Dissonance Blog for Research Project

Leading large numbers of people during my military career taught me many things, but one of the most significant lessons I learned was that teamwork and collaboration are invaluable in accomplishing goals. In times of peace and war, I have personally seen how people all over the world, working as a single unit, can overcome what appear to be impossible odds. Furthermore, as a military instructor, I had the opportunity to teach diverse curriculum, such as conflict management, teambuilding, and strategic planning, to senior leaders in an environment that privileged cohesiveness among group members.

Naturally, I now tend to transfer the value of collaboration into other areas of my academic and professional life. For instance, I always prefer and seek out exercises and hands-on activities that engage students in team dynamics in my classroom. I have found that, no matter how well I think I explain an idea, collaborative learning helps students understand concepts which I might not be able to communicate as well as their peers. My experience in the classroom also prompts me to agree with Kenneth Bruffee that students “learned from the students they helped and from the activity of helping itself” (418).[1] Collaborative learning is definitely a two-way street because students gain as much as they give in the process of working with others.

Moreover, in the workplace I find teamwork on important projects to be just as influential to the employees’ success. In fact, in my estimation, workers have possibly more at stake than students in a classroom because promotions or careers are often on the line. Working in teams has the benefit of allowing employees to safely learn new practices without calling undue attention to their weaknesses. So, collaborative effort is valuable to me, but my personal dilemma resides in how best to structure group projects – particularly those which involve writing – when I now have a choice between traditional interaction and computer-assisted exchanges.

As a strong proponent of group authorship, I most enjoy working with other people when it’s in a face-to-face exchange. I believe that being physically present with team members allows problems to be resolved more quickly and encourages better group dynamics. (Of course, I also used to teach personality profile systems, such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, so I understand how different personality traits lend themselves more towards face-to-face meetings.) Rogers and Horton wrote an interesting article on the value of face-to-face collaborative writing, citing many of Bruffee’s ideas on how we “talk about talk” (123).[2] Their findings suggest that face-to-face collaborative writing allows authors to better understand the rhetorical situation and voice their “internalized dialogue” (123). So, I feel strongly that effective teamwork, especially on written documents, is best accomplished in face-to-face sessions.

Therefore, I am a study in contradiction on the subject of collaborative writing because I am somewhat reluctant to fully embrace the use of technology in group texts. Perhaps my hesitancy is due to the fact that, unlike some of my students and younger co-workers, I can remember when there was no Internet or e-mail. We actually had to sit in a room together and talk through our ideas and differences. Now, however, we have employers who send an e-mail to a worker when they are sitting right next to each other. As our environment is increasingly conducting school and work in a virtual setting, I am most concerned about the quality of group writing. I know that authors are able to communicate freely on the Internet and by e-mail, but I wonder about a group’s efficiency in resolving problems, compiling ideas, and composing documents when everything is done electronically. In an article I recently read, however, Selfe directly addresses my concern about the evolution of collaboration and brings up many benefits that I had not considered. For example, she argues that computer-assisted collaborative writing allows authors to contribute freely without worrying about “visual cues about age, ethnicity, sex and status” (147).[3] Looking at collaborative writing from the masked aspect of technology, I can see how some employees might feel more inclined to contribute to a project.

So, I have now reached a point where I need to question my own opinion about the benefits and drawbacks of collaborative writing and technology. I could look at the issue from many angles. For example, I could focus on collaborative learning in general to determine how technology has made an impact on the process. Or, I might approach the issue as a question about academic instruction in virtual collaborative writing. Alternatively, I could compare the collaborative writing of students in face-to-face and computer-assisted groups.

However, since my personal interest lies primarily in workplace writing, I have decided to research the following question: Do authors produce a better group text – specifically in the workplace – in a face-to-face setting or in a virtual environment? I have been able to garner some insight into my inquiry as I have taught hybrid versions of business writing for UNLV. While not technically in the workplace, my students must work as a group to produce a cohesive business report. Although, the students are not required to meet outside of class, and they have access to each other via computer, I have found that most of my students decide to meet at least once per week anyway. They appear to find the face-to-face interaction necessary to their success. But, I now have to wonder whether this is due to my own preference for face-to-face collaboration. In other words, I might not be conveying the value of computer-assisted teamwork as well as I could be.

Based on a preliminary discussion with Dr. Jablonski, I know that my research question will be difficult to answer in the time we have for this course. I would really need to do an empirical study to reach a definitive decision. However, I can achieve a tentative resolution to my question by examining what the literature has said about traditional collaborative writing and online collaborative writing – particularly in the workplace – and then comparing the information with my own thoughts and experience through a descriptive analysis. This approach is very appealing to me, and I feel my research could be very beneficial.

Resolving the conflict I feel about collaborative writing and technology is important to me because I hope to soon have a position in which I would be managing collaborative writing projects in the workplace. Understanding the benefits of both face-to-face and online teamwork – or perhaps the superiority of one over the other – could only make me a more effective writer and manager. In the process, I also hope my research will enlighten others with the same concerns.
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[1] “Collaborative Learning and the ‘Conversation of Mankind.’” Villanueva 415-36.
[2] “Exploring the Value of Face-to-Face Collaborative Writing.” New Visions of Collaborative Writing. Ed. Janis Forman.
[3] “Computer-Based Conversations and The Changing Nature of Collaboration.” New Visions of Collaborative Writing. Ed. Janis Forman.