Introducing Instant Messaging and Chat in the Workplace.pdf

Introducing Instant Messaging and Chat in the Workplace James D. Herbsleb, David L. Atkins Bell Laboratories, Lucent Technologies 2701 Lucent Lane Lisle, IL 60532 +1 630 713 1868 jherbsleb, datkins@ David G. Boyer Avaya Communications 101 Crawfords Corner Rd Holmdel, NJ 07733 dgboyer@ Mark Handel, Thomas A. Finholt School of Information, University of Michigan 3218 School of Information North Ann Arbor, MI 48109 handel, finholt@ ABSTRACT We report on our experiences of introducing an instant messaging and group chat application into geographically distributed workgroups. We describe a number of issues we encountered, including privacy concerns, individual versus group training, and focusing on teams or individuals. The perception of the tool’s utility was a complex issue, depending both on users’ views of the importance of informal communication, and their perceptions of the nature of cross-site communication issues. Finally, we conclude with a discussion of critical mass, which is related to the features each user actually uses. More generally, we encountered a dilemma that imposes serious challenges for user-centered design of groupware systems. Keywords Instant Messaging, Presence Awareness, Groupware, Technology Diffusion, Chat, Distributed Teams INTRODUCTION Instant messaging (IM), after experiencing enormous popularity among recreational users, is beginning to move into the workplace [1, 13, 15], following on the heels of other forms of text-based computer-mediated communication (CMC) such as e-mail and MUD rooms [2]. To date, there have been few published studies of the use of interactive text communication such as IM and chat outside of research groups who were motivated to use it by their desire to explore the technology. As with many types of groupware, one would expect that adoption is not a given among work groups more generally. Interactive text potentially suffers from many of the classic issue