Collaborative Design and Learning: Competence Building for Innovation (International Series on Technology Policy and Innovation)

In today's knowledge-driven economy, the ability to share insight and know-how is essential for driving innovation and growth. In this groundbreaking volume, scholars from around the world demonstrate how communication and information technologies are enabling dynamic project design and management practices that challenge traditional concepts of time, space and behavior. Showcasing experiments in architecture, engineering, and construction design―employing technological infrastructures that link people and their ideas across physical, intellectual, and cultural boundaries―the authors consider such issues as the links between competence and innovation and between individual and collective knowledge. At the heart of their analysis is the realization that technological innovation is chiefly a social activity. The implications are profound for the practical management of complex design projects, experiments in distance learning and virtual teams, and emerging theoretical concepts of collaborative learning and innovation.

William Mitchell is Professor of Economics at the University of Newcastle, Australia.