Computer support and facilitated structure in meetings-an empirical comparison of their impact

Explores whether computer support provides benefits beyond facilitation, which is one of the keys to success in group support systems (GSS) environments and one of the possible explanations of inconsistent GSS results. Teams of different size worked on an experimental task under one of three working conditions. They either had full computer support, a structured and moderated meeting process including manual support tools, or no support at all. This experimental design allowed the isolation of the impact of computers, a structured intervention in the meeting process by a facilitator and an increasing number of meeting participants. Results showed that, overall, the introduction of GSS into meetings has a stronger effect than merely facilitation or moderation without GSS support, though the type of effect differs for the observed variables. As the most important effects which computer usage introduces to meetings, an increased perceived speed of the meeting process and stronger anonymization, as well as more directness of the participant contributions were identified. A facilitated structure improves task understanding, reduces the dominance of meeting participants and enables teams to stay focused on the issues at hand. In consequence, computer-supported meetings are especially worth their additional effort over moderated meetings, when speed and anonymity, as well as direct input are more important to meeting success than equal participation and a straightforward discussion among meeting participants. Moderators should thus consider adding computer-supported meeting tools to their toolset