Visual collaboration lab

Visual collaborative tools have recently emerged and gained popularity to innovate and/or address problems collaboratively within teams. By providing a shared language and/or a shared visualization, they support several challenges of collaboration related to sense-making and sense-giving and action planning in multior-transfunctional teams. One of the goals of these tools is to assist teams to explore and/or brainstorm on a given problem. This is especially useful in processes which need to generate new options and alternatives through design. These tools allow for better structuring and bounding of a problem and facilitate solution searches in innovative ways during collaboration. This minitrack focuses on the design and development challenges, related theoretical explanations and justifications, and empirical evidence of using such tools. We also invite works that develop evaluation frameworks, or conduct empirical assessments of the effects of using these tools. We also encourage submissions that report the design processes of such tools and/or their conceptual modeling, as well as, their ontological and/or cognitive foundations. This minitrack invites submissions on, but are not limited to, the following topics:

• Design / Development process of visual tools
• Design principles of this/these tool/s
• Conceptual modeling
• Modeling methods, ontological modeling of methods that underlie the tools
• Conceptual foundations of visual cognition and related sense making
• How to design such tool(s) for shared visualization
• Explanations how visual tool/s can support innovation in teams
• In what way/s these artifacts can facilitate cross-boundary collaboration
• The role of visual tool/s in promoting the use of design thinking (and vice versa)
• The role of IS research and design theories in designing such tool/s for managerial/strategic purposes and practice in general
• How the models of these tools can be transformed into computer-aided design options downstream
• Implications of such tools for design practice and theory

Minitrack Co-Chairs:
Stéphanie Missonier, University of Lausanne (primary contact)
Hazbi Avdiji, University of St. Gallen
Yves Pigneur, University of Lausanne
Robert Winter, University of St. Gallen

Brand identity is paramount for companies. Owing to the advancement of technology, faster innovation, growing competition, and more demanding consumers, managing a brand is becoming increasingly complex. This is especially true for entrepreneurs in startups and SMEs, who may not have the knowledge and various resources to ensure a clear branding strategy. This paper describes the development, in three steps, of a visual collaboration tool that supports practitioners in SMEs and startups to collaboratively strategize their brand identity in a structured way. This paper reports the creation, demonstration, and a first evaluation of what we have called the Brand Identity Tool.

The paper can be found here

Organizational life, and indeed the world, is full of complex, poorly defined, so called “ill-structured” problems that need solving. While teams have a variety of tools to choose from to help tackle these problems, those tools invariably fail to address both the challenges of working collaboratively and of addressing the specific problem at hand.

https://wp.unil.ch/hecimpact/designing-solutions-to-complex-problems/

Hazbi defends his thesis on monday 4th of June at UNIL.

Title: SUPPORTING THE CHALLENGES OF CROSS-BOUNDARY TEAMWORK THROUGH DESIGN SCIENCE RESEARCH

Abstract:  In this doctoral dissertation, I relate six studies I have performed to address three challenges that cross-boundary teams (teams with great knowledge diversity) face: the challenge of coordinating knowledge and contributions, the challenge of forming cooperative attitudes, and the challenge of solving wicked management problems. These studies are inscribed in design science research, which is a paradigm of research aiming to develop prescriptive knowledge through artificial and theoretical contributions for practical problems. The artificial contributions in this research project are (1) the Coopilot App which addresses the coordination challenges by allowing individuals to evaluate how much shared understanding there is between them on the four requirements for coordination (joint objectives, joint commitments, joint resources, and joint risks), and (2) the Team Alignment Map which addresses the cooperation challenges by supporting the emergence of shared leadership through a process of cooperative joint inquiry into the four requirements. Design principles for managing coordination and supporting cooperation (the two first cross-boundary challenges) are drawn from the two artifacts. This manuscript also provides a design theory for managing the third cross-boundary challenge, i.e. wicked problem solving. By comparing the Team Alignment Map with two other similar design science research projects (the Business Model Canvas and the Data Excellence Model), I develop a design theory for visual inquiry tools that help practitioners inquire into specific wicked problems. The theoretical contributions of my research project consist in prescriptions on how team members should interact between them to collaborate effectively and overcome the three cross-boundary challenges. I propose a new conceptualization of cross-boundary teamwork as a process of joint inquiry. The view I propose is different from traditional accounts, in that I stress the importance of language. I highlight the cognitive conditions that should be met through communication to done down the boundaries between cross-boundary team members.

Looking forward to have a new Dr. in the team :-)