Using Web 2.0-based groupware to facilitate collaborative design in engineering education scheme projects

Employee collaboration is vital for manufacturing organisations wishing to be successful in an ever-changing global market place; it is commonly referred to as the joining of people and interests to meet a common goal via visual or oral interaction, information and knowledge sharing and the coordination of tasks; product development teams operating within the aerospace and defence industry rely extensively on this. To this end, the purpose of this paper is to present the results of a validation study carried out during an Engineering Education Scheme (EES) project initiated by a leading aerospace and defence manufacturing organisation, to confirm the benefits of using bespoke Web 2.0-based groupware to improve employee collaboration between dispersed teams. The results of a cross-sectional survey concluded that employees in the collaborating organisations would welcome greater usage of Web 2.0-based technologies. The study confirmed that groupware offers the potential to deliver a more effective collaborative environment with additional communication channels on offer to end users.