proposed research model. Strong support was found for the proposition that leadership roles identified by Quinn (1988) and examined in fully virtual and traditionally collocated teams are enacted in PDTs as well, Results suggest that leadership configuration influences leader role enactments. Trust was found to be important to team outcomes and influenced by media used and distance. Leadership role enactments were associated with perceptions of leader effectiveness, perceptions of performance, and satisfaction. Results suggest that leader effectiveness is associated with trust, perceptions of performance, and satisfaction. That is, trust, leadership configuration, distance, and leader role enactments all play important roles in PDTs. The results add insights into leadership and trust in partially distributed teams, which can inform professionals as to issues, leadership configurations, and leadership behaviors (roles) that will promote successful outcomes