Forming the Collective Mind (Geoffrey A. Cross)

Quantity in Basket:none Code: 1-57273-319-5 Price:$59.50 Title: Forming the Collective Mind Sub-title: A Contextual Exploration of Large-Scale Collaborative Writing in Industry Awards or Commendations: Association for Business Communication's Distinguished Publication Award (2001) Author(s): Geoffrey A. Cross Publish Date: 2001 Pages: 288 Format: Cloth

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AWARD WINNER ASSOCIATION FOR BUSINESS COMMUNICATION'S DISTINGUISHED PUBLICATION AWARD (2001) Teamwork, total quality management, and reengineering have created the need for large writing groups with 15 or more members to increase expertise in and commitment to organization decision making adapted to fast-changing global competition. This volume focuses on how to successfully conceptualize, organize and implement the documents that often serve as mediators in the transformation from task-based into process-based organizations. The book is the first detailed rendering of large-scale group writing involving numerous subgroups and addresses many pertinent questions and issues of cross-functional group writing. It draws on research and theory and psychology, management, computer science, architecture, rhetoric and composition, and business and technical writing to focus on how a collective mind forms in large-scale group writing in today's workplace. Additionally, there is extensive pertinent research on computer-mediated and face-to-face meetings, as well as group formation, training and development. Recommendations for all phases of large-group writing processes are made. This research identifies a phase of large-group writing that is not present in other writing processes. Contents: TOTAL QUALITY COLLABORATION. Overview of the Study. The Site of Writing: Montmarche Corporation. GENESIS OF A PROJECT. THE INVISIBLE ELEPHANT. Preliminaries of the January 13 Session. "What Can We Start to Get a Picture OF?" Conclusion of the Meeting. CAUSES OF APATHY, CACOPHONY, AND ANTICONSENSUAL REVOLT. Conditions. Immediate Causes. Precipitating Causes. MANAGING COLLABORATION. A New Direction: the End of the Beginning. Origins of Section. "Park" Unresolvable Issues. Interview Meeting with CIF. Prototype: First Situated Document Drafted. Managed Collaborations: Planning and Training. Preliminary Plan for Training. Projected Status Meeting, February 15. War Room Established. Procurator Training Meeting. PROCURATED COLLABORATIONS. Montmarche Human Resources, CIF Sign-Off. Overview of Remaining Procurated Collaborations. End of the SLA Project. MTS Evaluation of the SLA. FORMING THE COLLECTIVE MIND. Evaluation of the Writing of the Montmarche SLA. The Nature of Large-Scale Collaboration. Epilogue: Organization Climate for Large-Scale Collaboration. Appendixes. References. Author Index. Subject Index.