Crowdsourcing Controls: A Review and Research Agenda for Crowdsourcing Controls Used for Macro-tasks

Abstract

Crowdsourcing-the employment of ad hoc online labor to perform various tasks-has become a popular outsourcing vehicle. Our current approach to crowdsourcing-focusing on micro-tasks-fails to leverage the potential of crowds to tackle more complex problems. To leverage crowds to tackle more complex macrotasks requires a better comprehension of crowdsourcing controls. Crowdsourcing controls are mechanisms used to align crowd workers' actions with predefined standards to achieve a set of goals and objectives. Unfortunately, we know very little about the topic of crowdsourcing controls directed at accomplishing complex macrotasks. To address issues associated with crowdsourcing controls for macro-tasks, this chapter has several objectives. First, it presents and discusses the literature on control theory. Second, this chapter presents a scoping literature review of crowdsourcing controls. Finally, the chapter identifies gaps and puts forth a research agenda to address these shortcomings. The research agenda focuses on understanding how to employ the controls needed to perform macro-tasking in crowds and the implications for crowdsourcing system designers. 3.1 Introduction Crowdsourcing-the employment of ad hoc online labor to perform various tasks-has become a popular outsourcing vehicle. Digital platforms like Mechanical Turk (http://www.mturk.com), CrowdFlower (http://www.crowdflower.com), MobileWorks (http://www.mobileworks.com), and Crowdcrafting (http://crowdcrafting.org) are in part responsible for the emergence and popularity of crowdsourcing. These popular platforms have been dominated by micro-tasks-standalone decomposed tasks (Schmitz and Lykourentzou 2018). This arrangement-microtasking through digital platforms-has been successful at providing organizations with access to affordable labor available 24 h a day (Ye et al. 2017).

Behavior‒Output Control Theory, Trust and Social Loafing in Virtual Teams

“…Research on behavior controls in virtual teams has focused on whether they facilitate or hinder the development of trust in virtual teams. Research has also demonstrated the potential of controls to alter team members' behavior and attitudes in virtual teams [3,4,13,49], therefore, research is needed to understand the influence that controls can have on social loafing in virtual teams. This study highlights the important role that control can have on reducing social loafing in virtual teams.…”

“…As such, the results of this study demonstrate how problematic affect-based trust can be for virtual teams. In addition, much of the research on trust in virtual teams has been directed at understanding how trust can be developed in virtual environments [4,[11][12][13]49]. However, scholars have called for further research on understanding the conditions that determine the effectiveness of trust [17,89].…”

“…Behavior-output control theory (BOCT) posits that human behavior can be altered by comparing members' behavior to some predefined set of expectations and holding them accountable to meeting those expectations [47][48][49]. In teams, these predefined expectations are behaviors that members have agreed on as the appropriate behaviors needed to achieve the team's goals and objectives [49][50][51][52]. BOCT views team controls as a means to help ensure that team members' behaviors are aligned with the team's goals and objectives [14,[52][53][54].…”

“…BOCT views team controls as a means to help ensure that team members' behaviors are aligned with the team's goals and objectives [14,[52][53][54]. According to BOCT, effectiveness of team controls should be determined by whether team members conform to the pre-specified behaviors [3,4,49].…”

“…Teams typically employ controls by directing, monitoring, and evaluating the behavior or outcomes of team members [14,49,51,[54][55][56][57]. Team monitoring is a widely used type of behavior control in teams [4,14].…”