Scenario Identification and Description

Within the expert interviews, various scenarios were discussed which are categorized into the coding scheme given in Table7. Productivity scenarios with 35 mentions were discussed the most while knowledge management scenarios were discussed 14 times and idea management two times.

When it comes to idea management, it appears to be less interesting for enterprise crowdsourcing, as the crowd is limited to the employees, which contradicts the prac-

Table 7: The interview results given with the number of mentions per scenario.

level 2 mentions sum level 3 mentions

Idea management 2 -

Knowledge

2 12 Research 7

management Reporting / Analysis 5

Productivity 0 35

Supporting office tasks 6

Label and Cluster 5

Software development 3

Testing 15

Other 6

tice of gathering ideas from an open crowd [151]. However, one user discussed a

scenario, where proposals for a new logo could be collected via an ECPs. For knowl- edge management scenarios, research tasks, such as collecting information about new technologies and analyzing data, were mostly mentioned. From the analysis of the different statements, these scenarios are subdivided into the categories research and reporting/analysis. Following the discussions of scenarios in the expert interviews shows, that enterprise crowdsourcing seems to be very suitable for productivity sce- narios. Therefore, these are analyzed in detail and subdivided into several different kinds of productivity scenarios.

Supporting office activities scenarios describe principal or secondary activities of enterprise employees and can be completed using office tools available in the enter- prise. One example is the writing of texts for an Internet presence. The experts also mentioned editing photos, creating Excel macros and editing presentation slides. Label and cluster scenarios describe tasks concerning the clustering and labeling of data. The results are often used to train Machine Learning algorithms. One user described a project, where this is already in place using a PCP. Scenarios describing testing in- clude all tasks are concerned with the testing of program code. Here, the advantages of testing user interfaces with the help of an ECP were discussed in particular. In this context, a user of Company C drew attention to an attempt to perform crowd-testing within the Company introducing contests and prices to motivate employees. Soft- ware development scenarios describe tasks that involve the development and creation of program code but excludes testing, which is handled separately. Currently, IT de- partments suffer from the lack of employees in Germany. The ideas of outsourcing task related to software development or testing within a company might be related to the hopes, that ECPs could relieve the IT department.

Scenarios in the category other activities include everything that belongs to the productivity scenarios but does not fall into the categories mentioned above. One example of such an activity is the organization of corporate events, which was men- tioned by the decision-maker. Other scenarios also include organizing the activation

of IT tools and taking photographs to verify the current conditions or location of particular objects.

From the qualitative study, a high number of scenarios in the area of productiv- ity are identified. These form the basis for the differentiation of task assignment strategies and corresponding workflows. In the following, two contrary examples are described, which are provided to discuss general concepts for task assignment strategies and workflows in ECPs.

Scenarios of the sub-category software testing and support of office tasks are men- tioned most often throughout the interviews. Therefore, the specific scenarios testing a graphical user interface and create and edit presentation slides are chosen as examples. In addition, they show contrary requirements regarding the assignment strategy, con- fidentiality, and incentive mechanisms. These requirements are derived from the de- tailed transcribed and coded interview results.

The example testing a graphical user interface describes a certain task from the test- ing area within the productivity category, and serves as a representative task for many similar activities that are important for ECPs in IT companies. Testing a web-based Graphical User Interface (GUI) for example can be easily shared with skilled testers by providing a simple link and collecting written feedback. On the other hand, such a task may require the workers to come to a special laboratory for testing purpose, depending on the data that is supposed to be gathered. Testing a graphical user inter- face is a task that can be directly assigned to every worker of the enterprise, without further constraints in regards of qualifications or confidentiality level and may even be shared with partners or the public crowd. In some specific cases, GUI testing can be restricted by confidentiality issues, which requires an appropriate community man- agement. Therefore, this example scenario provides motivation and requirements for the task assignment strategy of direct assignment presented in the next section.

In some cases, it can be advantageous to require specific attributes or preconditions of the worker, such as the experience in using IT systems or even physical restraints (e.g., color blindness). For the motivation of workers, it was found, that testing a graphical user interface can be perceived as a positive diversion from the day to day office work. As testing is part of the software development process, which is usually undergone iteratively, tasks like this come up in regular intervals. It might be of value, to build a community of testers throughout the enterprise, who are queried regularly for specific testing tasks. As such a task does not support any learning or advancement of the worker, other ways of motivation have to be found. Incentivizing the worker with a lottery or recognition in the community can be options. This allows accounting for the necessary financial support without limiting the number of contributions when a direct reward would be promised.

The example creating and editing presentation slides describes a task from the support- ing office tasks area within the productivity category. In this example, an employee of the company shares information, e.g., incomplete or outdated presentation slides, to be updated for an upcoming presentation. In this scenario, the task has to be done by a single individual. In this case, constraints towards the qualifications or confidentiality level of the worker have to be considered.

Creating and editing presentation slides is a task that can be perceived as a burden- ing additional workload to workers. In such a case, the motivation plays an important role to ensure the quality of the provided work. Here, the affinity of the worker to- wards the content is of importance, and intrinsically motivated workers have to be found, that like to work on the given topic or with the required tool. Such a task could also be used to improve the workers’ capabilities to use specific office tools or to introduce them to certain information and processes within the company. Such a task cannot be assigned using a direct assignment of workers, but rather requires workers to apply for such a task and allow for review, rejection, and acceptance of applications. Therefore, this example motivates and provides requirements for the open application strategy provided in the next section.

From the empirical study, several scenarios relevant in the IT sector are identified and described. Two specific scenarios from the productivity category are chosen to de- scribe two example tasks that focus on different aspects of task assignment strategies. From the identified requirements, task assignment strategies are provided in the fol- lowing. Following the results of the qualitative study, the following task assignment strategies are derived from more than the two described scenario examples and take further identified requirements into account.