Piero Migliarese

Improved communications and collaborations among tasks induced by groupware

Abstract The recent developments of Information Technologies are characterized by some new classes of applications that are classified as Groupware. These developments are connected to the need of attaining better communications and new forms of collaborations among tasks or functional departments in modern organizational structures. The new strategic scenarios are fostering organizational structures in attaining increasing varieties of products, capacities of faster responses to market changes, flexibility in modifying strategies, organizational structures, technologies. Together with actual managerial policies looking for Just-in-Time and slack resources reduction, these points compel organization structures to manage tasks that are becoming more and more interdependent. Starting from this point of view, the paper analyzes from an organizational theory perspective the role that Groupware is assuming inside the emergent organizational models. Information Technologies appear as important opportunities in facing the problems of tighter interdependencies: they provide new communications channels and allow the introduction of new organizational forms which meet strategic requirements. Also the cooperation needs, critical in some organizational sub-systems like design departments, project management, cross-functional processes at managerial level as well at operational, can be sustained and improved through Groupware. These perspertives are presented in detail in the paper, together with a proposal of an architecture for GDSS design based on the classification of the organizational needs and of the opportunities offered by IT tools.

Implementing Systems for Supporting Management Decisions

This paper reports on experimentation with Organisation Analyser (OA), a prototype software aimed at supporting the identification and analysis of decision making networks in organisations. Previous research has identified that there was great benefit in adopting a network approach to the study of organisations. This research has viewed organisations as being composed of a variety of different types of networks: emergent networks, established networks, communication networks, grape vine etc. However, it is often difficult to operationalise such an approach when studying such complex phenomena as organisational decision making and implementation. To facilitate the application of network analysis to entire organisations, we have developed Organisation Analyser (OA), a Windows-based tool for the representation and analysis of all the relevant kinds of networks which we tested in one Irish organisation. Central focus on a sample of decisions currently being made and implemented in that organisation brought to light the very political and unstable nature of the objectives and the unfolding of the decisionmaking processes in organisations. With the help of a novel framework for the analysis of organisational decision making, this paper describes the organisation where the research is taking place and the decisions selected for the purpose of the study. It shows the support which OA provided the researcher in the analysis of the information collected and presents preliminary conclusions regarding the nature of the decision making effected by groups of top managers in organisations and the way in which these decisions are implemented. In particular, it provides new insights into the concepts of structural hole, centrality and decision ownership. It reveals how decision implementation can be just as difficult as choice. OA appears to have potential as a DSS tool to assist managers in structuring their organisational networks better.

A DSS design method based on organizational change

The paper proposes a DSS design approach based on three organizational aspects: (i) the analysis of decisional requirements of managers, (ii) the changes the DSS causes in users work habits and (iii) the changes the DSS causes in organizational power equilibrium. The aim of the proposed approach is to save the implementation from failure and to foresee reasons why organization components might reject the DSS. For each of the three aspects the paper describes the main problem the DSS designer has to face with and some solutions are proposed. In particular, as regards the analysis of power equilibrium changes, the paper proposes a new method based on the analysis of the network of relations existing in the organization. The relational method overcomes some of the limits of the two classical organizational approaches to political analysis of IT system introduction in organizations: i.e. the transaction cost perspective and the organization power theory. The paper describes an application of the proposed design approach, regarding the DSS introduction in a public health agency.

Cooperation support through the use of group decision systems

This article considers the development of the group decision support system (GDSS) field both from organizational and technological perspectives. The growing importance of teamwork, lateral coordination, and activities integration inside modern business organizations is emphasized. Technological and knowledge specialization, quick transformation of business environments, reduction of response time, and so on, are some of the reasons that can explain the renewed relevance of teamwork. Also, the development of information technology (IT) is analyzed in relation to the role it is assuming in supporting group activities. Research in the GDSS field is then introduced. A proposal concerning the identification of three different phases in GDSS studies is developed, ranging from decision rooms to distributed systems. Each phase shows distinctive research topics and application fields, together with different organizational goals. Results of these developments are the growth of potential application areas of GDSS ...

GDSS and Lateral Coordination for Reactive Production Scheduling: An Organizational Approach and the Prototype GROUPS

GDSS have reached distinctive and special interest in the literature and in some business organization. Following this research field, the paper explores and proposes new opportunities for applying Group DSS in complex and dynamic manufacturing environments in order to obtain adjustments to planned schedules (reactive scheduling) through lateral coordination instead than through hierarchical relations. The group considered in this paper is constituted by production executives and foremen.