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October 7, 2005

Where Do You Go to Learn About Distributed Work?

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Posted by Jim Ware

As readers of this blog know, Charlie Grantham and I (aka The Work Design Collaborative, or Future of Work) have been commissioned to conduct an exploratory study of the feasibility of launching a new industry association focused on distributed work.

We're well along in conducting our first round of interviews with interested and experienced thought leaders and leading practitioners. It would be premature to report findings, but I've picked up an interesting pattern that I thought might provoke some useful conversation.

One of the questions we ask each interviewee is, "What resources do you depend on for information about developments in distributed work?"

The answers have been all over the map, from naming specific market research firms and industry analysts to relying on personal networks of friends and colleagues. But what struck me this week is how many people have answered "Google" or "my RSS newsfeed."

Maybe that's not surprising, given today's technology and our increasing reliance on the Net, but I found it interesting that there don't appear to be any definitive or consensus sources (other than Future of Work and FutureTense, of course!)

So, other than Google, where do you go? What websites, blogs, analysts, or professional associations do you find helpful in sorting out trends, data, and conflicting perspectives on the future of work? I'm seriously interested in hearing from you. Where do you go? And Why?

Comments (2) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: Distributed Work | In the News


COMMENTS

1. kris olsen on October 10, 2005 9:32 AM writes...

Jim - there are tons of sources out there but most seem to lack focus (with the exception of Future Tense, of course) and try to be all things to all people.

This is the reason I've started a blog (Wiki That!) on the sole topic of wikis targeted for the NON-technical enterprise audience - pretty much the same audience as yours. I do believe wikis will be a very important tool for distributed enterprise collaboration.

I don't know how much of an audienmce I'll attract and to be honest, my blog ( http://www.wikithat.com ) is still being fleshed out, But I'm hoping it can become an effective resource for that particular topic.

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2. William Crook on December 10, 2005 12:44 AM writes...

I know of no better tech source for understanding the Future of Work than the blog network called the Web 2.0 Workgroup, which includes blogs like TechCrunch, Read/Write Web, and others focused on the new 2-way, distributed, social applications of the next generation Web. Of these, no app better defines where things are heading than BaseCamp, a project of Chicago design firm 37 Signals. BaseCamp is what wiki's and groupware were meant to be-- and it's fundamentally changing the business/corporate/project culture in every company that puts it to serious use. Check it out at BaseCampHQ.com

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