Research projects about coordination across people, tasks and resources

In a growing number of organizations, people work in teams or groups. Team members work jointly on a complex task toward a deadline and then move on to different projects. Often team members belong to several project teams at once. Teams also may form alliances or join forces with other teams. A critical feature in the successful operation of teams is collaboration. Collaboration means the ability of those working together to form common goals and understandings, to coordinate resources and activities, to learn from one another, and to alleviate conflict. Collaboration also refers to the ability of individuals and teams to coordinate with other teams and share their knowledge and resources.

Virtual teams have captured the imagination of managers and are featured in popular books. At the same time, empirical studies show that these teams face formidable barriers to effective work. The challenges faced by project teams in science, industry, and professional organizations have given rise to a loose community of researchers in fields such as information systems (ICIS) and computer supported cooperative work (CSCW), who are working to understand and aid collaborations and especially distributed work in and across teams. This website features a collection of related research projects on complex collaborations funded by the (CISE) at the National Science Foundation.