Exploring Collaboration with Social Network Analysis--A Pilot in the Social Sciences

The purpose of this project was to investigate the ways that professional staff members of Columbia University Libraries/lnformation Services (CUL/IS) collaborated with one another, both through formal and informal channels. Before beginning this project, we had some anecdotal understanding of how collaboration was happening between and among the staff of CULIIS, but we were interested in conducting a systematic investigation and evaluation of this collaboration. Our goal was to reveal the collaborative interactions of the staff and analyze these interactions in order to provide understanding about the types and frequency of interactions conducted. After learning more about the collaborative interactions, we aimed to assess how the collaborative interactions we collected mapped to known information about the activities of the professional staff, including an alignment to organizational goals and strategic objectives.