Toolbox Collaboration Setup For Research Ppt Final

Collaboration Setup for Research
CoCoNut and MyBBT

FITT
(Fostering Interregional Exchange in ICT Technology Transfer)

www.FITT-for-Innovation.eu

Practice in general

• CoCoNut = an internal IBBT project involving
researchers from many domains & backgrounds
(sociologists, economics, engineers, law researchers,
mathematicians, etc.)

“research the ways in which IBBT researchers work and interact, design
the ideal collaboration/sharing environment to work efficiently while
being geographically spread.”

• MyBBT = the implementation of the coconut findings
“Smart, interactive, attractive collaboration & knowledge sharing
platform for IBBT researchers and partners”
2 | 04.01.2010 Collaboration Setup for Research

Practice step by step

Step 1: Present state analysis

Step 2: Conceptual Modelling

Step 3: Technology Mapping
(MyBBT)

Step 4: Dissemination &
Valorisation


Step 1: Present state analysis

• Investigate the environment
- What are the usability criteria for optimal acceptance?
- What are the socio-professional criteria for optimal acceptance?
- Who are the relevant stakeholders, relations & working routines
• Investigate the market
- What technical tools and non-technical building blocks
- Create inventory of best practices


Step 1: Present state analysis - results

• the environment
- IBBT is very heterogeneous, be cross browser / cross platform
- Both early adopters as laggards among the users, tool must technically be
state of the art as well as very simple to use.
- Current working routines are very diverse. Information is spread
throughout the enterprise.
• the market
- Established companies have excellent tools, but they tend to assume one
platform and one set of clients.
- For our case: more relevant stakeholders in the open source solutions.


Step 1: Present state analysis - results


Step 2: Conceptual Modelling

• SOTA on multidisciplinary & virtual communication.
- ‘literature’ study
- Focus on models rather than tools
• Integrate previous findings into a general common model
- Model to be used in step 3 (technical implementation)
- Model to be used in ‘Cookbook’
• Developing Cookbook
- Set out the basis for a living cookbook, an IBBT manual
- First version is written here, and handed to community afterwards.
- Cookbook describes best practices in various aspects of the project work

Step 2: Conceptual Modelling


Step 3: Technology Mapping (MyBBT)

• System architecture layout
- Market study
- Write technical specification
• System implementation
- Using an Agile approach (6 sprints spread over 4 months)
- Using CoCoNut users (~40) as feedback audience
- Implementation based on Alfresco Share but adapted to the needs of
IBBT, as defined in the first two steps.
- Main functionality: Wiki tool, Document Sharing functionality, Discussion
boards etc. per project
- Aggregation of all project data in user/project dashboards.


Step 4: Dissemination and Valorisation

• System v1 live: October 2009
- Relatively small number of projects (20) and users (300)
- Close interaction with novice users is vital
• Disseminate results to IBBT community
- Make people aware of the cookbook
- Have people contributing to the cookbook
- Organize some events (e.g. We-BBT 2010)
• Continuous development!
- Get a feedback loop going.
- Listen to the users, implement and listen for feedback again. Repeat.

MyBBT? Please join us!


12

When?

Timing
• Original concern: at the very start of IBBT
• Project CoCoNut: started in Jan 2008, ends Dec 2009
• MyBBT platform: launched october 2009
• MyBBT is a continuous effort.
• CoConut will continue in 2010 for:
- User feedback and interaction
- Redaction tasks on Cookbook (maintain integrity of information)
- Specific tasks that require specific knowledge. E.g. usability issues, metrics or
security.


Who?

Stakeholders
• IBBT
- Active involvement of 5 people.
- Should involve the entire staff (30) in time, as the system is vital for
IBBT in a horizontal way throughout the organisation.
- At stake: structuring the information in the entire organisation, as well
as optimising the internal processes.
• IBBT researchers
- Core group of 15 FTE involved during project.
- Feedback board of 40 users during project (about 120 man days)
- At stake: obtain a usable one stop shop for all project related
information, tailored to their needs.

Where?

Location
• In all 5 universities of Flanders, at IBBT and online.
• Most of the work was done online.
• Monthly meetings were there of course, but video conferencing and
online collaboration tools were the larger part of this project.


Pro’s & Cons

Pro’s
• Strong user interaction during setup & implementation
• MyBBT itself: all project knowledge in 1 platform
• User-centered approach for continuous development.
Cons
• Adaptability of Alfresco: it is possible, but not always as easy as it
may seem.
• Users can be very demanding. This is not necessarily a bad thing,
but you will have to work hard to keep up. Make sure you have a
skilled team ready.


Why ?

Why was it established?
• IBBT is a decentralized structured organisation
- 900 researcher spread over 5 universities and many more campuses.
- Equal amount of research partners in industry
• There was no common work space before MyBBT
- Projects did have separate, closed collab websites
- This means: no knowledge sharing cross projects, no overview for
senior people that participate in more than 1 project
- Hence: little or no tools for knowledge sharing.


Why ?

Impact
• All tough very young, the system is received quite well.
• Most added value for seniors, who need overview and dashboards
• When everybody uses the tool in the right way we should be able to:
- Provide a single source of info regarding IBBT projects to our researchers
- Have one single point of entry for all IBBT related questions that are not
publically available
- Have clear processes and practices defined and documented
- Have a good way to communicate to the IBBT community, or segments of it.


Outcome

What happened after the implementation
• As said: the system was received quite well.
• Researchers are inclined to start new projects on MyBBT (such as
contract research), although we do not oblige them to do this.
• Many bug reports bottom up. We consider this a good thing.
• Unexpected side effects?
- More work than expected
- API proves a very useful tool, even more than expected. We already managed
to roll out an integration with our survey platform, contact DB.
- API makes for a powerful administrative tool (e.g. give me all projects of type
X, and of those projects all the project managers).


Outcome

Plans for the future?
• Continuous development of MyBBT
- After phase I ended with go-live in Oct 2010, phase II was launched
- Scope based on early experiences of users and our own input based on our
experience
- Initial scope: better feedback mechanism, better email client integration, RTE
enhancements for the wiki.
• Follow up project of CocoNut
- Given the success of CocoNut, we will continue to use our own research
group as prime input for MyBBT or even other projects
-  use the expertise of IBBT research groups in IBBT production environment


Lessons Learned

Looking back now we would …
• Probably invest even more time into the project.
• Put more focus on feedback to the feedback group
• Giving feedback to users that have invested a lot of their time into this
project is key to keeping them motivated and active.
• Content is key
• Especially for the extranet, content is truly the key to success
• Invest early on in the project in writing that content
• Invest early on in people that will continuously working on that content.


Toolbox Collaboration Setup For Research Ppt Final

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