The Geography of Coordination

Geographically distributed development creates new questions about how to coordinate multi-site work. In this paper, we present four methods product development organizations used to coordinate their work: functional areas of expertise, product structure, process steps, and customization. We describe the benefits and difficulties with each model. Finally, we discuss two difficulties that occur irrespective of the model used: consequences of unequal distribution of project mass, and finding expertise.

              Frequent ad hoc communication, however, is only one way that individuals can coordinate their work. Other approaches focus on designing the organization and assigning the work so as to reduce the amount of informal communication required. Although this will not eliminate the need for informal communication, the goal is to reduce it to a more manageable level. In this section, we introduce four models that organizations may adopt for this purpose. The first comes from the observation that a particular function is generally carried out by people with similar expertise. Second model of organizing focuses on projects, placing all work necessary to produce a product release in one organizational unit. In addition to these models, at least two other bases have been suggested for designing R&D organizations: product structure and development processes.