Guiding the Journey to Collaborative Work Systems

Guiding the Journey to Collaborative Work Systems is a hands-on, practical guide for dealing with the challenges of designing and implementing collaboration in the workplace. People working in groups and teams, team-based organizations and networked organizations, and value chains and strategic alliances understand that effective collaboration is mandatory for success in today's business environment. Change leaders― such as organization development managers, steering committee members, design team members, line managers, and others― will find this workbook an invaluable source of help, as it provides a step-by-step planning process to transform an organization to better support collaboration. Teams and groups can use the workbook to improve their collaborative processes, and elements of the workbook can be applied to a wide variety of situations where collaboration is needed.

The workbook covers a broad range of topics necessary for successful change, including generating and maintaining support for the initiative, launching a thoroughly planned change program, and effectively communicating the plan to the rest of the organization. Filled with assessments, tools, and activities, and based on interviews conducted with twenty-one experts and hundreds of team members, Guiding the Journey to Collaborative Work Systems offers the support needed to design in-depth plans for changing work systems to facilitate collaborative excellence.

Michael M. Beyerlein is director of the Center for the Study of Work Teams and professor of industrial/organizational psychology at the University of North Texas. He is author or editor of numerous articles and books, including Beyond Teams and The Collaborative Work Systems Fieldbook (both from Pfeiffer). Cheryl L. Harris is a consultant and researcher, affiliated with the Center for the Study of Work Teams. She facilitates organizations in their change efforts to better support collaboration, is author of several book chapters, and has developed a Web-based assessment tool for collaborative work systems.