Class8notes
From English 194 Wiki Site
Contents |
Preliminary Class Business
- Continue producing Glossary and Object items (and edit each other's items)
- Create Bibliography entries
- First Research Report due next Tuesday (report format)
- [Use time in class today to put Glossary & Object items in the wiki?]
Wiki Problems That Have Come Up
- Email from Viktoriya
- "I wanted to share a problem I ran into while creating a new page on our class wiki - the glossary item "collaboration." Since I began writing a section of our group page on various types and styles of collaboration, I thought about creating a glossary item for the term itself. I realized that a page with that exact name already exists - it is the title page for our group. I have two questions, actually. First, if you think that "collaboration" does not need to be in the glossary as it may be a little tautological to include an entry so self-evident and self-explanatory. Second, if a problem like this occurs again, what is a systematic alteration of the same title that we can adopt for the system to allow to have multiple pages/titles under the same name, or a slightly different name?"
- A workaround solution: Put quotes around the page title (see code for the following): Collaboration
Creativity Group: Report on Progress and Problems
Collaboration Group: Report on Progress and Problems
- Email from Ashley
- "I am having a bit of trouble with my research. I am interested in business collaborations and have been trying to research on the internet with different phrases but I am having little luck. I was wondering if you had a suggestion? My father has a business that deals somewhat with collaboration so I though that I would discuss the subject with him but I want to go beyond that and do general research to get background information. All that seems to be showing up on the search engines are certain deals that have been made with IBM or other random businesses. I am trying to search for a historical business collaboration, if one exists or even just something that helps to explain collaboration in the workplace or in large businesses. Any suggestions on how to tweak my search phrases? Thank you."
- Alan's email response to Ashley
- "My first thought is that there are actually two levels to the phenomenon of business collaboration:
- 1. Inter-business collaboration (business to business)
- 2. Intra-business collaboration (how people in a firm work together)
- In regard to #1: one important new business model in the last 20 years (originated by the Japanese car firms) is for a firm to treat its suppliers (e.g., the companies that make tires or windshields for a car manufacturer) as quasi-"internal" units of the company all connected together by a common information-technology network. Thus the main company will work closely with suppliers to iron out quality and supply issues; and suppliers will know in advance what their client company needs.
- Also in regard to #1: another aspect of the new business model in the last 20 years or so has to do with the relations between departments in a firm. In the past, for example, the engineering dept. might make a plan for something, then turn it over to manufacturing for assembly, which in turn hands it off to marketing and sales departments. No department worked with others, which led to all sorts of problems (e.g., an engineering plan that couldn't be manufactured with available materials, or a product that marketing could not find a demand for). Now there is a lot more cross-flow between departments. Product development teams might be created, for example, so that a marketing person sits in on the engineering planning discussions.
- The business-to-business area of information technology is flourishing, by the way. In part, this is what the "Web services" model of information tech is about. (You might Google "business to business" and "Web services."
- In regard to #2: collaboration is is where all the "team" action is, and also where all the new networked technology for collaboration is."
Some works on business:
- Davidow, William H., and Michael S. Malone, The Virtual Corporation: Structuring and Revitalizing the Corporation for the 21st Century (New York: HarperCollins, 1992) (pp. 7, 140 on supplier networks)
- Email from Tiffany
- "i've been researching different avenues of collaboration this weekend, and i feel like i'm stuck. i originally wanted to look into different societies: how they originate, what reasons they have for forming, how and why social roles are developed, how people fill certain needs of the community, etc. i wanted to start my part of the group project with the sociological theory of functionalism/organicism, that explains how members of society function to serve specific responsibilities that benefit the whole. but i also wanted to research some specific types of non-western, or non-industrialized societies and observe things at a microcosmic level-- but that is turning out to be more difficult than i thought. i feel like it would be more effective if i did my own field research and took my own notes, but obviously that is not very feasible.
- however, i am also interested in the collective efforts of doctors/medical field, regarding surgical procedures and such; and also the idea of war as a collaborative entity. but all these ideas seem so large; is it possible to just focus on one aspect of war or medicine or society? how should i go about structuring my research and the information i collect?
- any insight you have would be amazing.. thanks so much, and please, feel free to get back to me whenever you get the chance."
