Management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system
The article considers the theoretical principles of management of the coordination process in the socio-technical system; the base of corporate knowledge of the IT company is investigated; the problems of using the company's corporate knowledge base are analyzed; the directions of transformatio...
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pp_isofts_kiev_ua-article-4432024-04-26T22:46:31Z Management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system Управління процесом координації у соціотехнічній системі Girchenko, L.A. Doroshenko, А.Yu. Ziubrytska, Y.V. knowledge management; corporate knowledge base; indepth knowledge representation; information space; IT com-pany; sociotechnical systems UDC 004.5 менеджмент знань; база корпоративних знань; поглиблене подання знань; інформаційний простір; ІТ-компанія; соціотехнічні системи УДК 004.5 The article considers the theoretical principles of management of the coordination process in the socio-technical system; the base of corporate knowledge of the IT company is investigated; the problems of using the company's corporate knowledge base are analyzed; the directions of transformation of the corporate knowledge base are outlined; the types of spaces in the base of corporate knowledge and methods of their management are defined. The main characteristics of the socio-technical system are considered, which ensure success in the intensified competition and at the same time characterize the level of development of the new managerial thinking. The study clarifies the effects of information technology on the activities of human organizations and markets, the importance of coordination in many types of systems. The article identifies the main components of coordination, forecasts about the possible consequences of reducing coordination costs. Considerable attention in the article is paid to the peculiarities of construction and adjustment of management processes of corporate knowledge bases of socio-technical systems; methodological approaches and practice of ensuring the management of the coordination process in the socio-technical system. there is a tendency to accelerate the emergence of various species. The article identifies the main directions of transformation of the corporate knowledge base, outlines the prospects for further development of management of the coordination process in the socio-technical system. As a result, the types of spaces in the corporate knowledge base are identified and recommendations for methods of managing them are offered.Problems in programming 2020; 4: 98-109 У статті розглядаються теоретичні засади управління процесом координації у соціотехнічній системі; досліджено базу корпоративних знань ІТ-компанії; проаналізовано проблеми користування базою корпоративних знань компанії; накреслено напрями перетворення бази корпоративних знань; визначено типи просторів у базі корпоративних знань та методи керування ними. Розглянуто основні характеристики соцiотехнiчної системи, якi забезпечують успiх у загостренiй конкурентнiй боротьбi i одночасно характеризують рiвень розвитку нового управлiнського мислення. З проведеного дослідження стає зрозумілим наслідки впливу інформаційних технологій на діяльність людських організаціях та ринки, важливість координації у багатьох видах систем. У статті визначено основні компоненти координації, здійснено прогнози про можливі наслідки скорочення координаційних витрат. Значну увагу в статті приділяється особливостям побудови та налагодження процесів керування базами корпоративних знань соціотехнічних систем; методичним підходам і практиці забезпечення керування процесом координації у соціотехнічній системі. Прослідковується тенденція до прискорення появи різноманітних видів. Також визначено основні напрями перетворення бази корпоративних знань, окреслено перспективи подальшого розвитку керування процесом координації у соціотехнічній системі. В результаті визначено типи просторів у базі корпоративних знань та запропоновано рекомендації щодо методів керування ними.Problems in programming 2020; 4: 98-109 Інститут програмних систем НАН України 2021-01-25 Article Article application/pdf https://pp.isofts.kiev.ua/index.php/ojs1/article/view/443 10.15407/pp2020.04.098 PROBLEMS IN PROGRAMMING; No 4 (2020); 98-109 ПРОБЛЕМЫ ПРОГРАММИРОВАНИЯ; No 4 (2020); 98-109 ПРОБЛЕМИ ПРОГРАМУВАННЯ; No 4 (2020); 98-109 1727-4907 10.15407/pp2020.04 en https://pp.isofts.kiev.ua/index.php/ojs1/article/view/443/447 Copyright (c) 2021 PROBLEMS IN PROGRAMMING |
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knowledge management corporate knowledge base indepth knowledge representation information space IT com-pany sociotechnical systems UDC 004.5 |
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knowledge management corporate knowledge base indepth knowledge representation information space IT com-pany sociotechnical systems UDC 004.5 Girchenko, L.A. Doroshenko, А.Yu. Ziubrytska, Y.V. Management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system |
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knowledge management corporate knowledge base indepth knowledge representation information space IT com-pany sociotechnical systems UDC 004.5 менеджмент знань база корпоративних знань поглиблене подання знань інформаційний простір ІТ-компанія соціотехнічні системи УДК 004.5 |
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Girchenko, L.A. Doroshenko, А.Yu. Ziubrytska, Y.V. |
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Girchenko, L.A. Doroshenko, А.Yu. Ziubrytska, Y.V. |
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Girchenko, L.A. |
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Management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system |
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Management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system |
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Management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system |
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Management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system |
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Management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system |
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management of the coordination process in sociotechnical system |
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Управління процесом координації у соціотехнічній системі |
| description |
The article considers the theoretical principles of management of the coordination process in the socio-technical system; the base of corporate knowledge of the IT company is investigated; the problems of using the company's corporate knowledge base are analyzed; the directions of transformation of the corporate knowledge base are outlined; the types of spaces in the base of corporate knowledge and methods of their management are defined. The main characteristics of the socio-technical system are considered, which ensure success in the intensified competition and at the same time characterize the level of development of the new managerial thinking. The study clarifies the effects of information technology on the activities of human organizations and markets, the importance of coordination in many types of systems. The article identifies the main components of coordination, forecasts about the possible consequences of reducing coordination costs. Considerable attention in the article is paid to the peculiarities of construction and adjustment of management processes of corporate knowledge bases of socio-technical systems; methodological approaches and practice of ensuring the management of the coordination process in the socio-technical system. there is a tendency to accelerate the emergence of various species. The article identifies the main directions of transformation of the corporate knowledge base, outlines the prospects for further development of management of the coordination process in the socio-technical system. As a result, the types of spaces in the corporate knowledge base are identified and recommendations for methods of managing them are offered.Problems in programming 2020; 4: 98-109 |
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Інститут програмних систем НАН України |
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2021 |
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https://pp.isofts.kiev.ua/index.php/ojs1/article/view/443 |
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Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
© L.А. Girchenko, А.Y. Doroshenko, Y.V. Ziubrytska, 2020
98 ISSN 1727-4907. Проблеми програмування. 2020. № 4
UDC 004.5 https://doi.org/10.15407/pp2020.04.098
L.А. Girchenko, А.Y. Doroshenko, Y.V. Ziubrytska
MANAGEMENT OF THE COORDINATION PROCESS
IN THE SOCIOTECHNICAL SYSTEM
The article considers the theoretical principles of management of the coordination process in the sociotechnical
system. On the example of the selected IT company, the corporate knowledge base is researched, the problems
of using the corporate knowledge base are analyzed and the directions of corporate knowledge base transfor-
mation are outlined with the help of software tools for its coordinated use and in-depth presentation of
knowledge. As a result, the types of spaces in the corporate knowledge base are identified and recommenda-
tions for methods of managing them are offered.
Key words: knowledge management, corporate knowledge base, in-depth presentation of knowledge, infor-
mation space, IT company, sociotechnical systems.
Introduction
A distinctive feature of the modern in-
formation society is that most employees are
engaged in the production, storage, processing
and sale of information, especially its highest
form – knowledge. In the informatization of
society, the main attention is paid to a set of
measures aimed at ensuring the full use of
reliable, comprehensive and timely knowle-
dge in all human activities. The direction of
knowledge management began to develop
rapidly in the 90s of last century. This was
due to a change in priorities in business and
society, as well as the ongoing scientific and
technological revolution, which is based on
the use of the latest information technology in
all areas of human activity. The most profita-
ble and attractive area for investment is the
development of high technology and service,
which determine the rapid return on invest-
ment, reduce dependence on raw materials,
provide an opportunity to capture new niches
in the use of goods or services. Thus, the di-
rection of research on the management of
corporate knowledge bases in sociotechnical
systems is relevant.
Important aspects considered from a
practical point of view are methodological
approaches and the practice of ensuring the
management of the coordination process in
the sociotechnical system. The research
methods were general scientific methods,
systematization, grouping, comparison, anal-
ogies, coefficients, structural, factorial, statis-
tical and comparative analysis, empirical
knowledge, expert assessments, design.
Development tools: Confluence, XMind,
Draw.io [1–3].
In recent years, there has been a grow-
ing interest in complex systems that involve
both humans and computers that can be coor-
dinated. Coordination can be seen as a pro-
cess of managing the relationships between
different activities. Coordination issues have
been studied by many scholars Bond and
Gasser, Huhns and Gasser, Malone and
Crowston, A.V. Anisimov, F.I. Andon, A.Y.
Doroshenko, S.D. Pogoriliy, G.E. Zeitlin,
O.A Yatsenko and others. Thus, further pro-
gress may be possible by characterizing dif-
ferent types of dependencies and identifying
coordination processes that can be used to
manage them [4].
Coordination models and languages
have attracted the attention of the scientific
community in many fields, including the de-
sign of distributed and parallel computer sys-
tems. Parallel programs developed in the style
of coordination have two components – a
computational model and a coordination
model, which are responsible for the algo-
rithmic and behavioral aspects of computing,
respectively. Coordination tools, as shown
earlier, can serve not only as a software inte-
grator, but also as a software accelerator in
terms of improving the performance of paral-
lel programs [5–7].
The purpose of this article is to outline
the areas of management of the coordination
process, to develop practical recommenda-
tions for the management and use of corporate
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
99
knowledge bases and to implement these rec-
ommendations in improving the effectiveness
of sociotechnical systems.
1. Analysis of existing problems of
using the corporate knowledge base
Any production organization is a
complex sociotechnical system, which logi-
cally distinguishes material and human factors
of production, and which is considered in
terms of interaction of the two subsystems:
- technical and economic, which
includes not only technical and technological
factors, but also management knowledge,
organizational structures, methods of pro-
duction planning, job development, tech-
niques and skills, the level of qualification
and design of the labor process, which in
turn improves economic efficiency of the
organization.
- social, which includes values of
the organization, attitude to the functions
performed, forms of incentives for employ-
ees, management style, employee participa-
tion in decision-making, career opportuni-
ties, organizational culture, etc.
The term «sociotechnical system»
was first coined in the 1960 s by Eric Trist
and Fred Emery, consultants at the Tavistock
Institute of Human Relations (London). The
concept of sociotechnical systems, in contrast
to the unilateral action of technology on man,
is based on the idea of human-machine inter-
action. The design of technical and social
conditions should be carried out in such a way
that technological efficiency and humanitari-
an aspects do not contradict each other.
Researchers cite several characteristics
of the sociotechnical system, which ensure
success in the intensified competition and at
the same time characterize the level of devel-
opment of new managerial thinking. One of
them is the organizational philosophy, which
provides knowledge and understanding by the
employees of the organization's goals and
mission, readiness to take full responsibility
for the final results of the activity. Second, the
organizational structure of management pro-
vides employees with the right to participate
in the management of the organization. An
innovative approach to job development and
the role of the executor in the decision-
making process is also important. The charac-
teristics also include innovative forms and
methods of training and retraining, more flex-
ible personnel policy aimed at guaranteeing
employment. Training should be based on
mastering a wide range of specializations, as
well as on acquiring knowledge that enables
employees to perform various functions, be
competent in various aspects of work, master
related professions and master the so-called
professions of the future. Another important
characteristic is the new criteria in assessing
the economic efficiency of the use of modern
technologies and capital investments in the
development of production [8].
The widespread use of information
technology has changed the way people work
together. Coordination can take place in dif-
ferent types of systems. For example, special-
ized software was developed to support the
collaboration of several authors on the same
document; now it helps people display and
manipulate information more effectively in
meetings; helps people use the email process
productively.
The continued development of new
computer programs in this area is guided by a
consistent theory of how people coordinate
their activities without information technolo-
gy, and how they can do so much more pro-
ductively with computer support. It is im-
portant to understand the effects of infor-
mation technology on the activities of human
organizations and markets, the design of co-
operative working tools and the design of
distributed and parallel computer systems.
Well-established coordination is often
invisible, but its absence immediately be-
comes visible. Examples of fuzzy coordina-
tion are when we book and pay for an apart-
ment in a foreign country, but spend an hour
waiting for the keys or cleaning finishing, or
when our favorite word processor stops work-
ing on a new version of the operating system.
We can become very aware of the conse-
quences of poor coordination.
Coordination can be used in many
types of systems: human, computational, bio-
logical, and so on. As for the question of de-
pendency management in human activity, it is
central to the theory of organizations, eco-
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
100
nomics, management science, sociology, so-
cial psychology, anthropology, linguistics,
law and political science. In computer sys-
tems, the dependencies between different
computational processes must be managed,
and, as many researchers point out, certain
types of interactions between computational
processes resemble interactions between
people [8].
One of the advantages of the defini-
tion used for coordination is that coordination
offers a direction for addressing issues. If
coordination is defined as dependency man-
agement, then further progress can be made
by characterizing the different types of de-
pendencies and identifying coordination pro-
cesses that can be used to manage them.
For interdependence between compo-
nents, coordination is important because it
explicitly or implicitly affects the perfor-
mance of certain activities (eg, design or re-
design of components) [4].
Many coordination processes require
decisions that affect the activities of the or-
ganization. For example, in sharing resources,
the group must "decide" how to allocate re-
sources; in task/subtask management, the
group must "decide" how to segment the task.
In all these cases, alternative ways of making
group decisions generate coordination pro-
cesses. For example, any group decision may
be made by management (e.g., a "manager"
who makes a decision), a vote, or a consensus
(as a result of negotiations) [4].
An obvious way to generate new
coordination processes are alternative forms
of communication (synchronous versus asyn-
chronous, paper versus electronic) for
everywhere in the process where information
needs to be transmitted. The coordination
structure also emphasizes new aspects of the
problems. For example, when we view com-
munication as a way to manage the relation-
ship between producer and consumer, we
need to take care of how to make the infor-
mation "usable." Coordination models can
include parameters for things like incentives,
productivity, and communication costs that
vary widely across human, computing, and
biological systems [4].
In order to analyze the terminology of
coordination, it is important to clearly define
the components of coordination. It is useful
to define evaluation criteria. For example,
we may define some general "goals" of the
activity (for example, car production or re-
port printing) and other measurements to
assess how well these goals are being met
(for example, minimizing time or cost).
Some coordination processes may be faster
or more accurate than others, for example,
greater coordination is not always worth it. It
is important to realize that there is no "right"
way to determine the components of coordi-
nation in different situations. For example,
we can sometimes analyze everything that
happens in a production unit as one "activi-
ty", and at other times we can analyze each
station on the assembly line as a separate
"activity". As another example, we can give
the example of muscle coordination, when
different parts of the body of the same per-
son are implicitly considered as separate "ac-
tors" performing separate "actions". When
analyzing coordination in human orga-
nizations, it is often helpful to simply ask
people what their goals are and evaluate
their behavior in terms of these criteria.
Another important example is the coordina-
tion of market operations. The goal of mar-
ket participants may be to maximize their
individual benefits, but the market as a coor-
dination mechanism must be assessed in
terms of how well it meets such general cri-
teria as maximizing the needs of market
participants [4].
Coordination is an activity that in it-
self involves certain costs. Although there are
many other factors that can affect the way
organizations and markets coordinate (e.g.,
global competition, national culture, govern-
ment regulation, and interest rates). One im-
portant feature, of course, is its cost. And it
seems plausible that information technology
can significantly reduce the cost of certain
types of coordination.
You can make a few simple predic-
tions about the possible consequences of re-
ducing coordination costs. It is useful to illus-
trate these effects by analogy with similar
changes in transportation costs caused by the
introduction of trains and cars:
1. The effect of reducing the "first
order" of transport costs trains and cars were
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
101
achieved simply by a certain replacement of
the old transportation technologies with new
ones: people began to ride trains more and in
carriages with horses less.
2. The effect of reducing the "second
order" of transport costs was reflected in the
increase in the number of used vehicles: peo-
ple began to travel more, and it goes without
saying that it could be done cheaper and more
convenient on trains than on foot.
3. Finally, the effect of the "third or-
der" allowed to create more structures of in-
tensive transportation: people eventually be-
gan to live in a remote suburb and use shop-
ping malls outside the city. These two exam-
ples of new structures undoubtedly depend on
the wide availability of cheap and convenient
transportation.
You can also expect several effects
from the use of new information technologies
to reduce coordination costs:
1. The "first order" effect of redu-
cing the cost of coordination with infor-
mation technology may be a replacement for
information technology of some types of
coordination of people. For example, many
banks and insurance companies have re-
placed large numbers of human officials in
their offices with automated systems. It has
also long been predicted that computers will
lead to the demise of middle management, as
communication tasks performed by middle
managers can be performed more cheaply,
namely with the help of computers. This
prediction has not been realized for decades,
but many people believed that it would final-
ly begin to happen en masse in the mid-
1980 s and 1990 s.
2. The effect of reducing the "sec-
ond order" You can increase the cost of co-
ordination of the total amount on second-
hand coordination. In some cases, this may
interfere with the first-order effect. For ex-
ample, in one case studied by the authors of
the study, a computerized conference system
was used to eliminate middle managers [4].
However, a few years later, almost as many
new positions were created for corporate
staff, many of whom were helped by new
computer systems. This example demon-
strates that the resource management task
can now be applied to more complex analy-
sis that was not possible before.
3. The "third order" effect of reduc-
ing coordination costs may encourage the
transition to more "intensive coordination" of
structures. In other words, coordination struc-
tures that were previously too "expensive"
will now become more effective. Technolo-
gies such as e-mail and computer conferenc-
ing can help reduce the cost of these types of
communications and advanced means of in-
formation exchange [4].
Reducing the cost of coordination
through information technology can lead to a
general shift to smaller firms and a propor-
tional increase in the use of markets, from
internal decision-making within firms to the
coordination of economic activity in general.
It is clear that the coordination of market op-
erations is much more expensive than internal
coordination.
IT can lead to both centralization and
decentralization, depending on how they are
used. This conclusion can be made by clearly
defining the main factors. When IT imple-
mentation reduces information costs for de-
cision making, it leads to greater centraliza-
tion. For example, Otis Elevator used IT to
centralize reporting and manage customer
service functions, instead of distributing
these functions to numerous remote field
offices. On the other hand, when IT primari-
ly reduces agency costs, it leads to greater
decentralization. In this case, agency costs
are the costs of employees who do not act in
the interests of the firm. For example, when
one insurance company developed a system
to more effectively monitor the overall per-
formance of its vendors, they were able to
decentralize many decisions to vendors,
whereas previously they were made centrally
[4]. Coordination theories are also useful in
the following areas:
- in the empirical study of human
coordination or other biological systems (eg,
field, laboratory or econometric studies);
- in the development of new tech-
nologies to support human coordination;
- when designing and experiment-
ing with new methods of coordination of dis-
tributed and parallel computer systems;
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
102
- in formal modeling of coordina-
tion processes (for example, mathematical or
computer modeling).
Thus, we can conclude that the ideas
of coordination are useful, because they offer
new systems, by classifying systems and
analyzing how systems use them; that scien-
tists have been paying attention to coordina-
tion since the middle of the twentieth centu-
ry, and that new information technologies
have an impact on both markets and organi-
zations, in particular: the size of organiza-
tions and the degree of centralization of deci-
sion-making in them. General coordination
mechanisms can manage many dependen-
cies: both market operations, centralized and
decentralized management decisions, and
internal decision-making processes in an
individual organization. Coordination helps
address a variety of immediate practical
needs, including:
- designing computer and commu-
nication tools that allow people to work to-
gether more effectively;
- using the power of several com-
puter processors working simultaneously on
common problems;
- creating more flexible and effi-
cient ways of organizing collective human
activity.
The knowledge management system in
the set of applied tools and the mechanism of
information support on the basis of modern
information technologies is called to provide
innovative development of the company, so
necessary in the conditions of development of
a society.
IT companies, more than others,
should focus on the use of the latest technol-
ogies for more efficient organization of
the external and internal environment: elec-
tronic document management, gamification,
socialized corporate portal, BigData,
BI-analytics, OLAP, automated controlling
and more. All this is absolutely close to the
understanding by the information technology
professionals.
Therefore, IT companies must act as
representatives of the innovation sector of the
economy, creating unique mechanisms of
management systems to stimulate their in-
novative development, including comprehen-
sive controlling systems to assess the effec-
tiveness of implemented tools based on se-
lected indicators.
Effective solutions help create new
products, improve old ones and increase
customer satisfaction. When the support
service answers questions faster and more
accurately, solves problems of users, dissatis-
fied customers become less. This reduces the
outflow of users, which increases financial
performance.
Knowledge management is the process
of processing, managing and using the
knowledge and experience of employees (in-
ternal experts) to effectively solve problems.
Coding Sans conducted research in
European IT companies (see Fig. 1). Employ-
ees were asked one question: "What is the
main challenge in the field of software devel-
opment do you see for yourself?" A fifth of
respondents from various positions indicated
that this is an exchange of knowledge. This is
the second result after «capacity» – the ability
to solve more problems in less time.
Fig. 1. Results of respondents' answers to the
main challenge in the field of software
development
But it is much more interesting to
compare the voices between those who write
the code and their managers (Fig. 2).
The column with information about
managers is marked in white, and the column
with information about developers is marked
in dark color. The difference between the val-
ues is almost a third in relative terms. It turns
out that the developer finds channel for
knowledge management more important.
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
103
Fig. 2. Respondents' responses to the main
challenge in software development compared
to code writers and managers [9]
It is more important for managers to
keep up with everything. Typically, they del-
egate tasks to subordinates: they turn to HR,
hire more developers, and expect for tasks to
be closed on time.
Even if the recruiter collects all the
cream of the market, the problem will not go
anywhere. Developers don't have a way to get
information operatively in order to close tasks
quickly, so the problem will arise again, but
on a larger scale. This is an endless cycle
from which the manager himself will not
come out.
Software companies face the chal-
lenge of developing, selling, supplying and
maintaining increasingly sophisticated solu-
tions and products. This can be done most
effectively only with a knowledge manage-
ment system.
2. General characteristics of the
company
An international technology product
company with a full cycle of development in
the field of Entertainment was selected for the
study. It is part of a global holding company
with a total staff of almost 2,000 people.
The company is an ecosystem that
combines IT products, marketing and other
areas. Works on the development of product
innovations, the creation of competitive
advantages of products and the company
as a whole, accumulates expertise and speed
of implementation, unites in research teams
of professionals and implements bold and
risky ideas.
3. Corporate knowledge base
management tools
Effective management of the corpo-
rate knowledge base requires the use of
modern tools. The choice of tools depends
on the tasks, problems and opportunities in a
particular organization. For example, for one
company it is necessary to create an effective
and stable communication space for interac-
tion between departments, and for another it
is necessary to start processes of continuous
selection and evaluation of ideas and pro-
posals of employees, for the third it is neces-
sary to focus on creating special relation-
ships with its customers. Let's consider the
features of using the tools Confluence,
XMind, drow.io for the collection, analysis,
exchange and transfer of corporate
knowledge.
Confluence – Web-based corporate
wiki, which is used mainly within the organ-
ization, forming a single whole organization
to achieve its goals, and is a space for team-
work, which accumulates information and
opportunities for collaboration. It was devel-
oped by Atlassian Software Systems and
more than 50 million companies worldwide
use the company's products (the most popu-
lar are JIRA and Confluence). Confluence
simplifies collaboration within the team and
allows you to organize effective information
management. Integration with Microsoft Of-
fice facilitates its use in a familiar environ-
ment: create content and collaborate on doc-
uments, spreadsheets and presentations on
Confluence pages, edit pages directly from
Microsoft Office.
Confluence has a sophisticated in-
formation retrieval system with the ability to
quickly search for keywords. The infor-
mation in Confluence is placed by sections
or spaces that contain pages. Spaces allow
you to share information between projects or
teams, can have a unique data structure and
appearance depending on the goals of the
project. You can create a space using ap-
pearance templates for easier data organiza-
tion. The basic editing tools available in the
panel at the top of the window are used to
edit and add information to pages. Macros
are used to add files, charts, content, various
reports, etc. [1].
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
104
XMind is software for creating so-
called mind maps for brainstorming, which
help to organize information in a visual asso-
ciative form. XMind is a tool that helps cap-
ture thoughts and chart them. In other words,
with this program you can detail your task
and work on it more purposefully. Each ele-
ment of the map can be an idea connected to
other ideas through hierarchical connections.
The program allows the user to capture their
thoughts, build them into different charts,
use these charts with other users. XMind
supports intelligence maps (connection dia-
grams), Ishikawa diagrams (also known as
causal or fishbone diagrams), tree diagrams,
and tables. XMind is convenient to use for
corporate knowledge management, during
meetings, in task management, in time man-
agement [2].
Draw.io – a service designed for the
creating of classic diagrams, relationship
diagrams of logical objects, network dia-
grams, organizational charts of diagrams,
graphs, flowcharts, electronic circuits, UML-
models, business process models, interactive
design prototypes and layouts, inserts in im-
age diagrams, etc. [3].
The described tools are modern
means of conceptual design of information
systems that can significantly improve the
productivity and coordination of joint work.
4. Practical recommendations
Let’s define the transformation of
corporate knowledge databases. To put doc-
umentation in defined order, firstly, it’s rec-
ommended to logically separate it into prod-
uct (which relates to description of the prod-
uct) and operating (which relates to internal
processes of company). They have different
business requirements, working regulations,
accounting, etc. This logical separation is
offered to be done with the help of Conflu-
ence labels or another pages attributes. Also,
the structure of the corporate knowledge da-
tabase is developed considering the future
necessity to take out part of information into
external databases with minimal efforts, for
example, for customers.
To such kind of information belongs
general description of product/module, man-
uals, user guidance’s, description of external
API’s, articles about malfunction elimina-
tions.
Some part of information in the cor-
porate knowledge database will be presented
just for internal use, information about sys-
tem’s architecture, information about physi-
cal infrastructure (servers, networks, etc),
technical support, administrators guidances,
different operating documentation of the
team (reports, statuses of projects and tasks,
etc).
Recommended steps for realization
during creating of new united corporate
knowledge database:
1. Poll final users and formulation
of requirements for internal Wikipedia.
2. Analysis current database to
highlight popular and not relevant blocks.
3. Creating a plan and vision of
corporate knowledge database development.
4. Creating a clear corporate
knowledge database structure on Confluence
and descriptions in schemas for every space.
5. Transformation of the database
main page.
6. Creating a glossary with all local
terminology for team synchronization.
7. Implementation of a new safety
principle, which will be defined in the next
clause.
8. Making the transition when
working with Confluence from «everything
is secret» to «everything is open» on Read (if
there is any secret information – hide it on
the closed page).
9. Database modification in the way
that any employee of any department can
find the necessary information, without pre-
viously knowing where to look for it.
After modification of all spaces they
can be classified due to three types.
The first type includes space, where
documentation of one team of developers is
kept (see Fig. 3).
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
105
Fig. 3. Space of the first type
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
106
It is necessary to adhere to the princi-
ple of division documentation into product
(all, that relates directly to the product: archi-
tecture, interaction with others, environment,
API, etc) and operating which concerns di-
rectly the working process within the team).
The second type includes space, where
there is processed documentation of a few
teams or only one team, but including a few
products. For successful use of created
schemes it is recommended to use additional
navigation tools: pages will be assigned team
labels, then a list of all labeled pages will be
automatically compiled by the content by
label macro into content for one team.
Version 1: At the first level we create
separate sections for each team, within these
sections we repeat the distribution, presented
in drawing. The documents of each team are
collected together, which is convenient for the
team. For a third-party user looking for in-
formation, extra levels of page hierarchy are
added, and it may not be obvious which sec-
tion contains the document you want.
It may turn out that the documentation
for the same product is divided into different
sections (see Fig. 4).
Fig. 4. Space of the second type of ver.1
Version 2: At first level we save dis-
tributions, for example, Architecture, Metrics,
QA, Operating Documentation, at the next
levels we divide into specific teams. Docu-
ments for the product are collected, which
makes finding information more easily, posi-
tively affects its integrity and fullness. The
team may feel uncomfortable when its docu-
ments are classified for different sections. To
reduce this uncertainty it is suggested to use
an additional navigation tool: pages will have
teams labels and then a list of all labeled pag-
es should be automatically collected by macro
content by label into the content for one team
(see Fig. 5).
The third type includes a space in
which there is no documentation for specific
products, and only reporting and other docu-
mentation is maintained (see Fig. 6).
The first page of all spaces should be
as informative as possible for the user who
entered this space for the first time. It should
contain information about the team / products,
links to the most important and frequently
visited pages, it should simplify navigation in
space.
Below is a list of sections that are rec-
ommended to be presented on a first page of
each space:
1. For which team/product or for
what purpose does this space exist. Optional-
ly should be added, on what questions this
team is responsible and in which way. Ex-
ample message for one of the teams: “Hi,
this is a space of a team of technical writers.
We write documents for everyone, keep a
glossary, maintain the relevance of docu-
mentation. If you need to add your term to
the glossary, draw the architecture of the
program or write a user manual, we will
help. Write an application to the Technical
Writers project at JIRA”.
2. The composition of the team or at
least the leader and the one that is responsible
for the product.
3. How to look for information in
space. Links to the most commonly used
product and operating documentation, neces-
sarily including the link to the onboarding
page.
4. Recently edited pages.
5. Popular documents.
6. Search.
7. Useful links.
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
107
Fig. 5. Space of the second type of ver.2
Теоретичні і методологічні основи програмування
108
Fig. 6. Space of the third type
8. You can also place a tree of space
pages here, but this is optional because it is
always presented in the menu on the left. By
default, all Confluence spaces will be created
open for viewing to all logged-in users. Any-
way, each space will have a section for confi-
dential information, access to which by de-
fault will be open only to the owner of the
space and closed to all others.
Since the access permissions for Con-
fluence pages are inherited by hierarchy, i.e.
if the user is denied access to the parent page,
it is automatically closed to all children, then
access within the space will be easy to con-
trol: the page placed in the confidential in-
formation section or created in it will auto-
matically disappear from public access, and to
share the page, just move it from this section
to any other.
Conclusions
Thus, the analysis of a large array of
statistics, the study of existing software, for-
eign experience and the current state of
knowledge management allows us to con-
clude that the ideas of coordination are use-
ful because they offer new systems, by clas-
sifying systems and analyzing how present
systems use them. Scientists have been pay-
ing attention to coordination since the middle
of the twentieth century, and new infor-
mation technologies have an impact on both
markets and organizations, in particular: the
size of organizations and the degree of cen-
tralization of decision-making in them. Gen-
eral coordination mechanisms can manage
many dependencies: both market operations,
centralized and decentralized management
decisions, and internal decision-making pro-
cesses in an individual organization. Coordi-
nation helps to address a variety of immedi-
ate practical needs. Research of the corporate
knowledge base on the example of an IT
company, analysis of the problems of its use
and features of the use of development tools
allowed to structure the spaces of the corpo-
rate knowledge base of the IT company; uni-
fy the pages of the corporate knowledge base
of the IT company; create a convenient navi-
gation of the corporate knowledge base of
the IT company; introduce templates for key
pages in space (about, processes, metrics,
etc.) and new approaches to data storage in
terms of company security. As a result of the
study, the methods of renewal, updating,
supplementing and avoiding duplication of
information in the corporate knowledge base
were improved.
References
1. https://www.atlassian.com/software/confluence
2. https://www.xmind.net/
3. https://drawio-app.com/
4. Malone T.W., Crowston K. The Interdiscipli-
nary Study of Coordination. ACM Computing
Surveys. 1994. Vol. 26. N. l. P. 87–119.
5. Doroshenko A. Coordination Facilities to
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Algorithms "High Performance Computing
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dam, Netherlads. Lect. Notes in Computer Sci.
1998. Vol. 1401. Springer Verlag.
P. 950–952.
6. Doroshenko A., Thorelli L.-E., Vlassov V.,
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in UkrPROG'98: Proc. I Int. Scientific and
Practical conf. in programming UkrPROG'98,
Kyiv, Sept. 2-4.1998, Glushkov Institute of
Cybernetics. P. 235–242.
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B. Smith (eds.). Coordination theory and col-
laboration technology. Lawrence Erlbaum As-
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development-2019
Література
1. https://www.atlassian.com/software/confluence
2. https://www.xmind.net/
3. https://drawio-app.com/
4. Malone T.W., Crowston K. The Interdiscipli-
nary Study of Coordination. ACM Computing
Surveys. 1994. vol. 26. No. l. P. 87–119.
5. Doroshenko A. Coordination Facilities to
Enhance Concurrency of Race-Free Parallel
Algorithms "High Performance Computing
and Networking", Proc.Int. Conf., Amster-
dam, Netherlads. Lect. Notes in Computer
Sci. 1998. Vol. 1401. Springer Verlag.
P. 950–952.
6. Doroshenko A., Thorelli L.-E., Vlassov V.,
Coordination Models and Facilities Could be
Parallel Software Accelerators. in "High Per-
formance Computing and Networking", Proc.
7-th Int. Conf. HPCN'99.-LNCS, Vol. 1593.
P. 1219–1222.
7. Doroshenko A. Coordination Programming
Abstractions for Efficient Parallel Programs.
in UkrPROG'98: Proc. I Int. Scientific and
Practical conf. in programming UkrPROG'98,
Kyiv, Sept. 2-4.1998, Glushkov Institute of
Cybernetics. P. 235–242.
8. Gary M. Olson, Thomas W. Malone, JOHN
B. Smith (eds.). Coordination theory and col-
laboration technology. Lawrence Erlbaum As-
sociates, Inc., 2001. 816 p.
10. https://codingsans.com/state-of-software-
development-2019
Received 23.10.2020
About authors:
Girchenko Liudmyla Andriivna,
Graduate student
Faculty of Computer Science and
Cybernetics.
Number of scientific publications in
Ukrainian publishing houses – 7.
Number of scientific publications in
foreign publishing houses – 3.
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5433-2399,
Doroshenko Anatoly Yuhymovych,
Doctor of physical and mathematical
sciences,
Professor, Head of the Theory Department
computer computing of the Institute
software systems of the NAS of Ukraine,
Professor of Automation and
management in Technical systems.
Number of scientific publications in
Ukrainian publishing houses – more than 150.
Number of scientific publications in
foreign publishing houses – more than 50.
h-index – 6.
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8435-1451,
Ziubrytska Yuliia Viacheslavivna,
Graduate student
Faculty of Computer Science and
Cybernetics.
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5025-8614.
Affiliation:
Taras Shevchenko National University
of Kyiv.
60 Volodymyrska Street, City of Kyiv,
Ukraine, 01033
National Technical University of Ukraine
“Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute”
37, Prosp. Peremohy, Kyiv, Ukraine, 03056
E-mail: girchenkoliu@gmail.com,
doroshenkoanatoliy2@gmail.com,
yuliia.ziubrytska@gmail.com
https://drawio-app.com/
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