What Aspects of Collaboration are Meaningful to You? Informing the Design of Self-Tracking Technologies for Collaboration

Abstract

While the workplace collaboration software market is booming, existing tools are often tech-focused and rarely support reflection and self-regulation of collaboration practices. Building on approaches from personal informatics, we aim to understand and promote the use of data to empower employees in exploring their own work practices, with a focus on collaboration processes. This study focuses on the preparation stage and examines what aspects of collaboration are meaningful to office workers. We interviewed employees from a single work team (N= 15) after a 2-weeks reflecting period on metrics related to collaboration experience. We contribute new insights into how employees envision metrics reflecting their collaboration experience and what personal, social, and organizational considerations surround collecting and sharing this data. We discuss how these insights can inform the design of self-tracking technologies for collaboration.