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

Barriers to Use of Social Media by Emergency Managers

Social media (SM) are socio-technical systems that have the potential to provide real-time information during crises and thus to help protect lives and property. Yet, US emergency management (EM) agencies do not extensively use them. This mixed-methods study describes the ways SM is used by county-level US emergency managers, barriers to effective SM use, and recommendations to improve use. Exploratory interviews were conducted with US public sector emergency managers to elicit attitudes about SM. This was followed by a survey of over 200 US county level emergency managers. Results show that only about half of agencies use SM at all. About one quarter of agencies with formal policies actually forbid the use of SM. For both disseminating (sending out) and collecting information lack of sufficient staff is the most important barrier. However, lack of guidance/policy documents is the second highest rated barrier to dissemination via SM. Lack of skills and of the training that could improve these skills is also important. For collecting data, trustworthiness and information overload issues are the second and third most important barriers, which points to the need for appropriate software support to deal with these system-related issues. There are few differences associated with agency characteristics. By understanding important barriers, technologists can better meet the needs of emergency managers when designing SM technologies

Supporting the Use of Social Media by Emergency Managers: Software Tools to Overcome Information Overload

Information overload has been suggested as a potential barrier to use of social media by emergency managers, especially for gathering information during disasters. This paper, based on a survey of 477 U.S. county-level emergency managers, examines the relationship of the perception of information overload as a barrier to social media use for gathering information, to the intention to use social media. It also examines the relationship of perceived usefulness of certain technological advancements currently being developed to intention to use. Results indicate that emergency managers’ perception of information overload as a barrier to use is negatively related to intention to use it, while perceptions of the usefulness of these technologies are positively related to intention to use. The study calls attention to the importance of resolving information overload to increase the use of social media for emergency management, and suggests the implementation of appropriate software tools to ameliorate this problem

How the Internet of Things Technology Enhances Emergency Response Operations

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a novel paradigmthat connects the pervasive presence around us of a variety of things or objects to the Internet by using wireless/wired technologies to reach desired goals. Since the concept of the IoT was introduced in 2005, we see the deployment of a new generation of networked smart objects with communication, sensory and action capabilities for numerous applications, mainly in global supply chain management, environment monitoring and other non-stress environments. This paper introduces the IoT technology for use in the emergency management community. Considering the information required for supporting three sequential and distinct rhythms in emergency response operations: mobilization rhythm, preliminary situation assessment rhythm, and intervention rhythm, the paper proposes a modified task-technology fit approach that is used to investigate how the IoT technology can be incorporated into the three rhythms and enhance emergency response operations. The findings from our research support our two hypotheses: H1: IoT technology fits the identified information requirements; and H2: IoT technology provides added value to emergency response operations in terms of obtaining efficient cooperation, accurate situational awareness, and complete visibility of resources

The Design of an Online Social Network Site for Emergency Management: A One Stop Shop

Web 2.0 is rapidly creating new opportunities for communication and collaboration. Part of this explosion is the increase in popularity and use of Social Network Sites (SNSs) for general and domain-specific use. In the emergency domain there are a number of websites including wikis and SNSs. but they stand as silos in the field, unable to allow for cross-site collaboration. In this paper we describe ongoing design science research to develop and refine guiding principles for the design of an SNS that will bring together emergency domain professionals in a “one-stop-shop.” We surveyed emergency professionals who study crisis information systems, to ascertain potential functionalities of such an SNS. Preliminary results suggest that there is a need for the envisioned SNS. Future research will continue to explore possible solutions to issues addressed in this paper

Real or Fake? User Behavior and Attitudes Related to Determining the Veracity of Social Media Posts

International audienceCitizens and Emergency Managers need to be able to distinguish "fake" (untrue) news posts from real news posts on social media during disasters. This paper is based on an online survey conducted in 2018 that produced 341 responses from invitations distributed via email and through Facebook. It explores to what extent and how citizens generally assess whether postings are "true" or "fake," and describes indicators of the trustworthiness of content that users would like. The mean response on a semantic differential scale measuring how frequently users attempt to verify the news trustworthiness (a scale from 1-never to 5-always) was 3.37. The most frequent message characteristics citizens' use are grammar and the trustworthiness of the sender. Most respondents would find an indicator of trustworthiness helpful, with the most popular choice being a colored graphic. Limitations and implications for assessments of trustworthiness during disasters are discussed

Curriculum for a Program in EM with IS-Focus - Thumbs up? Attitudes of Emergency Managers to Proposed Masters Programs in EM With an IS Focus

International audienceInformation Systems (IS) increasingly are used in Emergency Management (EM), so it is prudent to include IS study in EM education. This paper presents the results of analyzing the responses to a survey that proposed potential courses for programs at the master's level. The survey was completed by 373 practitioners, academics and/or researchers with EM experience. All proposed courses were rated above 4 on a 7-point scale for how essential they are to the curriculum. However, there were disagreements. Qualitative analysis of volunteered comments indicate that some low ratings were due to disagreement with the content of the course as described, or with the need for an entire course to cover the topic. An unexpected finding was that a substantial number of respondents spontaneously expressed opposition to the use of IS for EM in general. The findings are discussed and a preliminary curriculum is proposed