Benefits & Costs of Collaboration in IT Workplace

Question: Discuss about theBenefits Costs of Collaboration in IT Workplace. Answer: Introduction Two or more people or organisations coming together for a common goal is a collaboration (Schuman, 2006). It is a joint effort (Rouse, 2016) and by definition excludes individual work. Information Technology (IT) is the use of computers, networks, storage and other infrastructure to store, retrieve, process, and share electronic data and is often employed in the context of business as opposed to personal use (Bigelow, 2015). This short paper discusses the benefits and costs of collaboration in an IT workplace. Benefits Collaboration promotes a superior quality of work by supporting the division of labour on which our present-day society is based. The ever-increasing specialisation in technology, processes, and customer requirements mean that an individual in an organisation can specialise and thus excel in one or just a handful of domains to be adding value to the entity's mission (Belcher, n.d.). This requirement implies we need to bring together people of different skills to achieve goals, thus, collaboration. Multiple minds working together leads to that many ideas and leads to achieve the task at hand. Collaboration helps build team morale and helps increase job satisfaction (Boyer, n.d.). It increases the chances of interaction among the team members which may aid in honing resilient teams which will care about the quality of work they produce. Costs Collaboration requires the participation of multiple people, and thus the need to keep them on the same page, and thus meetings. It leads to meetings which are often inefficient and result in wasting time (Harmon Cullinan, 2016). Collaboration may lead to useless power struggles (Belcher, n.d.). In the absence of a real authority figure, some individuals may attempt to gain power rather than concentrate on the task at hand. It may also lead to covert conflicts in working styles of individuals (Belcher, n.d.) who would rather like to work solo. Some of these people of these employees may take out their tension on the work, thus being detrimental to the organisation's goals. References Belcher, L. Advantages Disadvantages of Collaboration in the Workplace. Chron. Retrieved 28 January 2017, from https://smallbusiness.chron.com/advantages-disadvantages-collaboration-workplace-20965.html Bigelow, S. (2015). What is Information Technology (IT)? - Definition from WhatIs.com. TechTarget. Retrieved 28 January 2017, from https://searchdatacenter.techtarget.com/definition/IT Boyer, S. The Importance of Collaboration in the Workplace. Nutcache. Retrieved 28 January 2017, from https://www.nutcache.com/blog/the-importance-of-collaboration-in-the-workplace/ Harmon, S. Cullinan, R. (2016). The Dark Side of Collaboration. The Huffington Post. Retrieved 28 January 2017, from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/shani-harmon/the-dark-side-of-collabor_b_9825020.html Rouse, M. (2016). What is collaboration? - Definition from WhatIs.com. TechTarget. Retrieved 28 January 2017, from https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/collaboration Schuman, S. (2006). Creating a culture of collaboration (1st ed.). San Francisco, Calif.: Jossey-Bass.