Rich Communication Media Research Articles

Human Resource Management in Knowledge Transfer

Abstract: The competency to transfer knowledge and learn from their experience has been found to influence crucial organizational outcomes, including productivity, timeliness, and sustainability. A multiplex approach to knowledge transfer is likely to be most effective. Personal contacts or movement and face-to face communication are rich communication media that are particularly well suited for discerning information to be transferred and acquiring a deep understanding of it. Thus, this paper proposes to investigate knowledge transfer in Foreign Multinational Corporations (MNCs) network. Knowledge characteristics of personnel being transferred also impact the success of knowledge transfer. Key words: Human resource management (hrm); Organizational knowledge; Knowledge transfer; Foreign Multinational Corporations (MNCs)

Assessing communication media richness in requirements negotiation

A critical claim in software requirements negotiation regards the assertion that group performances improve when a medium with different richness level is used. Accordingly, the authors have conducted a study to compare traditional face-to-face communication, the richest medium and two less rich communication media, namely a distributed three-dimensional virtual environment and a text-based structured chat. This comparison has been performed with respect to the time needed to accomplish a negotiation. Furthermore, as the only assessment of the time could not be meaningful, the authors have also analysed the media effect on the issues arisen in the negotiation process and the quality of the negotiated software requirements.

Divided Loyalties

Identification with a home organization may be particularly problematic for the development of interorganizational team identification. This study explores multiple conditions under which home organization identification may either positively or negatively affect the ability of members to identify with an interorganizational distributed team. The authors examine two types of team member arrangements: members of different home organizations segregated by location and members of different home organizations integrated within locations. They also examine interorganizational teams using either lean or rich communication media. Results suggest that for individuals who identify strongly with their home organizations, integrating members of different organizations within locations helps overcome barriers to interorganizational team identification. For individuals who do not identify strongly with their home organizations, using a rich communication medium enhances interorganizational team identification. Implications for future research, organizational alliance formation, and team managers are discussed.

An Inside Look

This study describes the formation of a dispersed team and the communication processes to evolve in this team. The authors examine how the members of such a team actually used e-mail for communication instead of starting from assumptions concerning the richness or leanness of the communication medium being used. Aspects of group formation and group composition are considered, and team member behaviors in an occasional face-to-face meeting are described. Observing how communication actually unfolds will allows the authors to review media richness theory’s claim that teams need face-to-face communication or another allegedly rich communication medium for effective communication about complex problems or equivocal tasks. The team to be described is a international group of researchers who joined a mailing list dedicated to preparing a research proposal that was to be funded by the EU.

Interoperable community platforms and identity management in the university domain

Community support systems (community platforms) that are providing a rich communication medium for work‐ or interest groups are gaining more and more attention in application areas ranging from leisure support and customer support to ‘knowledge management. One of these application areas is the support of teaching and research activities in universities. In this article we first identify possibilities for community platforms in universities and present some applications at Technische Universität München (TUM). From the current situation at TUM we motivate that a key feature of future community platforms has to be interoperability, and concentrate on how to provide interoperability in general, and how we are doing it in the environment at TUM. In particular we focus on service independent identity management as one central aspect of interoperability.

Making the Most of E-Mail

The article focuses on a study conducted by John Carison of Baylor University and Robert Zmud of the University of Oklahoma in which they measured four factors that they felt defined the richness of e-mail. Carlson and Zmud explored several kinds of knowledge that should help e-mail users communicate more richly and therefore lead them to hold more positive attitudes toward e-mail. First, they examined the effects of knowledge-building experiences with e-mail. They noted that, through experience, users may develop greater communication expertise with e-mail. The researchers also studied the effect that knowledge of a communication partner might have on users' perceptions of e-mail as a rich communication medium. Partner knowledge would allow e-mail users to refer to shared experiences, or to understand more readily what the other person is trying to communicate.