vsbabu.org

Why do collaboration tools fail?

David Weinberger: The benefits of using collaboration software are multiple and manifest. So, why aren’t organizations more interested in using it? One explanation: We are in the realm not of scientifical business management but organized religion. The issue isn’t business efficiency but the maintenance of power. Collaboration software does indeed hyperlink the hierarchy. And that’s just plain scary to The Establishment, the status quo and/or The Man. The price of admission is business' corrupt soul.

Steve Yost disagrees with David Weinberger assertion: Lots of organizations are extremely interested in collaborative tools now. The main reason they can’t successfully adopt collaborative technology is because you can’t get people to all go use new technology at once, yet in the face of simple email and browser use, that’s what’s necessary: the new technology usage has to be unanimous. If one person in a group can’t or won’t use the new tech, the forum reverts to the least common denominator -- ubiquitous email.

Both links via Jeroen Bekker’s Groove weblog.

My feeling is that David right. Steve is also right in the sense "it ain’t easy enough to use" is the common reason people cite when they don’t want to collaborate. I think that is a more politically correct reason than telling - "I’m afraid that if I collaborate, organization will know what I know and since my knowledge is out there, why should organization be further interested in me?"

That, is something HR should really try to solve. There must be a feedback system in place that is immediate and proportional to the effort involved - one company succeeded very well in knowledge management by giving out awards every week on "Contributor of the week" and "User of the week" (who made use of information in the knowledge management system in a most efficient way).

Also, a good contributor is very beneficial to the organization since that person has demonstrated s/he is capable of ideas and is willing to share. There certainly could be more ideas from that person. If s/he feels that the organization recognize that fact, it is really good motivation.

Bad motivation can include lack of feedback and lack or proportional feedback. Feedback should be proportional mainly to the work done, not on how much effort went into it. The stress should be on working efficiently than on working hard. If it taked person A 100 hours to finish some thing and person B 20 hours to do the same thing, congratulate person A and B, let it be known to person A that it could be done in 20 hours and give B a chance to explain to A how it could be done. Very often managers think that person A "struggled" and hence shower encouragement on A, while neglecting B thinking that s/he knows how to do things quickly anyway. Soon, B is going to take 100 hours - of which 80 hours s/he is going to use for his or her personal time, since B feels that there is no proportional reward in doing things more efficiently. Then, why bother?