Coordination in Distributed Collaborative Environments: a Key to Better Decisions

Distributed, collaborative decision making is becoming more common in many organizations. It occurs for a multitude of decision types, and is enabled by IT support. However no systematic study of the use and impact of such IT-based environments on decision outcomes has been done. In this research I develop a taxonomy of information environments and the information and coordination mechanisms made available in a distributed collaborative environment (DCE). I will use this taxonomy to study the fit between use of the DCE and the information environment in which decisions are made. I hypothesize that use of appropriate coordination mechanisms for inputs and processes improves decision outcomes. I will test the model in an empirical field study of two different operational decision types made with and without a DCE in offshore oil production.