Doctoral Degrees (Information Science)

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Browsing Doctoral Degrees (Information Science) by browse.metadata.advisor "Le Roux, Daniel Bartholomeus"

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    The use of enterprise social networks for social support within virtual teams
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2023-12) Henry, Michael Stephen; Le Roux, Daniel Bartholomeus; Parry, Douglas A.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Information Science.
    ENGLISH SUMMARY: Communication within organisations has become increasingly virtual, and this increased virtuality has brought more opportunities for distributed work. At the team level, increased distributedness resulted in virtual teams – teams separated by geographic and/or temporal distance. Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual teams have become increasingly common and, as a result, there exists a need to understand the communication practices and the implications of these practices for individual team member’s well-being. Enterprise social networks (ESNs) like Slack and Microsoft Teams are a central tool for communication in virtual teams. In particular, ESNs are frequently used to communicate social support among team members. Social support has been associated with a wide range of individual well-being outcomes, making it suitable for examining the effects of ESN use within virtual teams. To this end, this dissertation addresses a single primary objective: Investigate the relationship between social support and ESN use within virtual teams. The objective was addressed through a literature review followed by a three-phase mixed-methods empirical study. The academic literature was explored by completing a systematic review. The review identified the current state of research concerning ESNs, virtual teams, and social support including the integration of those findings across fields. Informed by the results of the systematic review, two research questions were developed for the empirical work and a mixed-methods research design was implemented. First, a qualitative analysis of messages within team channels in an ESN was conducted to examine enacted support behaviours. Building on this, Phase Two involved interviews of distributed workers who use ESNs to identify their enactment and perceptions of social support. In Phase Three a quantitative survey was distributed to corroborate and generalise the results of Phases One and Two. The empirical work resulted in findings from each phase as well as two metainferences: an ESN locations taxonomy and an integrative framework for virtual team social support enactment within ESNs. Findings included the use of messages, threads, and emoji reactions for expressing specific types of social support, such as the use of threads for informational and appraisal support. Expressions of support varied based on location within ESNs (e.g. announcement channels compared to direct messages). Emotional support expressions tended to occur in private locations, including within watercooler interest group channels and private team channels. Descriptive statistical results as well as correlations between various types of ESN use and perceived social support were found in Phase Three. The study produced several artefacts usable by future researchers: a framework for examining distributed work (Chapter 2), a taxonomy for enacted social support within ESNs (Chapter 7), a taxonomy of ESN locations (Chapter 10), and an integrated framework for virtual team social support enactment within ESNs (Chapter 10). An interview guide has been included for future research on ESN use within virtual teams, as has a survey instrument which measures the frequency of ESN location use and enacted social support within ESNs.