In a Nutshell

So here's what I've been up to over the past half year...

I’m presently researching Enterprise 2.0 – social web applications which support the interests and goals of businesses and other purposive enterprises such as governments, NGOs, research networks, and so on. A great deal of activity, development, and discourse, primarily commercial in nature, has attended this field since its quite recent inception. Yet relatively little empirical research has been undertaken to explore its multiple claims of benefits to the enterprise and even less explores the social aspects of Enterprise 2.0 adoption. With Enterprise 2.0 technologies being rapidly implemented within many types of organizations, both commercial and noncommercial on a global scale, clear understanding of social causes and (not necessarily connected) social effects is essential to achieve socially beneficial outcomes.

So I’m looking into two related research questions:
• What social factors contribute to success or failure in Enterprise 2.0 adoption?
• Following Enterprise 2.0 implementation, what social influences come into play in the organization?

I expect my research to demonstrate key elements of organizational predeliction to positive engagement with Enterprise 2.0 tools and methods. I also expect to demonstrate and explain social effects of such adoption within organizations – a key insight for enterprises currently engaging in or planning Enterprise 2.0 investments.

First, I’ll be exploring these questions here at the university, by surveying several academic communities – ECS, Digital Economy, and Sociology – on their uses of social software. I’ll then work with ISS and ECS systems groups to enhance the currently available web-based social tools. Subsequent surveys are expected to provide insight into usages, motivations, and effects. I plan to work with several external enterprises in similar fashion and have made contacts with appropriate parties at Boeing, Accenture, and Sun UK. I also plan to contact several NGOs in this regard.

The resulting insights should help to advance understanding of Enterprise 2.0’s social causes and effects, and lead to improved practice in the domain.

My supervisors are Professor Dame Wendy Hall from ECS and Professor Susan Halford from the School of Sociology.

An inspiration to us all

Over the past year or so I have had the great good fortune to meet and work with a truly singular woman of technology. Currently Professor of Computer Science at the University of Southampton, UK, she was Head of the School of Electronics and Computer Science from 2002 to 2007. She became University's first female professor of engineering in 1994 and has been a pioneer in advancing computing technologies and women's involvement in their advance. I speak, of course, of Professor Dame Wendy Hall DBE FREng.

Presently she holds multiple responsibilities, including:

• President of the ACM -- while not the first woman to hold the position, she is the first president from outside North America.
• Founding director, along with Professor Sir Tim Berners-Lee, Professor Nigel Shadbolt, and Daniel J. Weitzner, of the Web Science Research Initiative, which was launched in 2006 as a long-term research collaboration between the University of Southampton and MIT.
• My PhD supervisor in collaboration with Professor Susan Halford in Southampton's School of Sociology. Ahem.

Wendy's support for women in technology is manifest. From her University webpage:
"She is particularly prominent as a strong and vocal advocate for women’s opportunities in SET and for the need to ensure that girls are not excluded from participation in science and engineering careers. In her research and her public life she has sought to ensure that women are equal beneficiaries of technological advance, and her example of achievement and dedication has made her a distinguished role model for women."

I am both honoured and delighted to work with Wendy, who is at once brilliant, innovative, passionate for her work and truly inspirational.