Designing Practice-Oriented Interactive Vocabularies for Workflow-Based Virtual CoP

Abstract

This chapter concentrates on the development of practice-specific toolkits for managing on-line practices in the context of virtual communities of practice. The authors describe two case studies in different application domains each presenting alternative but complementary insights to the design of computer-mediated practice vocabularies. The first case study describes how established practices in music performance are encapsulated in a suitably augmented music toolkit so as to facilitate the learning objectives of virtual teams engaged in music master classes. The second case study is slightly different in orientation as it seeks to establish a toolkit for engaging in new coordinative practices in the course of building information-based products such as vacation packages for tourists. This time the virtual team is a cross-organization virtual community of practice with members streamlining their efforts by internalizing and performing in accordance with the new practice. Collectively, the case studies provide insight to building novel practice-specific toolkits to either encapsulate existing or support novel practices.