Supporting document management in complex multitask environments

Supporting document management in complex multitask environments Olha Bondarenko (TU Eindhoven) Ruud Janssen (Novay) Samu ël Driessen (Oc é Technologies)

Goodbye to paper!
problems with paper
costs of storage
static content, hard to revise
no remote access
large ecological footprint
image: “old fashioned”, “chaos”
since 1990’s a steady move to digital work styles
distribution via email
archiving in doc. mgt. systems
flexible offices, clean desk policy
mobile devices, nomadic workers
connected anytime, anywhere

Or is paper is here to stay?!
paper documents abound in many modern offices
why is paper still around?
paperless office has been “an inch away” for decades
what does paper support that digital technology still doesn’t?

“ The Myth of the Paperless Office”
Sellen & Harper, Xerox PARC, 2001
paper supports knowledge work
authoring, reviewing
planning and thinking
collaborative activities
organizational communication
paper has unique affordances for reading
flexible navigation, rearranging to create an overview
annotation, interweaving reading and writing

Our own research
started in 2002 at Oc é, continued at TU/e
originally application oriented
new ways to integrate paper and digital technology
learn from paper to improve digital technology
research divided into three stages
how does paper support task management?
how does paper support task switching?
how does paper represent context and task state?

Three challenges
Information overload & fragmentation
Increased number of communication channels & storage
Negatively affects performance and causes stress
Multitasking & frequent switching
Information workers have an unstructured workflow
Working on multiple tasks and switch before completion
Mobility demand
Flexible offices and nomadic work
Digital support is needed independent of physical location

Stage 1 how does paper support task management?

Motivation and approach
paper seems to support knowledge workers in their task management, but in what ways?
contextual interviews, 28 participants
semi-structured interviews, in situ
artifact walkthrough
critical incident collection
taking pictures, making sketches
data analysis
interpretation using affinity diagrams
requirements for document management systems

Findings at a glance
a wide variation
desks vary from clean and well ordered to one big mess
workers apply a mix of “filing” and “piling”
workers vary from “paper traditionalists” to “digital frontrunners”
but also many similarities
paper documents: hot and warm versus cold
paper piles support task management in many ways
knowledge workers need to manage a mix of paper and digital documents

hot documents “ I am working on this now” warm documents “ I need to work on this soon” cold documents “ this is old stuff, I may still need it in the future” hot documents “ I have to finish this today” warm documents “ this is lying around from yesterday”

The person behind the desk
knowledge workers are multi-taskers
they need to switch between tasks
they need to postpone tasks
they need to be reminded about tasks
they need an overview of their tasks
document management is not their primary concern

Paper piles support task management
piles provide an overview over tasks
a pile serves as a reminder for a task
a pile keeps individual documents in their task context
a pile can be rearranged to reflect changes in a task
a pile can be relocated to reflect changes in a planning
piling requires no verbalization effort

The effects of ongoing digitization
from mail to email
from desk to desktop
multiple incomplete systems
paper and digital still coexist
printing is easier than scanning
printing to combine documents from various sources

Least effort principle
Document management is a secondary task for most of the information workers
A document management system has to require as little effort as possible
Information workers are already overloaded with places where documents need to be stored and maintained
A document management system has to be based on a system that is already in use or it will increase fragmentation and fail

Grouping documents
Multiple places to store documents contribute to information fragmentation and increase overload
Documents from different sources need to be brought together when working on a task
Paper is still the only tool to support this

Requirements for technology
systems to support document management should
place documents in their task related context
combine documents from various sources
provide an easy way of (re)grouping documents
allow flexible and ad hoc restructuring within a group of documents
be based on a system that is already in use
require as little cognitive effort as possible

Stage 2 how does paper support task switching?

piles and documents contain cues that reflect the state of interrupted or postponed tasks
how are these cues created or changed?
in situ observation, 4 participants
observer unobtrusively present at workplace
recording all actions and changes in the environment
pre- and post observation interviews
data analysis
identify tasks and task switches
identify task switching strategies that aim to preserve the state of the interrupted task
identify factors influencing the task switching strategies

Findings at a glance
8 task switching strategies were identified
active or passive
cues or no cues left in the environment
active strategies passive strategies cues left in environment
activation
changing location
gathering
writing down
printing
no action/state preserved
no cues left in environment
deactivation
no action

Task cues left in the environment
t1 represents the current task (no action/state preserved)
t2 are documents she collected for an upcoming meeting (gathering)
t3 are documents that she put aside to work on later (changing location)

Task switching: factors
Reason for switch
Domain of the last action

Internal vs external reason to switch
external reasons: passive strategies dominate
passive strategies allow for an immediate switch
cues serve as a reminder but are fragile
supports task resumption when task is resumed on short notice and environment remains untouched
internal reasons: active strategies dominate
active strategies involve creation of more persistent cues (location, structure, explicitness)
more robust cues that will survive longer, at the cost of some time and effort

Paper vs digital switching
Task switching in the physical world
Active patterns dominate
People actively rearrange their documents at the moments of task switching
Task switching in the digital world
Passive patterns dominate
People switch from one task to another without taking an observable action to preserve the state of the task

Multitasking & switching
Task-related document collections
Combining documents from different sources together
Easily (re)groping documents as the task goes
Stable state
Regrouping is a mechanism to indicate the stable state within a task
Stable states play a major role in successful task resumption
Gives an answer to the question “where was I” in a task?
In paper pile, the most recent document is usually on top, regrouping and rearranging documents within groups is very easy

Stage 3 how does paper represent context and task state?

piles and documents contain cues that reflect the state of interrupted or postponed tasks
what are these cues, and what do they encode?
triad elicitation, 12 participants
pictures of participant’s desk and objects on it
randomly select sets of 3 pictures
“ choose two that are similar, and different from the third”
laddering down (“what makes you think that…”)
laddering up (“what does it mean for you that…”)

Approach (continued)
data analysis
visual cue: statements describing phenomena that can be observed by other people
semantic judgment: statements describing judgments based on knowledge of the participant
statements were classified
statements within a class were categorized
visual cue categories were clustered
semantic judgment categories were clustered

“ these two are printed”  “that one is handwritten” [initial statement; visual cue: text presentation]
“ the text is regular and evenly spaced”  “the text is irregular” [laddered down; visual cue: shape of content]
“ these I will give to others”  “this one is to remind myself” [laddered up; semantic judgment: interaction purpose]
Example: triad elicitation and laddering

Triad elicitation study results
Recognized visual cues
Identifying what people see when they look at their documents
Encoded semantic judgments
Identifying what people think when they look at their documents
Model of relationships
Bringing seeing and thinking together

Findings at a glance location group arrangement page content purpose task context planning & overview color contrast structure of layout appearance of cover text presentation content presentation visibility of content shape of content size and dimensions volume grouping position in the group structure of the group edges relative location absolute location relation to other objects ownership & confidentiality interaction purpose information presentation keeping decision throw-away decision similarity and relations period of use resource demand action demand current usage frequency of access importance what does it mean for you what makes you think that what does it mean for you what makes you think that what does it mean for you what makes you think that

Getting grip on the relationships
page content:
extent to which cues can be changed without interfering with work itself, is limited
cues are explicit and changes require a lot of effort (such as verbalization)
group arrangement:
cues range from explicit (plastic folders, paper clips) to implicit (loosely gathered piles)
explicit cues are more persistent and require more effort to change
location:
most flexible cues when it comes to assigning a meaning
a natural reference point (the self, other objects)
easiest to manipulate, it happens almost automatically

Encoding semantic information
Tasks are complex notions in the head and parts need to be offloaded in the environment
Information about the state of the task is encoded by associating available visual cues with semantic judgments about the task
This is one of the major reasons for paper being on the desks

Easily available and flexible cues
The mechanism of encoding information about the task state needs to be transferred to the digital domain
Digital environment is very different from physical and the mechanism cannot be copied directly.
Encoding information in the digital domain often requires significant effort compared to the physical domain
The visual cue should be comparably salient and easy to adjust

Requirements

Overview Task decomposition level Supported process Requirements Knowledge work Document and task management Support least effort principle: document and task management is a secondary task for an information worker Unstructured workflow Non deterministic task flow Support unstructured workflow with ad-hoc collections of associated documents: documents are representation of tasks Multitasking Frequent switching Support representing the current state of the task in the environment: tasks are most often switched without finishing up Task suspension / resumption Stable state creation Support encoding of semantic information about the task state into easily available and flexible visual cues

Supporting knowledge work
Least effort principle dominates
Based on the system in use
Support variety of styles and needs
Paper
Supports variety and unifies document sources
Increases fragmentation and does not support refinding

Supporting unstructured workflow
Provide ad-hoc collections of task-related documents as representations of tasks
Arrange documents along with the task flow
Provide overview within and across collections
Allow implicit planning / prioritizing
Paper
Provides a constant overview of tasks in a glance
Provides unobtrusive reminders
Quickly gets chaotic and outdated

Supporting multitasking
Support task suspension and resumption in the environment
Preserve and reflect the current task state
Allow custom changes in the representation
Paper
Allows for robust task state representation
Provides an overview of a number of tasks
Always requires action

Support task suspension / resumption
Support encoding of semantic judgments in digitally available environmental cues
Extract information about the past (automated)
Provide information on a proper level
Allow user input to encode information about the future
Encode information on a proper level / effort
Paper
Supports easy & flexible encoding and decoding of cues
Cues are highly implicit and prevent long term planning

Summary and conclusion learning from paper to improve digital technology?

Lessons learned
Design according to the fundamental user needs
Technologically driven design complicates interaction and increases user effort
Superficial requirements only suitable for later design stages
Take into account human capabilities and constraints
Find the ways to use advantages of the digital domain rather than mimicking physical cues

Future research
Investigate the existing encoding mechanism in the digital domain
Investigate social, organizational and personality aspects
Iterative design to evaluate and refine the requirements

http://www.futureworkspaces.nl	86
http://www.slideshare.net	5
http://groene-energie-informatie.nl	4
http://www.gripophnw.nl	2
res://ieframe.dll	1

Supporting document management in complex multitask environments

by Samuel Driessen on May 10, 2010

Accessibility

Categories

Tags

Upload Details

Usage Rights

5 Embeds 98

Statistics

Supporting document management in complex multitask environments — Presentation Transcript