Maturing Collaboration in Intelligent Energy: Challenging the Conventional Wisdom of Collaboration Environments

Abstract

Abstract Maturing Collaboration in Intelligent Energy: Challenging the conventional wisdom of Collaboration Environments This paper explains why the conventional wisdom of collaboration environments is out of date with the current landscape of technology enablers and should be aligned with the shifting landscape of how people collaborate. To date, the collaboration has focused on enabling team collaboration. The focus going forward should be to enable the Digital Engineer and move away from designing collaboration environments around structured team processes, as this actually limits the value of the collaboration environment. After years of significant investment in collaboration technology, process improvements and change management, many organizations have not captured the transformational value that was promised with such programs. Common themes have emerged from industry case studies to better understand the root causes associated. A Collaboration Maturity Model was introduced in a previous paper (Gilman, Kuhn 2012) to outline the current state of collaboration and potential future areas of innovation. The underlying enablers of collaboration will be discussed such as technology; environment, process and organization that have shifted to suggest the traditional team based collaboration environments do not fit the expectations of today’s Digital Engineer. Many of the traditional collaboration environment designs were focused specifically on enabling teams to work together when information could not be easily shared and communication across distance was not seamless. Today there is a clear opportunity to re-think collaboration environments to better meet the work practices of next generation workers.