Ambiguities, Awareness and Economy: A Study of Emergency Service Work

Pettersson, Mårten; Randall, Dave; Helgeson, Bo

doi:10.1023/b:cosu.0000045707.37815.d1

Cited by 57 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…In our home discipline of Human-Computer Interaction there have been studies of emergency call centers and hurricane crisis management centers [3,10,15,22], and technology-focused studies of how ubiquitous computing systems [7,8], interactive large screen displays [8,17,19], and simulations [9,11] can improve performance. Obviously, the view of emergency planning and management as high-tech professional work is important, but we would argue that it is not comprehensive.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Emergency Management Planning as Collaborative Community Work

Schafer¹,

Carroll²,

Haynes³

et al. 2008

Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management

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Emergencies often have causes and effects that are global. However, emergencies are also inherently local: They occur in a particular place and point in time. While it is critical for governments and society to better organize emergency management top-down, it is also important to become more aware of local community-level values, planning, involvement, knowledge, and skill. Local communities plan collaboratively for potential emergencies of varying scales.Our discipline of Human-Computer Interaction studies the interaction between people and computers. Researchers in this field consider how information technology affects emergency management. They aim to improve emergency management through the design of useful and novel interfaces to technology. The purpose of our work was to take a broader perspective on emergency management and investigate the models and patterns of emergency-related work practices. In particular, we examined emergency management from a local community perspective. This focus on local communities partly stems from our prior research on community groups and their use of information technology. It is also motivated by the realization that emergencies are local events, which happen in communities.This paper reports on a study of one community's emergency planning activities. Five aspects of community preparedness are discussed: collaborative efforts, local area details, local culture, geographic information, and emergency plans, and a case study provides concrete examples of each. Local community preparedness is complex and gives rise to many collaboration issues. Revealing this complexity, the paper offers some implications for community emergency management technology.KEYWORDS: emergency planning, ethnography, field study, human-computer interaction, community informatics * We thank the numerous people involved with emergency management in State College for their cooperation.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Emergency Management Planning as Collaborative Community Work

Schafer¹,

Carroll²,

Haynes³

et al. 2008

Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…The higher the interdependency between tasks, the more important coordination becomes. Artman and Waern (1999) and Petterson et al (2004) have described how call takers and dispatchers in emergency response teams create common ground with callers and response personnel. For unmanned space exploration, research teams with relative low task interdependency were found to benefit from simultaneous access to real-time data, as more people could participate in the collaboration and scientists could adapt their models based on real-time data (Olson and Olson 2000).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Technology Effects in Distributed Team Coordination—High-Interdependency Tasks in Offshore Oil Production

Bayerl

Lauche

2010

Comput Supported Coop Work

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Abstract. For highly interdependent yet location-specific tasks, distributed teams need to closely coordinate activities and processes. This field study in the upstream oil and gas industry focused on challenges in the coordination of highly interdependent tasks if teams work remotely on an ongoing basis. Based on 78 semi-structured interviews and observations over a period of 12 months, we identified coordination requirements for primary team activities, as well as effects of changing media capabilities to overcome difficulties of ongoing distribution. Implications for media requirements in the support of ongoing distributed teams are discussed.

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“…We have something to learn about those occasions upon which awareness is relevant and those where it is not.'' (Pettersson et al, 2002).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How Can I Help You? Call Centres, Classification Work and Coordination

Martín

O’Neill

Randall

et al. 2007

Comput Supported Coop Work

Self Cite

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As a comparatively novel but increasingly pervasive organizational arrangement, call centres have been a focus for much recent research. This paper identifies lessons for organizational and technological design through an examination of call centres and Ôclassifi-cation work ' -explicating what Star [1992, Systems/Practice vol. 5, pp. 395-410] terms the Ôopen black box'. Classification is a central means by which organizations standardize procedure, assess productivity, develop services and re-organize their business. Nevertheless, as Bowker and Star [1999, Sorting Things Out: Classification and Its Consequences. Cambridge MA: MIT Press] have pointed out, we know relatively little about the work that goes into making classification schema what they are. We will suggest that a focus on classification Ôwork' in this context is a useful exemplar of the need for some kind of Ômeta-analysis' in ethnographic work also. If standardization is a major ambition for organizations under late capitalism, then comparison might be seen as a related but as-yet unrealized one for ethnographers. In this paper, we attempt an initial cut at a comparative approach, focusing on classification because it seemed to be the primary issue that emerged when we compared studies. Moreover, if technology is the principal means through which procedure and practice is implemented and if, as we believe, classifications are becoming ever more explicitly embedded within it (for instance with the development of so-called Ôsemantic web' and associated approaches to ontology-based design), then there is clearly a case for identifying some themes which might underpin classification work in a given domain.

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Ambiguities, Awareness and Economy: A Study of Emergency Service Work

Cited by 57 publications

References 14 publications

Emergency Management Planning as Collaborative Community Work

Emergency Management Planning as Collaborative Community Work

Technology Effects in Distributed Team Coordination—High-Interdependency Tasks in Offshore Oil Production

How Can I Help You? Call Centres, Classification Work and Coordination

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