One of the basic ProfHacker goals, I think, is to try to help people change things for the better on campus, especially when it comes to technology and work, whether in the form of research, teaching, or governance. And so one of the topics we often hear about is faculty member’s reluctance to take up new technology.
For example, several years ago, when I chaired my campus’s information technology committee, a perennial topic of discussion was faculty resistance to managing their calendars on Outlook. “All the staff and administrators use it,” we would hear, “and it makes scheduling meetings incredibly easy: the server finds times when everyone’s available. No need to send 20 e-mails to coordinate groups. Why do people resist this?”
One reason, of course, is that tons of people don’t use an online calendar, and given the peculiar nature of faculty time and incentives, would rather organize their calendar and to-do lists around getting tenure (for example) rather than facilitating other people scheduling Yet. Another. Meeting. People in different roles on campus often have quite different experiences of “working time,” and so the gulf between them can seem vast and intractable.
And yet, there is a small, basic step that each of us--and by “us” I mean the group of people who might read a blog, especially one like this one--can do to improve our work on campus: You can propose alternatives to your colleagues.
I was reminded of my time on the information technology committee just last week, when a group of faculty from four campuses were trying to schedule a meeting around everyone’s summer plans. After four or five dates were proposed and rejected, one of the other members of the group stood up and said, “This isn’t helpful. Let’s just send out a Doodle and schedule it that way.” And last summer, the hiring committee I was on would use Doodle to organize meetings, as well.
One of the things that people in those groups liked about Doodle was that it didn’t ask anything of them other than, “can you meet at these times?” No need to load in your whole schedule, or keep up your calendar, or anything else. It’s nice. For faculty, such an option is flexible and easy, and doesn’t imply that you’re giving over your calendar to others.
My point here isn’t to assert the advantages of Doodle over Outlook, which in any case are hardly comparable products. Rather, it’s to say that what allowed those groups to use Doodle was that, at some point, someone actually proposed a different way of doing things. Rather than circulate e-mails endlessly, or come to an agreement in person about a date, only to realize that someone forgot to check their calendar, the suggestion of an easy-to-use alternative made work a little better.
At the same time, everyone has suffered through a committee that has decided to draft and revise a document via e-mailed attachments. Some people use track changes, others use “Save as,” someone else only has Microsoft Works, and sooner or later everything’s a mess.
The way to avoid this is to propose using a different platform, whether it’s a wiki or Google Docs. Not everyone will want to do it, of course. Some people might not like Google’s interface, and others will get stuck on owning their words.
As long as your suggestion is couched in a pragmatic, enthusiastic way, and doesn’t imply that people who do things a different way are stupid for doing so, people will at least listen. Having said that, it’s ok if your proposal is rejected the first couple of times you propose it. What you’re trying to do is change the expectation around collaborative writing, say, or around scheduling. The more times people hear a platform being used, or the more times they see it, the more people will migrate to a better way of doing things.
The key, of course, is that the tool really does have to be better in some way, and can’t simply be the shiny new thing. The payoff, after all, has to be worth the opportunity cost. It’s a slow process, but eventually it should wear down opposition.
Do you have good strategies for encouraging people to change work patterns? Let us know in comments!
Photo by Flickr user sheilaellen / Creative Commons licensed.
