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Chapter 2 Collaboration Information Systems
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produce something, say, the draft of a document, and a second person will review that draft and
provide critical feedback. Given the feedback, the original author or someone else will then revise
the first draft to produce a second. The work proceeds in a series of stages, or iterations, in which
something is produced, members criticize it, and then another version is produced. Using itera-
tion and feedback, the group’s result can be better than what any single individual can produce
alone. This is possible because different group members provide different perspectives. “Oh, I
never thought of it that way” is a typical signal of collaboration success.
Many, perhaps most, student groups incorrectly use cooperation rather than collabora-
tion. Given an assignment, a group of five students will break it up into five pieces, work to
accomplish their piece independently, and then merge their independent work for grading by
the professor. Such a process will enable the project to be completed more quickly, with less
work by any single individual, but it will not be better than the result obtained if the students
were to work alone.
In contrast, when students work collaboratively, they set forth an initial idea or work product,
provide feedback to one another on those ideas or products, and then revise in accordance with
feedback. Such a process can produce a result far superior to that produced by any student work-
ing alone.
Importance of Effective Critical Feedback

Given this definition, for collaboration to be successful members must provide and receive
critical feedback. A group in which everyone is too polite to say anything critical cannot
collaborate. As Darwin John, the world’s first chief information officer (CIO) (see Chapter 11),
once said, “If two of you have the exact same idea, then we have no need for one of you.” On the
other hand, a group that is so critical and negative that members come to distrust, even hate,
one another cannot effectively collaborate either. For most groups, success is achieved between
these extremes.
To underline this point, consider the research of Ditkoff, Allen, Moore, and Pollard. They
surveyed 108 business professionals to determine the qualities, attitudes, and skills that make
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a good collaborator. Figure 2-1 lists the most and least important characteristics reported in
the survey. Most students are surprised to learn that 5 of the top 12 characteristics involve
disagreement (highlighted in blue in Figure 2-1). Most students believe that “we should all get
along” and more or less have the same idea and opinions about team matters. Although it is
important for the team to be sociable enough to work together, this research indicates that it is
also important for team members to have different ideas and opinions and to express them to
each other.
When we think about collaboration as an iterative process in which team members give
and receive feedback, these results are not surprising. During collaboration, team members
learn from each other, and it will be difficult to learn if no one is willing to express different, or
even unpopular, ideas. The respondents also seem to be saying, “You can be negative, as long
as you care about what we’re doing.” These collaboration skills do not come naturally to people
who have been taught to “play well with others,” but that may be why they were so highly
ranked in the survey.
The characteristics rated not relevant are also revealing. Experience as a collaborator or in
business does not seem to matter. Being popular also is not important. A big surprise, however, is
that being well organized was rated 31st out of 39 characteristics. Perhaps collaboration itself is
not a very well-organized process.

Guidelines for Giving and Receiving Critical Feedback

Giving and receiving critical feedback is the single most important collaboration skill. So, before we
discuss the role that information systems can play for improving collaboration, study the guidelines
for giving and receiving critical feedback shown in Figure 2-2.