Group decision support systems

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Please improve this article if you can. (June 2007)

Group Decision Support Systems (GDSS) were referred to as a Group Support System (GSS) or an electronic meeting system since they shared similar foundations. However today's GDSS is characterised by being adapted for a group of people who collaborate to support integrated systems thinking for complex decision making. Participants use a common computer or network to enable collaboration.

Significant research supports measuring impacts of:

Group Decision Support Systems are categorized within a time-place paradigm.

Whether synchronous or asynchronous the systems matrix comprises:

  • same time AND same place
  • same time BUT different place
  • different time AND different place
  • different time BUT same place

Several commercial software products support GDSS practices. The Gartner Group has updated its views on GDSS and its relationship to webconferencing in a thorough document [1]

List of Group Decision Support Systems.

Contents

[edit] References

This is Chapter 10 of The Future Does Not Compute: Transcending the Machines in Our Midst, by Stephen L. Talbott. (Sebastopol CA: O'Reilly & Associates, 1995). Hardcover, 502 pages. ISBN 1-56592-085-6

Academic work on Group Decision Support Systems was largely led in the 1980s and 1990s by the University of Minnesota (the SAMM System) and the University of Arizona (PLEXSYS, later renamed GroupSystems). The Arizona research software was spun off as Ventana Corporation (now known as GroupSystems Inc.).

The University of Arizona researchers report both benefits and costs for their electronic meeting system. (Nunamaker, Jr., J. F.; Dennis, A. R.; Valacich, J. S.; Vogel, D. R. & George, J. F. (July), “Electronic Meetings to Support Group Work”, Communications of the ACM 34 (7): 40-61 .)

The benefits, or process gains, from using a GDSS (over more traditional group techniques) are:

  • More precise communication;
  • Synergy: members are empowered to build on ideas of others;
  • More objective evaluation of ideas;
  • Stimulation of individuals to increase participation;
  • Learning: group members imitate and learn from successful behaviors of others.

The costs, or process losses, from using a GDSS (instead of more traditional group techniques) are:

  • More free riding;
  • More information overload;
  • More flaming;
  • Slower feedback;
  • Fewer information cues;
  • Incomplete use of information.

However, the researchers found that GDSS over traditional group techniques limited or reduced the following process losses:

  • Less attention blocking
  • Less conformance pressure
  • Less airtime fragmentation
  • Less attenuation blocking
  • Less socializing
  • Less individual domination


by Uday S. Murthy and L. Murphy Smith The authors describe the guidelines and strategies for putting electronic meeting systems to work and present details and comparisons on two of the available less expensive software packages.

by D. J. Power - Editor, DSSResources.COM

Report by Philip S Tellis, Staff Scientist, ETU Division, NCST, Juhu

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

March 2006 Conversation column by Gardiner Morse
"Connecting Maverick Minds" ... Geoffrey West, president of the Santa Fe Institute, a unique research community

that innovates by mixing disciplines, talks about why free thinking matters.

  • 2006 HICSS-39 Thinklets (Collaboration techniques and processes)
    • 2001 HICSS-34 Mini-Track Topics (Collaboration systems and technology)
  • 1996-GSS HICSS-29 Mini-Track Topics (Group Support Systems)

[edit] Other links (to be sorted / annotated)

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