VISUALIZING

THE COMMUNICATION AT

SCAD LIFE

RESEARCH TEAM:

SAAD AQEEL Z. (DESIGN MANAGEMENT, SCAD)

AMIT BAPAT (INDUSTRIAL DESIGN, SCAD) SEBASTIAN BURCHERT (UNIVERSITY OF COLOGNE) ALEXANDER LIEDER (UNIVERSITY OF COLOGNE) YILMAZ YESILIRMAK (UNIVERSITY OF COLOGNE)

Research Team: Saad Aqeel (MFA Candidate-Design Management, SCAD) Amit Bapat (MFA Candidate-Industrial Design, SCAD) Sebastian Burchert (Student ID: 3637239, University of Cologne) Alexander Lieder (Student ID: 4023099, University of Cologne) Yilmaz Yesilirmak (Student ID: 3967530, University of Cologne)

AGENDA:

1. Introduction

2. Motivation

3. Purpose

4. Research Question

5. Research Method & Data

6. Results

7. Lessons Learned

1. Introduction

• In today’s businesses environment, efficiency and productivity depend not only on properly structured processes and effective IT support

• Increasingly also on the communication between teams and groups

• In this context, Social network analysis can be a very effective tool for promoting collaboration and knowledge sharing within important groups in organizations

2. Motivation

• Identify collaborative networks within and between SCAD’s Schools of Design, and with external partners

• Collaboration in the field of arts and design is recognized as a necessary indicator of innovation, and has been identified as a strategic initiative for SCAD’s five-year QEP

3. Purpose

• Create visual representations of social networks

• Prediction where collaborative networks are or can be formed by using three most popular network measures:

• degree centrality

• closeness centrality

• betweeness centrality

4. Research Question

1. What communication and collaboration patterns are identifiable within the School of Design at SCAD?

2. How transparent is collaboration and communication between individuals, departments and external entities?

3. To what extent are collaboration networks reflected among individuals, departments and external entities within the School of Design?

4. What are the major obstacles facing collaborative communication among different individuals, department and external entities within the School of Design?

4. Research Question

Limitations:

• Unable to analyze real data from SCAD to answer

research questions

• IT-Department not providing us with SCAD data

because of privacy issues

• Low response rate

5. Research Method and Data

Collection

1. SNA Tool (Condor)

2. Online Survey (Zoomerang)

3. Face to face interview

4. WORDiJ Software

5. SQL-Dumps as a base for the visualization

5. Research Method and Data

Collection

1. Condor

• Used to analyze the social network

• Developed from the MIT, to analyze email archives, etc

• Once the data is loaded into Condor, you can create graphs to visualize the communication within a group

5. Research Method and Data

Collection

2. Online Survey

• Purpose:

• To investigate the potential of using SNA at SCAD’s school of design

• Gain a holistic overview of the faculty’s experience in building collaborative relationships

• Data Collection:

• The primary motivation for using the online web-based approach was to collect and process data quickly. In conducting this part, we used zoomerang.com

5. Research Method and Data

Collection

2. Online Survey

• The main challenge:

• To gain a representative sample of faculty and staff members participating in the survey

• Problem:

• The response rate was very low. Total number of visitors was twenty five; only eight respondents completed the survey

5. Research Method and Data

Collection

3. Interview

• The goal:

• Gather information about current communication networks and the informal structure of School of Design as represented in ongoing patterns of interaction

• Data Collection:

• Interviews were conducted with two faculty members from School of Design

5. Research Method and Data

Collection

3. Interview

• Approach:

• Interviews consisted of an introduction

• Questions covering themes related to information networks and collaborative relationships in organizations

• Despite the structural nature of the interview, interviewees were encouraged to discuss in an open way about their experiences and views

5. Research Method and Data

Collection

4. WORDij Software

Extensive help provided by:

Dr. James Danowski

University of Illinois, Chicago

Dr. Ken Riopelle

Wayne State University, Detroit

A WORD-PAIR APPROACH TO INFORMATION RETRIEVAL

• system based on a linkage or network model for representing textual information.

• fundamental unit of analysis is the word pair, rather than the individual term.

•http://trec.nist.gov/pubs/trec1/papers/10.txt

• How is WORDij different than Condor?

both represent a social network. condor: node to node wordij: database using selected key terms.

• wordij is more flexible than condor.

Utilizes other nodes besides email. Advantage over condor. Words are nodes and word linkages depicted while condor has people as nodes and words shared by the people are depicted.

• condor is for analysis of email and WORDij

is for analysis of data.

• Why use WORDij?

Nature of the research demanded capabilities not provided by condor.

Search Process

• Lexis Nexis Database

• over 2000 articles scanned

• optimal search term:

Savannah w/1 College w/1 of Art w/1 Design (power search)

• period of 4 years: Jan 25th 2005 to Jan 25th 2009

• all articles extracted in .txt format

Department of Advertising and Design / Advertising & Design Department/ Adler Hall/ Morris Hall

Department of Accessory Design/ Eckberg hall

Department of Animation/ Montgomery Hall

Department of Architectural History/ Arnold Hall

Department of Architecture/ Eichberg Hall

Department of Art History/ Arnold Hall

Department of Arts Administration/ Arnold Hall

Department of Broadcast Design and Motion Graphics /Montgomery Hall

Department of Cinema Studies/ Hamilton Hall

Department of Design Management/ Gulfstream Center for Furniture and Industrial Design/ Clifford Hall

Department of Fashion/ Henry Hall/ Eckberg hall Department of Fibers/ Gordon Hall

Department of Film and Television/ Adler Hall/ Hamilton Hall

Department of Furniture Design/ Gulfstream Center for Furniture and Industrial Design/ Clifford Hall

Department of Graphic Design/ Poetter Hall

Department of Historic Preservation/ Eichberg Hall

Department of Illustration/ Morris Hall

Department of Industrial Design/ Gulfstream Center for Furniture and Industrial Design/ Clifford Hall/ Fahm Hall/ Eichberg Hall

Department of Interactive Design and Game Development/ Montgomery Hall

Department of Interior Design/ Eichberg Hall

Department of Metals and Jewelry/ Fahm Hall

Department of Painting/ Alexander Hall

Department of Media and Performing Arts/ Crites Hall

Department of Photography/ Bergen Hall

Department of Printmaking/ Alexander Hall

Department of Production Design/ Crites Hall

Department of Professional Writing/ Arnold Hall

Department of Sculpture/ Boundary Hall

Department of Sequential Art/ Norris Hall

Department of Sound Design/ Hamilton Hall

Department of Teaching/ Wallin Hall

Department of Television Producing/ Crites Hall

Department of Urban Design/ Eichberg Hall

Department of Visual Effects/ Montgomery Hall

Department of Foundation Studies/ Anderson Hall/ Boundary Hall/ Wallin Hall

Scad_dept.txt

34 SCAD Departments

with respective buildings

2005-2006

• Node size is a sign of network centrality • Thickness of line represents frequency of contact • Dept appearing first in article points to the other dept following in the article. • Placement of nodes based on optimal representation which minimizes cross linkages.

2006-2007

2007-2008

2008-2009

2005-2009

HOW TO MEASURE COLLABORATION: • count total number of links/ number of nodes --should increase over the years. • also count the number of thick lines, which depict an increase in degree of linkage.

• Conclusion

• Research accesses free information on the web.

• Task was to find what the press knows about these relationships

among departments. “Collaboration as seen through the eyes of

the press.” condor could not be used as it cannot parse words

• If the press are mentioning the 2 departments within an article:

then there is a better chance of collaboration

• Interpretation on collaboration? dramatic increase in last 2 yrs. i.e.

increase in the number of nodes that are linked and that links are

darker and stronger

• What is the pattern of communication? something is definitely

increasing not decreasing over time. Credibility in findings as data

is accessed through a public resource which is not internal

• How does scad use internal media to report collaboration? Strength of this research lies in the ability to analyze how well SCAD

is communicating with the outside world on publicity and

collaboration. Data gathered could be used for coolhunting purposes:

federal grants, potential areas/depts to develop etc.

6. Technical results:

6. Technical results:

Screenshots of our Visualization Application

Limitations/Drawbacks: - graph has to be completely connected - edge length has no semantic meaning - looks quite poor with too many egdes

7. Lessons Learned

Success Rates of IT Projects Resolution Type A, or project success: The project is completed on-time and on-budget, with all features and functions as initially specified. (34%) Resolution Type B, or project challenged: The project is completed and operational but over-budget, over the time estimate, and offers fewer features and functions than originally specified. (51%) Resolution Type C, or project impaired: The project is cancelled at some point during the development cycle. (15%)

7. Lessons Learned

Essential Factors for Successful Projects ► Clearly Defined Project Goal(s) It took us very long to define realistic project goals. We lost much time "running into wrong directions".

► Top Level Management Support We were supposed to visualize & analyze communication data from SCAD, but we have never had access to such data. We had to use a dummy-mailbox as a temporary solution for getting any data at all.

7. Lessons Learned

Essential Factors for Successful Projects ► Expertise of Project Members This was mainly an implementation project, but there was no top-notch programmer in our team. We could not implement most of our ideas; those we could implement were very time-consuming.

► Intense communication within the Group We underestimated the language barrier

7. Lessons Learned

1. Condor