Understanding and evaluating collaborative work in multi-site software projects - a framework proposal and preliminary results

Global enterprises have met challenges in managing and leading multi-site projects, working in virtual teams, sharing knowledge and utilizing new communication technology. Several claims stress that conventional face-to-face practices form an essential part of successful project co-working, but this is often impossible in globally dispersed projects. New information and communication technology solutions are needed for converting collaborative actions into virtual ones. We introduce a framework for analyzing and developing work activities in multi-site projects. Four areas of work are distinguished: personal work, work with people, project/team work, and knowledge work. The framework is used for studying the interaction between an individual and his/her work environment. Our interest is to help multi-site projects to successfully collaborate in distributed circumstances. The framework was tested by analyzing two case projects at Nokia. This paper presents our findings of the framework's usefulness to guide organizational and team development and characterizes R&D work in multi-site circumstances at Nokia.

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