Collaboration Software System

A Collaboration Software System is a software system that can support collaboration tasks (to enable team coordination and group communication).

• AKA: Groupware System, Group Support System, Collaborative Platform.
• Context:
  • It can typically provide Collaborative Environment for distributed teams to work together regardless of physical location.
  • It can typically facilitate Real-Time Communication through collaboration messaging features and collaboration notification systems.
  • It can typically support Document Sharing with collaboration permission controls and collaboration version tracking.
  • It can typically enable Task Management through collaboration task assignments and collaboration progress tracking.
  • It can typically integrate Collaboration Workflow with collaboration approval processes and collaboration review cycles.
  • ...
  • It can often incorporate Collaboration Analytics to measure collaboration effectiveness and collaboration participation levels.
  • It can often provide Collaboration Security through collaboration access controls and collaboration data protection.
  • It can often support Collaboration Knowledge Management with collaboration information repository and collaboration search capability.
  • It can often facilitate Collaboration Decision Making through collaboration voting mechanisms and collaboration consensus building.
  • ...
  • It can range from being a Simple Collaboration Software System to being a Complex Collaboration Software System, depending on its collaboration feature scope.
  • It can range from being a Specialized Collaboration Software System to being an Integrated Collaboration Software System, depending on its collaboration task domain.
  • It can range from being a On-Premise Collaboration Software System to being a Cloud-Based Collaboration Software System, depending on its collaboration deployment model.
  • ...
  • It can have Collaboration Synchronicity ranging from Asynchronous Collaboration Tool to Synchronous Collaboration Tool, depending on its collaboration communication mode.
  • It can have Collaboration Scale ranging from Small Team Collaboration Software System to Enterprise Collaboration Software System, depending on its collaboration user capacity.
  • It can integrate with External Enterprise Systems such as collaboration enterprise resource planning systems and collaboration customer relationship management systems.
  • ...
• Examples:
  • Collaboration Software System Categories by collaboration primary function, such as:
    • Communication-Focused Collaboration Software Systems, such as:
      • Team Messaging Collaboration Software System for collaboration team communication, such as Slack Collaboration Software System and Microsoft Teams Collaboration Software System.
      • Video Conferencing Collaboration Software System for collaboration remote meetings, such as Zoom Collaboration Software System and Google Meet Collaboration Software System.
    • Document-Focused Collaboration Software Systems, such as:
      • Wiki Collaboration Software System for collaboration knowledge sharing, such as Atlassian Confluence Collaboration Software System and MediaWiki Collaboration Software System.
      • Document Management Collaboration Software System for collaboration content creation, such as Google Workspace Collaboration Software System and Microsoft 365 Collaboration Software System.
    • Project-Focused Collaboration Software Systems, such as:
      • Project Management Collaboration Software System for collaboration project tracking, such as Asana Collaboration Software System and Monday.com Collaboration Software System.
      • Issue Tracking Collaboration Software System for collaboration problem management, such as Atlassian Jira Collaboration Software System and GitHub Issues Collaboration Software System.
  • Collaboration Software System Categories by collaboration deployment type, such as:
    • Open Source Collaboration Software Systems for collaboration community development, such as Mattermost Collaboration Software System and Rocket.Chat Collaboration Software System.
    • Commercial Collaboration Software Systems for collaboration enterprise use, such as Salesforce Chatter Collaboration Software System and IBM Connections Collaboration Software System.
  • ...
• Counter-Examples:
  • Personal Productivity Software System, which lacks collaboration multi-user capability and focuses on individual task management rather than team coordination.
  • Content Management System, which primarily focuses on content organization and content publication rather than real-time collaboration.
  • Customer Relationship Management System, which focuses on customer interaction tracking rather than internal team collaboration, although modern systems may include collaboration features.
  • Project Management Software System that lacks collaboration communication features, which focuses solely on project scheduling and resource allocation without supporting team interaction.
• See: Remote Work System, Collaborative Working Environment, Computer-Supported Cooperative Work, Social Software System, Enterprise Social Network, Collaboration Process, Collaborative Editing, Virtual Team.

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References

2015

• (Wikipedia, 2015) ⇒ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_software Retrieved:2015-7-7.
  • Collaborative software or groupware is an application software designed to help people involved in a common task to achieve goals. One of the earliest definitions of collaborative software is 'intentional group processes plus software to support them.'

    The design information technology, seems to have several definitions. Understanding the differences in human interactions is necessary to ensure that appropriate technologies are employed to meet interaction needs.

    Collaborative software is a broad concept that overlaps considerably with computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW). According to Carstensen and Schmidt (1999) groupware is part of CSCW. The authors claim that CSCW, and thereby groupware, addresses "how collaborative activities and their coordination can be supported by means of computer systems." Software products such as email, calendaring, text chat, wiki, and bookmarking belong to this category whenever used for group work, whereas the more general term social software applies to systems used outside the workplace, for example, online dating services and social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook. The use of collaborative software in the work space creates a collaborative working environment (CWE). Finally, collaborative software relates to the notion of collaborative work systems, which are conceived as any form of human organization that emerges any time that collaboration takes place, whether it is formal or informal, intentional or unintentional. Whereas the groupware or collaborative software pertains to the technological elements of computer-supported cooperative work, collaborative work systems become a useful analytical tool to understand the behavioral and organizational variables that are associated to the broader concept of CSCW.

• (Wikipedia, 2015) ⇒ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/collaborative_software#Groupware_and_levels_of_collaboration Retrieved:2015-7-7.
  • Groupware can be divided into three categories depending on the level of collaboration:
    1. Communication can be thought of as unstructured interchange of information. A phone call or an IM chat discussion are examples of this.
    2. Conferencing (or collaboration level, as it is called in the academic papers that discuss these levels) refers to interactive work toward a shared goal. Brainstorming or voting are examples of this.
    3. Co-ordination refers to complex interdependent work toward a shared goal. A good metaphor for understanding this is to think about a sports team; everyone has to contribute the right play at the right time as well as adjust their play to the unfolding situation - but everyone is doing something different - in order for the team to win. That is complex interdependent work toward a shared goal: collaborative management.

• https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/CONF56/About+Confluence
  • QUOTE: Confluence is a wiki. You can use it to collaborate on writing and sharing content with your team. Your team can be as small or as big as you like. It could encompass the whole world.

2006

• (Banker et al., 2006) ⇒ Rajiv D. Banker, Indranil Bardhan, and Ozer Asdemir. (2006). “Understanding the Impact of Collaboration Software on Product Design and Development.” In: Information Systems Research, 17(4). doi:10.1287/isre.1060.0104
  • ABSTRACT: Prior research suggests that supply chain collaboration has enabled companies to compete more efficiently in a global economy. We investigate a class of collaboration software for product design and development called collaborative product commerce (CPC). Drawing on prior research in media richness theory and organizational science, we develop a theoretical framework to study the impact of CPC on product development. Based on data collected from 71 firms, we test our research hypotheses on the impact of CPC on product design quality, design cycle time, and development cost. We find that CPC implementation is associated with greater collaboration among product design teams. This collaboration has a significant, positive impact on product quality and reduces cycle time and product development cost. Further analyses reveal that CPC implementation is associated with substantial cost savings that can be attributed to improvements in product design quality, design turnaround time, greater design reuse, and lower product design documentation and rework costs.

2004

• (Dustdar, 2004) ⇒ Schahram Dustdar. (2004). “Caramba — A Process-Aware Collaboration System Supporting Ad hoc and Collaborative Processes in Virtual Teams.” In: Journal Distributed and Parallel Databases, 15(1).
  • ABSTRACT: Organizations increasingly define many business processes as projects executed by virtual (project) teams, where team members from within an organization cooperate with outside experts. Virtual teams require and enable people to collaborate across geographical distance and professional (organizational) boundaries and have a somewhat stable team configuration with roles and responsibilities assigned to team members. Different people, coming from different organizations will have their own preferences and experiences and cannot be expected to undergo a long learning cycle before participating in team activities. Thus, efficient communication, coordination, and process-aware collaboration remain a fundamental challenge. In this paper we discuss the current shortcomings of approaches in the light of virtual teamwork (mainly Workflow, Groupware, and Project Management) based on models and underlying metaphors. Furthermore, we present a novel approach for virtual teamwork by tightly integrating all associations between processes, artifacts, and resources. In this paper we analyze (a) the relevant criteria for process-aware collaboration system metaphors, (b) coordination models and constructs for organizational structures of virtual teams as well as for ad hoc and collaborative processes composed out of tasks, and (c) architectural considerations as well as design and implementation issues for an integrated process-aware collaboration system for virtual teams on the Internet.

    process-aware collaboration - Workflow - Groupware - virtual teams - Knowledge Logistics - interaction management

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