Command and Control: The Sociotechnical Perspective

Command and Control: The Sociotechnical Perspective
Author: Guy H Walker
Publisher: CRC Press
Total Pages: 342
Release: 2017-09-18
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 1317164040

Military command and control is not merely evolving, it is co-evolving. Technology is creating new opportunities for different types of command and control, and new types of command and control are creating new aspirations for technology. The question is how to manage this process, how to achieve a jointly optimised blend of socio and technical and create the kind of agility and self-synchronisation that modern forms of command and control promise. The answer put forward in this book is to re-visit sociotechnical systems theory. In doing so, the problems of 21st century command and control can be approached from an alternative, multi-disciplinary and above all human-centred perspective. Human factors (HF) is also co-evolving. The traditional conception of the field is to serve as a conduit for knowledge between engineering and psychology yet 21st century command and control presents an altogether different challenge. Viewing military command and control through the lens of sociotechnical theory forces us to confront difficult questions about the non-linear nature of people and technology: technology is changing, from platform centric to network centric; the interaction with that technology is changing, from prescribed to exploratory; and complexity is increasing, from behaviour that is linear to that which is emergent. The various chapters look at this transition and draw out ways in which sociotechnical systems theory can help to understand it. The sociotechnical perspective reveals itself as part of a conceptual toolkit through which military command and control can be transitioned, from notions of bureaucratic, hierarchical ways of operating to the devolved, agile, self-synchronising behaviour promised by modern forms of command and control like Network Enabled Capability (NEC). Sociotechnical system theory brings with it a sixty year legacy of practical application and this real-world grounding in business process re-engineering underlies the entire book. An attempt has been made to bring a set of sometimes abstract (but no less useful) principles down to the level of easy examples, design principles, evaluation criteria and actionable models. All of these are based on an extensive review of the current state of the art, new sociotechnical/NEC studies conducted by the authors, and insights derived from field studies of real-life command and control. Time and again, what emerges is a realisation that the most agile, self-synchronising component of all in command and control settings is the human.

Advanced Macroergonomics and Sociotechnical Approaches for Optimal Organizational Performance

Advanced Macroergonomics and Sociotechnical Approaches for Optimal Organizational Performance
Author: Realyvásquez, Arturo
Publisher: IGI Global
Total Pages: 350
Release: 2018-11-30
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1522571930

The overall design and strategies that create work systems within organizations must be evaluated and analyzed in order to ensure that all structures of a company are properly harmonized. Harmonizing all aspects of a company serves to optimize workflow and support all interactions between employees, machines, and software utilized by the company. Advanced Macroergonomics and Sociotechnical Approaches for Optimal Organizational Performance provides emerging research exploring the theoretical and practical aspects of system harmonization and applications within macroergonomics. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as stress-related conditions, organizational culture, and worker health, this book is ideally designed for ergonomists, human resource professionals, manufacturing engineers, industrial engineers, industrial designers, researchers, industry practitioners, research scientists, and academics seeking current research on the optimization of workflow and work systems.

Dreamscapes of Modernity

Dreamscapes of Modernity
Author: Sheila Jasanoff
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 363
Release: 2015-09-02
Genre: Science
ISBN: 022627666X

Dreamscapes of Modernity offers the first book-length treatment of sociotechnical imaginaries, a concept originated by Sheila Jasanoff and developed in close collaboration with Sang-Hyun Kim to describe how visions of scientific and technological progress carry with them implicit ideas about public purposes, collective futures, and the common good. The book presents a mix of case studies—including nuclear power in Austria, Chinese rice biotechnology, Korean stem cell research, the Indonesian Internet, US bioethics, global health, and more—to illustrate how the concept of sociotechnical imaginaries can lead to more sophisticated understandings of the national and transnational politics of science and technology. A theoretical introduction sets the stage for the contributors’ wide-ranging analyses, and a conclusion gathers and synthesizes their collective findings. The book marks a major theoretical advance for a concept that has been rapidly taken up across the social sciences and promises to become central to scholarship in science and technology studies.

Sociotechnical Communication in Engineering

Sociotechnical Communication in Engineering
Author: Jon Leydens
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 148
Release: 2015-10-14
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 131768365X

This collection explores why engineering communication constitutes sociotechnical communication. Sociotechnical communication acknowledges that engineering communication occurs not in a vacuum but shapes and is shaped by multiple social forces. Through diverse research cases, the authors show how sociotechnical communication disrupts common myths in engineering communication: the myth that communication can be purely technical and neutral, and that data speak for themselves. The book highlights these myths, considering first how styles, types, and means of sociotechnical communication played pivotal—and differing—roles in the evolution of wind power technology in Denmark and Germany. The role of myth in engineering blogs in also examined, wherein the effect of engineers maintaining "objective" or "neutral" personae, accentuating technical facts over their social relevance, and eschewing controversy, is to decrease public interest in engineering issues. We see the myths emerge again via product development engineers, whose narrow technical roles constrain their identities and may contribute to constraining their design innovation capacities, in contrast to more holistic, flexible spaces that foster innovation. The myths are also apparent in constructing bridges across Millennial-Baby Boomer generational divides, to facilitate engineering collaboration and knowledge transfer among engineers. Finally, the myths are situated in light of related myths and broader research trends in engineering communication. This book was originally published as a special issue of Engineering Studies.

The Sociotechnical Constitution of Resilience

The Sociotechnical Constitution of Resilience
Author: Sulfikar Amir
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 293
Release: 2018-05-17
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9811085099

This book considers the concept of resilience in a global society where coping with the consequence and long term impact of crisis and disaster challenges the capacity of communities to bounce back in the event of severe disruption. Catastrophic events such as the 9.11 terrorist attack, the Fukushima nuclear disaster, and the volcano eruption in Central Java entailed massive devastation on physical infrastructures, and caused significant social and economic damage. This book considers how the modern sociotechnological system facilitating human activity defines how societies survive and whether a crisis will be short-lived or prolonged. Drawing on the concept of sociotechnical resilience, this book closely examines a range of events North America, Asia, Australia, and Europe. By presenting the successes and failures of sociotechnical resilience, it offers important insights and practical lessons to build better and comprehensive understandings of resilience in a real-world setting, significantly contributing to the study of disaster resilience.

Knowledge Management in the SocioTechnical World

Knowledge Management in the SocioTechnical World
Author: Elayne Coakes
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 225
Release: 2012-12-06
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1447101871

This book follows on from Elayne Coakes'previous book in the CSCW series, The New SocioTech (published April 2000). Whereas that book gave a broad introduction to the re-emerging area of sociotechnical design, this one applies these principles specifically to the area of Knowledge Management (KM). KM has been a key tool in ensuring that people and technology work together to optimum effect within organisations for many years, but recent studies have called for a more systemic approach to the topic. This book examines that problem via sociotechnical principles which have recently re-emerged as one of the most widely used approaches to information systems and organisational design. Including contributions from academics and practitioners, this book looks at key aspects of the field such as: - Knowledge management strategy formulation - Knowledge requirements - Case studies from corporate learning environments and industry It will be of interest to practitioners, researchers, and managers who are involved in any aspect of information systems/sociotechnical design or knowledge management. It will also useful for advanced students on information systems or related courses.

Socio-Technical Networks

Socio-Technical Networks
Author: Fei Hu
Publisher: CRC Press
Total Pages: 400
Release: 2010-11-17
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 143980981X

While there are sporadic journal articles on socio-technical networks, there's long been a need for an integrated resource that addresses concrete socio-technical network (STN) design issues from algorithmic and engineering perspectives. Filling this need, Socio-Technical Networks: Science and Engineering Design provides a complete introduction to

Requirements Engineering for Sociotechnical Systems

Requirements Engineering for Sociotechnical Systems
Author:
Publisher: IGI Global
Total Pages: 373
Release: 2005-01-01
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1591405084

"This book provides a detailed account concerning information society and the challenges and application posed by its elicitation, specification, validation and management: from embedded software in cars to internet-based applications, COTS packages, health-care, and others"--Provided by publisher.

Technology and Society

Technology and Society
Author: Deborah G. Johnson
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 877
Release: 2008-10-17
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 0262303388

An anthology of writings by thinkers ranging from Freeman Dyson to Bruno Latour that focuses on the interconnections of technology, society, and values and how these may affect the future. Technological change does not happen in a vacuum; decisions about which technologies to develop, fund, market, and use engage ideas about values as well as calculations of costs and benefits. This anthology focuses on the interconnections of technology, society, and values. It offers writings by authorities as varied as Freeman Dyson, Laurence Lessig, Bruno Latour, and Judy Wajcman that will introduce readers to recent thinking about technology and provide them with conceptual tools, a theoretical framework, and knowledge to help understand how technology shapes society and how society shapes technology. It offers readers a new perspective on such current issues as globalization, the balance between security and privacy, environmental justice, and poverty in the developing world. The careful ordering of the selections and the editors' introductions give Technology and Society a coherence and flow that is unusual in anthologies. The book is suitable for use in undergraduate courses in STS and other disciplines. The selections begin with predictions of the future that range from forecasts of technological utopia to cautionary tales. These are followed by writings that explore the complexity of sociotechnical systems, presenting a picture of how technology and society work in step, shaping and being shaped by one another. Finally, the book goes back to considerations of the future, discussing twenty-first-century challenges that include nanotechnology, the role of citizens in technological decisions, and the technologies of human enhancement.