Exploring the emerging research topics on information technology-enabled collaboration for development

1. Introduction

Collaboration is becoming critical for competitive advatange. Broadly speaking, collaboration refers to the interactions of at least two parties to achieve a common goal (Wood & Gray, 1991). Collaboration is an integral part of planning, problem solving, decision-making, learning, knowledge sharing, as it helps individuals go beyond their own limited abilities, and broaden their eyesight through crowd wisdom (Arduin, Grundstein, & Rosenthal-Sabroux, 2013; Cheng, Li, Sun, & Huang, 2016a; Staples & Webster, 2008). Information technologies (ITs), including Internet and digital platforms, have been widely applied in practice to support collaboration in modern organizations. Collaboration technologies have been used to improve, collaborative processes in many global regions (Bajwa et al., 2008) and participant behavioral factors (Briggs et al., 2013; Cheng, Fu, & Druckenmiller, 2016b). Virtual teams make interactions possible that cross time and space. Individuals collaborate in a more flexible and cost-efficient way to get things done.

Broadly termed as IT-enabled collaboration, practice and research in this area has focused on many global regions at the individual level, team level, and organizational level. However, in developing, emerging and/or transitioning economies, current research on IT-enabled collaboration is scarce, as the majority of the efforts have been expored in Western Europe and North America. Regions like Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, and Latin America have been underrepresented.

In general, IT has been widely adopted for development in expanding capabilities (Qureshi, 2011). From IT-enabled collaboration standpoint, developing economies can benefit tremendously despite infrastructural constraints. Modern technologies support wired and wireless, synchronous and asynchronous, computer communication amongst indivduals and team members (co-located or virtual) in intra/inter-organizational settings, across regional boundaries, and across other entities in the value chain. Such collaborative structures can be further enhanced by hand held mobile devices in communities of practice and social media environments for development. There are a multitude of issues and interesting stories that need to be explored crossing behavioral and technical spectrum of research in this area.

Developing/emerging/transitioning economies (these terms have been sometimes used interchangeably) are defined by low gross national income per capita and include the majority of countries and regions, other than the relatively few highly developed nations (Roztocki & Weistroffer, 2015). Recent research suggests that IT has been playing an important role in developing and emerging economies (Roztocki & Weistroffer, 2011). This special issue specifically examines IT-enabled collaboration for development in these regions. Although IT-enabled collaboration is becoming increasingly common in global regions, their proliferation and impacts have been widely explored in developed nations (Bjørn & Ngwenyama, 2009; Cheng & Macaulay, 2014), especially in major business locations. However, their diffusion and usage patterns in developing countries and underdeveloped areas in developed countries are unclear. The range and reach of collaborative technologies provide opportunities for entities in developing regions to overcome infrastructure barriers and become globally competitive (Sarker & Sahay, 2004).

There is evidence that IT-enabled collaboration plays a crucial role for development (Saab, Tapia, Maitland, Maldonado, & Tchouakeu, 2013). First, the usage of IT is accessible to a growing numbers of developing areas, and individuals can make use of online collaborative activities for development. For example, IT-enabled collaboration can help rural farmers engage in programs that provide agricultural services and training, and thus improve their wellbeing and income. Second, open innovation and the flat management¹ of organizations facilitated by IT have made it possible for individuals and teams worldwide to put forward solutions to combat poverty and gender inequality (Antikainen, Mäkipää, & Ahonen, 2010). Through collective intelligence brainstorming from online platforms, innovative ideas are proposed and distributed information is gathered to help developing areas and development calls. Finally, project failures (as they relate to software implementation), can result not only from the lack of IT infrastructures or devices, but also due to relational issues among different stakeholders (Cheng, Fu, Han, & Zarifis, 2017; Šmite, Moe, Šāblis, & Wohlin, 2017). Seamless IT-enabled collaboration facilitates interpersonal and inter-organizational interactions for development projects.

Given the limited research on IT-enabled collaboration for development and the importance of this research stream motivated our call for studies, across different facets such as: e-government and civic engagement, business, education, healthcare, and online communities. The accepted papers cover information systems, technologies, theories, processes, methods, and/or models that can be transferred and applied from developed regions to developing regions, and social, behavioral, psychological and technical factors influencing IT-enabled collaboration for development. In the next section, we provide an overview and classification of research on IT-enabled collaboration for development. Our contextual framework is shown in Section 3. Section 4 presents individual summaries of the accepted papers.

2. Overview of IT-enabled collaboration for development

Research on IT-enabled collaboration for development involves multi-paradigmatic perspectives of studies, and encompasses an intersection of two themes, IT-enabled collaboration and IT for development. Based on the development of IT and the widespread use of technology supported applications, the original form to collaboration and development can be reshaped simultaneously, providing new paths for organizational innovation and reformation. In this section, the following part moves on to review some of the current studies on IT-enabled collaboration and IT for development with the objective of integrating the two streams of the research.

2.1. Overview of IT-enabled collaboration

Most of the literature since early 1990s emphasize the importance of IT-enabled collaboration. Numerous organizations have adopted IT supported collaboration tools, such as group support systems and collaboration support system, in the workplace (Briggs et al., 2013; George, Easton, Nunamaker, & Northcraft, 1990). With the help of these tools, a group of individuals can collaborate together to make best use of individual wisdoms and experiences for joint goals. Collaboration is comprised of five elements of social-technical arrangement to achieve common goals. Theseinclude: people, process, leadership, technology, and information (Boughzala, De Vreede, & Limayem, 2012).

During IT-enabled collaborations, stakeholders (individuals, teams, and organizations) face the challenges of social-behavioral factors including lack of shared understanding and goal alignment (Cramton, 2001), information asymmetry (Bajwa et al., 2008), low level of satisfaction (Briggs et al., 2013), and several technique issues related to information systems and technology implementations (Riemer, Steinfield, & Vogel, 2009). In order to address these challenges, research has focued on each of the five elements identified earlier. In terms of people and leadership, existing studies mostly focused on the individual traits and personalities in coordinating with each other, and the capabilities to guide virtual collaboration for joint collaboration. Collaboration climate that influences individual behavior has also been addressed. With regards to the process (i.e. procedures involved in collaboration from initial idea generation to final selection and commitment building), good design can lead to better individual commitment and collaboration outcomes (Kolfschoten, den Hengst-Bruggeling, & De Vreede, 2007). As for the information (i.e. broad range of evidence including: ideas, knowledge, and signals) generated, exchanged, integrated, and accessed by collaboration stakeholders can convey additional cues to collaborative members (Boughzala et al., 2012).

Research on IT-enabled collaboration contributes to virtual teamwork studies and in various working settings (Nunamaker, Twyman, Giboney, & Briggs, 2017). In general, there is strong evidence that IT-enabled collaboration contributes to relationship building, profit improvement, greater employee involvement, better deliverable quality, and value creation (Boughzala et al., 2012; Briggs et al., 2013; Nunamaker, Briggs, Mittleman, Vogel, & Pierre, 1996; Qureshi, Briggs, & Hlupic, 2006). Especially in the context of information and communication technology for development, IT-enabled collaboration facilitates interaction and information exchange, thus leading to social-economic development through better leveraging of collaborative resources.

2.2. Overview of IT for development

IT for development, in principle, is the name given to a myriad of activities that reflect the use of virtual technologies for social-economic development of developing communities. Existing studies on IT for development generally examine the issue of “if” and “how” ITs relate to development, and allude to two general streams of research. There are studies that address IT-related issues in developing countries, and the use of IT on general development (Brown & Grant, 2010). These developments may include improvements in people’s lives, that is, economic well-being, such as improvement of living conditions, the use of intermediaries for systemic poverty (Walsham, 2017). However, the influence of IT on development is not only confined to economic growth, but also contributes to the choices in the economic and social sphere (Kleine, 2010).

According to adaptive structuration theory, collaborative work results from the interactions of actors and structures (Gopal, Bostrom, & Chin, 1992). Agency-based capability inputs and structure-based capability inputs serve as resources that influence work outcomes. Resources can be converted into capabilities and achieve degrees of empowerment including existence of choice, sense of choice, use of choice and achievement of choice, and finally contribute to development (Alsop & Heinsohn, 2005). The appropriation of structures leeds to positive decision outcomes such as efficiency, quality, consensus and commitment, and may generate new social structures including rules, resources (Niederman, Briggs, de Vreede, & Kolfschoten, 2008). Therefore, development is an outcome of the appropriation between agency and structures.

As rules, formal and informal norms, laws, discourses are embedded in the structure, resources of different settings, on the one hand, the structure of a development community can affect the degree of empowerment, and thus influence the outcome of IT for development (Kleine, 2010). For example, Chinese bureaucratic organizations weigh great importance on guanxi which is embedded in the social norms of Chinese community, relevant studies should consider this structure-based capability input when investigating the IT for development in China. On the other hand, agents’ educational resources, health condition, psychological resources, and various other characteristics also influence the final outcome of IT for development, and can only can be realized within a given structure (Heeks, 2010). For instance, individual with higher educational level will be easier to master the IT devices, and the psychological features such as tenacity will facilitate the process of IT usage on development.

Previous researchers argued that structures could be embedded in the technical systems in global MIS development projects (Niederman et al., 2008). In order to facilitate the success of development project through the deployment and use of technologies, structural and agent-based resources are also important for the choices that lead to empowerment and final development outcomes (Junghee Lee & Hyunjoo Lee, 2010).

Collectively, IT-enabled collaboration and IT for development make use of the collaborative features from various perspectives (collaborative goals, joint wisdoms, high level of information accessibility, and structured collaborative process), and address the research state of IT for development in different communities for development outcomes (Walsham, 2017). Given the five collaboration dimensions (people, process, leadership, technology, and information) (Boughzala et al., 2012), and the framework of choice for development (Kleine, 2010), IT-enabled collaboration and IT for development overlap in several folds. First, structure and agency-related factors conjointly influence collaboration and development. Second, IT-enabled collaboration makes the best use of distributed resources and intellectual wisdoms, which facilitate development. Third, IT for development in turn contributes to collaboration, which will correspondingly facilitate future development. In the next section that follows, we present our research framework on IT-enabled collaboration for development.

3. Contextual framework on IT-enabled collaboration for development

Although IT for development has been studied from various perspectives, developing countries and regions often exhibit poor hardware and software infrastructure, lower experience in IT implementation, and inadequate planning on goal setting (Ilavarasan, 2017; Soja & Cunha, 2015). IT-enabled development also takes place in countries that are considered developed. In this special issue, we aim to focus on the perspective of collaboration and the human interactions, and anchoring the work on cognate disciplines such as psychology, management, and marketing to better understand and design collaborative work for development. We will discuss IT-enabled collaboration for development at individual level, group level, organizational level, and country or district level below.

At the individual level, IT-enabled collaboration is reflected in motivational parts of individual perceptions and behaviors, measured by influencing factors of individual participation and engagement in online development communities. Some individuals participate in IT-enabled collaboration within the process of interpersonal interactions. Others may be concerned with individual personality and other psychological factors in the investigations of IT-enabled collaboration for development, such as trust (Cheng, Nolan, & Macaulay, 2013).

At the group level, IT-enabled collaboration is manifested in the perceptions and behaviors of a group of individuals who are involved in collaboration. It is related to teamwork that facilitates global, virtual, distributed, hybrid/blended, and face-to-face IT-enabled collaboration for development (Cheng, Yin, Azadegan, & Kolfschoten, 2016c). Compared with the existing shared mental model (Mathieu, Heffner, Goodwin, Salas, & Cannon-Bowers, 2000) and goal setting theory (Loock, Staake, & Thiesse, 2013) that facilitate IT-enabled team collaboration, contextual factors should be taken into account in the context of IT for development.

At the organizational level, IT-enabled collaboration may be reflected in business cooperation (such as client vendor relationships), corporate sustainability (such as green information systems), and inter-organizational relationships (such as information integration for development). IT-enabled collaboration helps organizations achieve better development deliverables in the information age (Doerflinger & Dearden, 2013).

At the country or district level, IT-enabled collaboration is manifested in smart city and e-governance practices (Ibrahim & Elramly, 2017). From development-related government projects, to city governance through electronic platforms, IT-enabled collaboration helps with city planning and construction through idea crowd sourcing from citizens. Furthermore, IT also enables cross-country or cross city collaborations for joint development.

This special issue includes ten papers that focus on various contributions of IT-enabled collaboration for development at different levels. Six papers are at the organizational level, one paper is at the group level, two papers are at the individual level, and one paper is at the country/district level. The papers have also investigated different perspectives and topics in developing regions. The papers in this issue cover adoption, implementation, utilization, and impact of a myriad of collaborative technologies for synchronous and/or asynchronous, co-located and/or virtual collaboration in developing countries such as South Africa, Vietnam, China, and Brazil. The scope of the papers includes perspectives of individuals and groups engaged in IT-enabled collaboration, organizations that use IT-enabled collaboration, and developers and consultants engaged in supporting IT-enabled collaboration in developing regions. The contextual framework is shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Framework for IT-enabled collaboration for development research.

There are many emerging important variables in IT-enabled collaboration for development, such as trust, control mechanism, cultural influence, accessibility, participation and engagement, accountability, citizenship behavior, environmental factors, and managerial structure, which offers a lot of new insights. In order to address the challenges in collaborative platform design, idea crowd-sourcing for developing communities, collaboration in supply chain management, and collaborative e-governance, the papers in this special issue adopt various research methodologies (case study, action research, design science research, and survey research) to address the research problems related to IT-enabled collaboration for development from behavioral and design perspectives.

The studies on IT-enabled collaboration for development set out to investigate ways that lead to positive development outcomes. According to the framework by Kleine (2010), development outcomes include principal outcome of choices, and secondary outcomes of easier communication, greener environment, more autonomy, and so forth. Thus, the development outcomes of IT-enabled collaboration include the degrees of empowerment that relates to the sense, use, and achievement of IT-enabled collaboration for development. In the papers that are accepted in this special issue, the research topics mostly emphasize human (citizenship, participation) and social (governance, sustainability, smart city development) factors in IT-enabled collaboration for development. Therefore, the secondary development outcomes mostly relate to individual level and social level development through the IT-enabled collaboration.

4. Papers in this special issue

The first paper in this issue is co-authored by Luning Liu, Jingrui Ju and Yuqiang Feng and is entitled “An extensible framework for collaborative e-governance platform workflow modeling using data flow analysis.” Based on object-oriented workflow modeling using data flow analysis, the authors seek to address the challenges in designing and developing a collaborative e-governance platform across organizational boundaries in developing countries. An extensive framework is proposed including three level-extensive dimensions of requirement, method, and model. The authors have also validated the utility of their framework in a citizen appeal processing platform.

The second paper in this issue is co-authored by Simon Fuger, Robert Schimpf, Johann Füller and Katja Hutter and is entitled “User roles and team structures in a crowdsourcing community for international development – a social network perspective.” They examine team social structure and user role at both individual and team level in a crowdsourcing community. Specifically, openIDEO.org, a platform that aims to improve lives of individuals in developing countries, is chosen as the research case. Through social network analysis and network measures (in-degree, out-degree, betweenness and reciprocity), this research contributes to the studies on team configuration in the field of open development.

The third paper in this issue is co-authored by Judy van Biljon, Mario Marais and Melanie Platz, and is entitled “Digital platforms for research collaboration: using design science in developing a South African open knowledge repository.” Using design science research paradigm, this paper sets out to design a sustainable open knowledge repository to support knowledge sharing and collaboration. Through evidence-based and conceptualization grounding of evaluation, the knowledge repository design is validated. The deliverables serve as repeatable instantiation of artifacts that align user requirement, system features, and process principles together.

The fourth paper is co-authored by Zhaojun Yang, Jun Sun, Yali Zhang, Ying Wang and Lisha Cao and is entitled “Employees’ collaborative use of green information systems for corporate sustainability: motivation, effort and performance.” The authors examine the employees’ IT-enabled collaborative usage of green information systems and attempt to enrich the understanding of GIS innovation and its importance for sustainable organizational development. Based on the BAO model and motivation theories, this study tested four hypotheses from the collected survey observations in both China and USA. The results discuss about the role of GIS strategy on GIS motivation, GIS collaborative effort, green image and environmental performance respectively. It also shows the mechanisms for better competitive advantage at both, strategic and operational levels.

The fifth paper is co-authored by Yuting Wang, Hefu Liu and Zhao Cai and is entitled “Enhancing client citizenship behavior in enterprise system service of China: the role of enterprise system benefits and guanxi.” This paper sets out to examine how to improve clients’ citizenship behavior through the benefits provided by enterprise system. The investigation of citizenship behavior contributes to the study of IT-enabled collaboration in the Chinese context. Based on social exchange theory and the mediators – ganqing and renqing, the authors examine how vendors and clients are motivated to build high-quality collaboration through the collection and analysis of survey data from client firms. The study serves as a basis for future research in the field of IT-enabled collaboration for development through advancing the theoretical and practical development in the area of clients and vendor relationships.

The sixth paper is co-authored by Gabriela Viale Pereira, Maria Alexandra Cunha, Thomas J. Lampoltshammer, Peter Parycek and Maurício Gregianin Testa, and is entitled “Increasing collaboration and participation in smart city governance: a cross-case analysis of smart city initiatives.” The authors seek to investigate and better understand collaborative governance through smart collaboration, and the role of IT-enabled solutions on governance participation and engagement. The research was conducted using data from multiple case studies from three cities in Brazil. Through well-guided interview protocols and sampling principles, data analysis using Nvivo suggests empirical evidences of collaborative governance. Collaborative governance dimension, IT-enabled governance dimension, and participation and engagement dimension factors were proposed. The findings contribute to the field of IT-enabled collaboration in smart city initiatives. Information sharing and integration between agencies serve as important asset in collaborative governance.

The seventh paper is co-authored by Nan Zhang, Zhikui Lu and Yunyun Shou, and is entitled “The dominant role of governing structure in cross-sector collaboration in developing China: two case studies of information integration in local government one-stop services.” The authors argue that cross-sector collaboration is more important than systems or technologies in the success of information integration. Based on the case studies of Beijing and Chengdu in China, they analyze one-stop service center project and reveal some general determinants of cross-sector collaboration for similar projects in China. Specifically, it focuses on a transition from control-oriented government to service-oriented government and suggests that a top-down path and a bottom-up path may be used to solve the limitations of information resources integration. Based on the framework of initial conditions, structures, processes, constraints, outcomes and accountability, this study reveals key determinants of information integration in cross-sector collaboration in developing China.

The eighth paper is co-authored by Ying Hua, Shuang (Sara) Ma, Yonggui Wang and Qimeng Wan, and is entitled “To reward or develop identification in online brand communities: evidence from emerging markets.” This paper discusses the IT-enabled collaboration in online brand community, which could also facilitate the collaboration in another direction. Based on regulatory focus theory, external and internal motivation, the authors investigate customer participation in the emerging online brand community. Web-based questionnaire survey data was collected to test the hypotheses.

The ninth paper is co-authored by Judith Molka-Danielsen, Per Engelseth and Bich Thi Ngoc Le, and is entitled “Vendor-managed inventory as data interchange strategy in the networked collaboration of a Vietnam ship parts supplier and its customers.” This paper addresses information exchange in vendor-managed inventory systems. It compares different information exchanges between a pipe and valves supplier company with three different partners in Vietnam. The research is of interest partly to collaboration using technology, partly to technology use in supply chains, and partly to technology use in developing countries. A descriptive case study was conducted on the relationships between Vietnam Ship Parts and its network of customers. It focuses on relationships between the company and its three main customers, highlighting how the companies collaborate and exchange information. A four-dimensional framework of supply chain collaboration model is adapted to illustrate the collaborative strategies in their case. Trust and cultural aspects are also discussed in the formation of the supply chain collaboration.

The tenth paper is co-authored by Maximilian Schreieck, Manuel Wiesche and Helmut Krcmar, and is entitled “Governing nonprofit platform ecosystems – an information platform for refugees.” The authors discuss the effect of governance mechanisms on stimulating third-party contribution in nonprofit platform ecosystems, and set out to overcome the problem of information deficit for refugees through digital collaboration among different stakeholders. This study was conducted through action research on a nonprofit project (INTEGREAT) of a digital information platform for refugees. Based on the governance strategy of governance structure, accessibility and control, trust, and boundary resources, the action study was conducted in two cycles to answer the research questions. Results indicate that the centralized governance strategy contributes to value co-creation and collaboration facilitation in nonprofit platform ecosystems.

In summary, the papers published in this issue highlight future potential for research in this area and offer new insights in IT-enabled collaboration for development. The research builds upon three pillars – governance, citizen, and enterprise, and their collaboration at different levels including: individual, group, organization, and country. Future research requires development of emerging IT-enabled collaboration platforms to facilitate the sharing of ideas and solutions for emerging development projects. Such research can inform and offer potential contributions to the future development of smart cities and will help to understand the behavior of citizens and enterprises. Moreover, with rapidly changing technologies, extensive improvements in the organization of goods and services is required, which calls for further research in emerging supply chain models using collaboration to achieve development outcomes.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Sajda Qureshi, Doug Vogel, and Roland Weistroffer for their valuable feedback on the earlier versions of this editorial.

Notes on contributors

Xusen Cheng is an Associate Professor and Chair of E-business Department in the School of Information Technology and Management in the University of International Business and Economics, Beijing, China. He has obtained his PhD in informatics in Manchester Business School at the University of Manchester. His research focuses on trust development in virtual teams, collaboration process and system design, sharing economy and e-business, and the integration of behavior and design issues in information system. His research paper has appeared in journals such as Journal of Management Information Systems, Information Technology and People, Group Decision and Negotiation, Computers in Human Behavior, International Journal of Information Management, Scientometrics, Information Processing and Management, Journal of Global Information Technology Management and British Journal of Educational Technology, amongst others. His research has also been included in numerous conference proceedings such as ICIS, HICSS, PACIS, and DSI, amongst many others.

Xiangbin Yan is a Professor and head of the Donlinks School of Economics and Management in the University of Science & Technology Beijing. He was previously the Chair of the Department of Management Science & Engineering in the School of Management at Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT), China. He received a PhD from the Department of Management Science & Engineering from Harbin Institute of Technology. He has been a visiting research scholar in the AI Lab in the MIS Department at the University of Arizona from 2008 to 2009. His current research interests include electronic commerce, social media analytics, social network analysis, and business intelligence. His work has appeared in journals such as Information and Management, Journal of Informetrics, Scientometrics, Information Systems Frontiers, Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, and Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications.

Deepinder S. Bajwa is a Professor of Information Systems in the Department of Decision Sciences at Western Washington University. He received his DBA from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale in 1993. His research interests include: collaborative ITs and business intelligence. For over a decade, he has led research projects exploring the diffusion and impacts of collaborative ITs in six global regions. His research has been published in several journals including: Australasian Journal of Information Systems, Decision Support Systems, Decision Sciences, Group Decision and Negotiation, Information Resources Management Journal, Journal of Computer Information Systems, Journal of Information Technology, Journal of Information Technology Theory and Application, Journal of Management Information Systems, amongst others. He is the recipient of the best paper award at the Midwest Business Administration Association Conference held in Chicago in 1995. His papers have also appeared in the proceedings of several national and international conferences.

Additional information

Funding

We would like also to thank National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant numbers 71571045 and 71531013] for support.

Notes

1. Flat management is a horizontal form of management.