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Conceptualizing Collaboration & Community in Virtual Reference & Social Q&A

Marie L. Radford, Ph.D.Chair, Dept. of Library & Information ScienceRutgers University, NJ

Nicole A. Cooke, Ph.D.Assistant ProfessorUniversity of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Lynn Silipigni Connaway, Ph.D.Senior Research ScientistOCLC

Stephanie MikitishPh.D. StudentRutgers University, NJ

Mark AlpertPh.D. StudentRutgers University, NJ

Chirag Shah, Ph.D. Assistant ProfessorRutgers University, NJ

CoLISCopenhagen, Denmark

19-22 August 2013


• Provide evidence for modeling new ways to collaborate in VRS

• Collaboration with Social Q&A (SQA)

• Three phases

• Transcript Analysis

• 500 VRS transcripts

• Telephone interviews

• 50 librarian interviews, 50 user interviews

• Design Sessions

• Construct design specifications

Cyber Synergy: Seeking Sustainability through Collaboration between Virtual Reference & Social Q&A Sites

http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/synergy/default.htm



• VRS

• Global reach

• Anytime/anywhere access

• Cooperative services may reduce costs

• Librarians have deep subject expertise

Virtual Reference Services (VRS) & Social Q&A (SQA)

• SQA

• Crowd-sourcing

• Good in lean economic times

• Social & collaborative

• Anyone can provide answers


• Lack of library funding

• Service reductions

• Some VRS discontinued or endangered

• Empirical data needed to explore possibilities to enhance VRS

Why Cyber Synergy?


• How can VRS become more collaborative, within and between libraries, & tap more effectively into librarians’ subject expertise?

• What can VRS learn from SQA to better serve users & attract potential users?

• How can we design systems & services within & between VRS and SQA for better quality and sustainability?

• In what ways can the Communities of Practice (Wenger, 1998, 2004) framework contribute to our understanding of collaboration barriers & opportunities in the VRS environment?

Research Questions


Theoretical Framework: Communities of Practice

(CoP)


Communities of Practice (CoP):

“Groups of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic, and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interacting on an ongoing basis.”

(Wenger, McDermott, & Snyder, 2002, p. 4)


• Joint enterprises

• Feature mutual engagement

• Shared repertoire of resources & sensibilities

Distinct Dimensions of CoP


• Learning focus

• Depend on interactions between members

• Voluntary

• Customizable

• Individual

• Encourage members to solve problems & develop new approaches/tools

• Share expertise, share weakness

More Dimensions of CoP

(Wenger, 1998, 2004)


• Insufficient time

• “Information hoarding”

• Low levels of collegiality

• Shifting group memberships

• Lack trust building opportunities

• Geographical gaps

• Promotes heterogeneity

Barriers to CoP


• VRS librarians

• Shared interest in serving user information needs

• Operate within community for sharing information

• Hold shared practice through MLIS degree

VRS Librarians as CoP


• Phone interviews with 25 VRS librarians

• Recruited via professional list-servs, personal contacts, & OCLC’s QuestionPoint (QP) librarian blog

• Responses collected with SurveyMonkey

• Anonymous

Data Collection – Phone Interviews


• Combination of open & closed questions

• Topics

• Collaboration

• Referrals

• Comparison of VRS to SQA

• Critical incidents (Flanagan, 1954)

Interview Questions


• Descriptive for demographic data & Likert style questions

• Line-by-line qualitative analysis to identify:

• Recurring themes

• Representative quotations

• Code book developed

• NVivo software

Data Analysis


Results


Librarian Demographics (N=25)

76%, n=19

11.76

60%, n=15

52%, n=13


Participants reported that VRS

were slightly busier than FtF

services


40% reported that overall reference

volume was increasing


Successful Interactions

“There were lots of happy faces, so the user seemed

pleased.”


Successful Interactions

provided an “opportunity to educate the patron”


Referrals

One-quarter mentioned referring question to another librarian


Difficulties

Barrier to Referrals

Lack of lead time, usually because “the

paper was due too soon for me to answer.”


Collaboration• Majority collaborated

>once a week • E-mail most common

mode, then FtF• FtF easiest in shared

physical settings


Reasons for Collaboration

• Unable to answer question• Give user more

comprehensive answer


Facilitators to Collaboration• Perceive other librarians as willing to help • Know who to ask for help


“There are librarians who are hostile in body language and sometimes verbally

if it interferes with their other duties. They have made it very clear that I should not ask and so I do not.”

Barriers to Collaboration


VRS & SQA Compared

VRS

More synchronous

Authoritative

Complex questions

Objective


Collaboration with Subject Experts

Librarians expressed a willingness to consult non-librarian experts,

particularly professors


Questions Appropriate for SQA

• Objective, ready reference, fact-based • Yes/no questions• Questions based on experience or opinion


Conclusion


• Usually refer to another librarian

• Factors in addressing/referring difficult questions

• Content knowledge

• Shared professional standards

• Technological familiarity

Difficult Questions


• Believe other librarians are willing to collaborate

• Shared professional ideals and expertise

• Seen as value-added service

• FtF enables collaboration

Collaboration


• Analysis of data from

• Remaining librarian interviews

• 50 VRS/SQA user interviews

• 3 expert design sessions

SQA & Collaboration• Librarians view SQA as:

• Less authoritative

• Less complex

• Less objective

• Not against collaborating with experts

• Willing to expand CoP to other experts if demonstrate

• Professional expertise

• Extensive knowledge

• Demonstrate professional expertise or extensive knowledge


VRS librarians constitute a CoP in approach to referrals & collaboration


• Analysis of data from

• Remaining librarian interviews

• 50 VRS/SQA user interviews

• 3 expert design sessions

Next Steps


Ardichvili, A., Page, V., & Wentling, T. (2002). Motivation and Barriers to Participation in Virtual Knowledge-Sharing Communities of Practice, Paper presented at 3rd European Conference on Organizational Knowledge, Learning and Capabilities (OKLC), Athens, Greece, 5-6 April.

Correia, A. M. R., Paulos, A., & Mesquita, A. (2010). Virtual communities of practice: investigating motivations and constraints in the processes of knowledge creation and transfer. Electronic Journal of Knowledge Management 8(1), 11-20.

Cramton, C. (2001). The mutual knowledge problem and its consequences for dispersed collaboration. Organization Science, 12, 346–371.

Ellis, D., Oldridge, R., & Vasconcelos, A. (2004). Community and virtual community, Annual Review of Information Science and Technology, 38, 145–186.

Faraj, S., & Wasko, M. M. (2001). The web of knowledge: an investigation of knowledge exchange in networks of practice. Retrieved from http://opensource.mit.edu/papers/Farajwasko.pdf

Flanagan, J. C. (1954). The critical incident technique. Psychological Bulletin, 51(4), 327–358.

Gannon-Leary, P., & Fontainha, E. (2007). Communities of practice and virtual learning communities: Benefits, barriers and success factors. eLearning Papers, 5. Retrieved from http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract id=1018066

Gibson, C.B., & Manuel, J.A. (2003). Building trust: Effective multicultural communication processes in virtual teams. In C.B. Gibson & S.G. Cohen (Eds.), Virtual teams that work (pp. 59-86). San Francisco, CA: Wiley & Sons.

Jarvenpaa, S., & Leidner, D. (1999). Communication and trust in global virtual teams. Organization Science, 10, 791–815.

Kirkup, G. (2002). Identity, community and distributed learning. In M. Lea, & K. Nicoll, (Eds.), Distributed learning: Social, cultural approaches to practice (pp. 182-195). London: Routledge/Falmer.

References

http://opensource.mit.edu/papers/Farajwasko.pdf


Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

McDermott, R. (1999) Learning across teams: How to build communities of practice in team organizations. Knowledge Management Review, 8, 32–36.

Nincic, V. (2006). “Why don’t we trade places…”: Some issues relevant for the analysis of diasporic web communities as learning spaces. The international handbook of virtual learning environments (1067-1088). Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer.

Radford, M. L., Connaway, L. S., & Shah, C. (2011-2013). Cyber Synergy: Seeking Sustainability through Collaboration between Virtual Reference and Social Q&A Sites. Funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), Rutgers University, and OCLC. Retrieved from http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/synergy/default.htm

Ranganathan, S.R. (1957). The Five Laws of Library Science. Madras: Madras Library Association; London: G. Blunt and Sons.

Roberts, J. (2006). Limits to communities of practice. Journal of Management Studies, 43(3), 623-639.

Smith, P., Barty, K., & Stacey, E. (2005). Limitations of an established community of practice in developing online innovation, breaking down boundaries: international experience in open, distance and flexible education. Proceedings of the 17th ODLAA conference, 1-6, ODLAA, Adelaide.

Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and identity. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Wenger, E. (2004). Knowledge management as a doughnut: Shaping your knowledge strategy through communities of practice. Ivey Business Journal, Jan – Feb., 1-8.

Wenger, E., McDermott, R., & Snyder, W. M. (2002). Cultivating communities of practice: A guide to managing knowledge. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

References



Cyber Synergy Grant

•Cyber Synergy: Seeking Sustainability through Collaboration between Virtual Reference and Social Q & A Sites

• $250,000.00 grant funded by IMLS, OCLC, and Rutgers University

• Co-PIs

• Marie L. Radford, Rutgers University

• Lynn Silipigni Connaway, OCLC

• Chirag Shah, Rutgers University


Questions?Marie L. Radford, Ph.D.Chair, Dept. of Library & Information ScienceRutgers University, [email protected]@MarieLRadford

Nicole A. Cooke, Ph.D.Assistant ProfessorUniversity of Illinois [email protected]

Lynn Silipigni Connaway, Ph.D.Senior Research [email protected]@LynnConnaway

Stephanie MikitishPh.D. StudentRutgers University, [email protected]

Mark AlpertPh.D. StudentRutgers University, [email protected]

Chirag Shah, Ph.D. Associate ProfessorRutgers University, [email protected]