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Collective learning
Conflict between Computerised Collective Memory and the Prescriptive Organisation
Organizational Memory as Process not Object
Collective decision making and knowledge management in oncology
Cooperative work conditions in a satellite control room.
READ MY LIPS....BUT ALSO THE REST
Collective memory from the everyday work.
Visualised co-ordination support in distributed decision making
Knowledge Management for Collective Learning and Organisational Memory
Knowledge graphs
Shifting Perspectives on Organizational Memory
General discussion

Organizational Memory as Process not Object:

What we can learn from systems that work now. (From observations of Air Traffic Control)

Christine Halverson
Department of Cognitive Science,
University of California, San Diego
halverso@cogsci.ucsd.edu

Summary:

Much of the CSCW effort regarding collective or organizational memory has been directed to develop automation or automated aids that will fulfill the role of a collective memory base usable by a particular work force. There are several problems with this notion:

  1. a repository model is not always appropriate;
  2. stored solutions may be hard to index and thus difficult to retrieve; and
  3. interpretation may be problematic as the context changes between when the "memories" were stored and when they are accessed.

Distributed cognition facilitates applying a cognitive framework to a system. This directs observation and analysis to focus on the system's representational states and processes relevant to a particular task. The use of an object in a particular situation can be seen as the processes of coordinating with a particular representational state and interpreting it. These processes result in a task relevant representation; that is, a representational state that has been given meaning relative to its use and the situation.

What does this say for designing automation for a complex dynamic system? One thing it points out is that no matter how well designed much of the usefulness of the "collective memory" must come from the users themselves. This also means that the context of use will change over time, whether that change is anticipated or not."

Presentation and discussion

In her presentation, Christine pointed out how we as researchers often look at the objects at a workplace out of their context. The practitioners' use of the objects are contextualized. With the introduction of IT new use develops, but we shall take note of the resources used in the "old" situation so that the new tools do allow these to work. Explaining use is similar to explaining to your mom (somebody who is totally naive).

An important aspect of artifacts is that they perform precomputations for us, so that we do not have to do so much complex reasoning. Memory is always recontextualized, that is adapted to the current situation. The conclusion of this for design is that the appearance of an artifact should support immediate perception and remind persons of what has to be done. Designers of IT-systems often assume that IT is the whole solution and forget the support that already exists. Examples of such support are the slide rule, "cheat sheets", customizing notes.

Another aspect of artifacts are learnability, that is design should be conceived in terms of access (visibility for instance), appropriateness, use.


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