By Fred James Staff Writer An organization does not consist primarily of buildings, computers, furniture and telephones. Essentially, it consists of "a group of people working together to accomplish some agreed-upon goal." To approach that ideal requires more than a monthly staff meeting and a suggestion box. It takes a great deal of coordination, alignment and communication. Information technology brings people and information together in new more flexible ways. Through information technology, even the nature of groups have changed Instead of being "people in proximity," a group may now be more accurately defined as "people united by interest and purpose." E-mail addresses become your neighborhood, online communication your back fence. Meetings - formerly composed of specific time, location, people and subject - is reduced to only participants and agenda. Time and space have no dominion. We gather in spirit.
BETTER CONNECTIONS Cyberspace and virtual meetings began with conference calls. Even the lowly telephone number - which once represented a black rotary phone wired to a wall receptacle at a specific address - has become a cellular flip-phone tourist. Voicemail and e-mail gather messages for later handling. No missed calls, no phone tag, fewer interruptions, and better connections across multiple time zones. This fall, the National Institute of Justice held an electronic conference on computer crime. About 100 participants commented on a list of subjects by e-mail. The e-mail went to a moderator, who distributed each message to the 99 other participants, so they could respond. Attendees participated after work, at lunch or from home, when they had time. The conference communications were saved to compile into a book.
VIDEO Video removes the blindfold from conference calls - adding motion, sound, color and the ability to view documents and demonstrations. The benefits to government are substantial. With video, suspects are arraigned without the necessity of transporting them from jail to courthouse and back again, saving time, money, and reducing the risk of escape. Video-based distance learning brings big-city experts and resources to small rural school districts. Students can hear the instructor, see the demonstrations, and can ask questions and hear the answers. An instructor - a young eagle nestled under his arm - talks about eagles to video-linked students. The instructor holds the bird aloft, the wings unfold, and the students begin talking excitedly about the huge wingspan. They have a "personal experience" with the eagle, even though hundreds of miles away. The Nevada Legislature uses videoconference facilities in Carson City and Las Vegas to hold hearings and conduct business. Digital bits move through wires faster and cheaper than legislators and baggage move through airports.
MEETINGS In the United States, managers spend from 30 to 70 percent of each day in meetings. At best, meetings encourage new ideas, coordinate action, call attention to successful programs and raise morale. At worst, they are a waste of time and energy. According to one organization, the best meetings are short ones. They suggest eliminating the chairs and doing away with doughnuts. Information technology can do more than connect our voices, images and keyboards over time and distance. It too, can cut distractions and help participants focus on the task at hand. A videoconference with participants at their workstations is less likely to be delayed while someone runs back to a desk to retrieve a file, or look up some figures. The immediacy of a videoconference and being "on TV" encourages thorough preparation. Sometimes, however, there is no substitute that satisfies. The monthly staff meeting where everyone can meet, strategies can be mapped out, and the phones are turned off, can be exhilarating experience. Sometimes, having a physical presence in front of one makes the subsequent disembodied voices and e-mail messages more real. If a face-to-face meeting is required, an online calendaring system can query participants' schedules and set up a time and place.
TOO MUCH COMMUNICATION Sometimes, better connections and more information is exactly what you don't want. Sometimes there's just too much data, too much communication, too much group and not enough time to listen to one's own ideas. Modern office communications can be like that. A stack of mail hunkers in the in-basket. The voicemail light on the telephone flickers insistently - urgent messages awaiting your attention. The computer screen icon for e-mail blinks - e-mail waiting. Several people crowd into your office, all eager to talk. The phone rings again with another message. Memos tower in an unruly stack. Everyone wants to talk at once! Like fabled King Kanute, we can command the tide to halt, or we can back up, evaluate our office communications, and reengineer how we deal with it. And, once again, the same technology that helped create the glut of communication, can be employed to help deal with it.
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Groupware Defined According to a Novell white paper on collaborative computing, groupware includes e-mail, workflow, document management, task management, imaging, calendaring, scheduling, conferencing, electronic forms, development tools, databases and remote computing. Alan Freedman, in his Computer Glossary, says groupware is "software designed for use in a network that serves a group of users working on a related project."
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Groupware Helps Remove Drunks From Texas Highways AUSTIN, Texas - Motorists awaiting trial in Texas on charges of driving while intoxicated (DWI) can wait as long as a year for their cases to come to trial. Unfortunately, in a significant number of cases, those charged are often arrested for DWI again before the first case arrives in front of the judge. Last January, to help get the drunks off the road, a new Automatic License Revocation (ALR) law went into effect, It requires driver license revocation until trial. The ALR also stipulates that if a driver contests the revocation, a hearing must be held within 45 days. The Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) had less than six months to figure out how to implement a "speedy hearing" process, to encompass prosecutors in 14 regions throughout the huge state. Hearings must be scheduled, defendants, witnesses and prosecutors must be notified, and DWI files must be send and received. DPS built its system using Lotus Notes. When DWI defendants call DPS to request a hearing, ALR operators can schedule the hearing date while the defendants are on the phone. The Notes application also generates official letters to the defendant summoning them to the hearings. Information flows both ways between DPS county prosecutors in the field and DPS headquarters based in Austin. Prosecutors use Compaq laptops to dial up the server in Austin, download their county's daily caseload schedules, then disconnect. Since a replicated copy of the database is stored on the laptop, the prosecutor can view case schedules, enter case findings, and review notes, without having to remain in constant telephone contact. The prosecutors e-mail updated case findings back to a Notes administrator at DPS headquarters, who reviews the results and updates the server. Since there are about 50,000 Texas DWI arrests each year, accessing case files from a laptop could be a cumbersome process. But when prosecutors dial into the Notes system, they receive only the ALR cases for their location. A Dallas prosecutor, for example, does not have to spend time downloading cases from Houston, Austin and El Paso - decreasing telephone connect time by an estimated 70 percent . Prosecutors also confer with one another via Notes e-mail and forums.
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Electronic Polling Helps Defuse Racial Incident POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y. - Electronic Town Halls are not a new idea. In 1988 an "electronic town hall meeting" was held in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. The occasion was a case in which a black woman claimed she had been raped by whites. Racial tensions were rising. The New York State Martin Luther King Jr. Commission initiated a public forum. But this forum differed from a traditional town hall meeting. Many times, such meetings turn into confrontations in which opinions generate heated responses, name-calling, long emotional speeches and unfocused anger. To keep attention squarely on the issues, this forum used handheld electronic devices to poll participants as the meeting progressed. Each participant had an equal anonymous voice in the results. Participants answered questions "yes" or "no" and indicated on a scale of one to 10 how strongly they felt about their answers. With electronic polling, it was determined that 70 percent of whites felt they were also victims of racial prejudice. Whites, however, felt that race relations between whites and blacks were good to excellent before the racial incident (92 percent), but only 5 percent of blacks agreed. The two-hour meeting helped individuals come to terms with what others really felt about the issues. The polling technology - from Quick Tally Systems of Beverly Hills, Calif. - was described as a "conflict resolution tool" by Michael Rowan, who conducted the polling. According to Rowan, when the media publicizes an issue, "the middle ground gets left out," even though 60-80 percent of the public are somewhere in that middle area. The media, he said, cover the extreme views. "The polarized get the ink. Journalists think they are being objective because they are getting 'both sides.'"
