What is virtualhomeforthedisabled.com?
1.1 Collaboration
This is a virtual organization
collaborate between “The Hong Kong Council of Social Service
(HKCSS)” and HK government. Our team represents the HKCSS, which is an NGO organization.
The evening team represents the HK government. These two organizations
cooperate to establish a new virtual company called “Home for the Disabled” and the website is “virtualhomeforthedisabled.com”.
1.2 Opportunities
In table 1, we can see that
the population of disabled people in the whole world is amazing. In Hong Kong,
more than 6.3% of people are in the trouble of disability. At the meantime,
from table 2, each of the disability type in Hong Kong occupies a larger number
of populations.
Table 1
Disabled Population
|
Ration in the Region
|
|
World
|
10 billion
|
14.3%
|
China
|
83 million
|
6.34%
|
Hong Kong
|
438,300
|
6.3%
|
Table 2
Disability Type
|
Population
|
Physically handicapped
|
122,600
|
Visually impaired
|
187,800
|
Hearing impaired
|
92,200
|
Speech impediment
|
28,400
|
Mental illness/mood
|
86,600
|
Autism
|
3,800
|
Mentally handicapped
|
77,000
|
Specific learning
disabilities
|
9,900
|
Attention deficit / Hyperactivity
disorder
|
5,500
|
Although HK
government and other social organizations provide
relatively perfect facilities to disabled, the
information about these facilities is complex to search for disabled who are
new to HK. Usually, disabled people can search information in HK government
websites like “Social Welfare Department”, “GOVHK- Services and Support for
Persons with Disabilities”. They can also search information in NGO websites
such as “The Hong Kong Society for Rehabilitation” etc. Since different website
provides different kinds of information, to people who are the first time come
to HK, it is difficult for them to search plenty different websites in order to
find the information they need. Besides, after the disabled people use the
facilities in public and experience the service, they have no place to give feedback.
Thus, we HKSCC and government see the opportunity to create this virtual
organization.
1.3 What our virtual.com does?
Vulnerable groups (asocial
vulnerable groups), which are also known as the socially weak groups, have the
big obstacle of lack of information and intelligence. Due to this asymmetry,
persons with disabilities are struggling in the process of socialization.
Our virtual organization
showed by website uses modern information network technology to build a virtual
community network of services for disabled people. The virtual community
website provides an information, material, emotional and multi-faceted
interactive platform. Specifically, the general portal provides the major
search engines and news; business website only provides transaction
information; virtual.com provides all kinds of daily requires and services. The
virtual organization offers personalized services so that disabled people can
exchange their own information on this platform. They can also enjoy the
e-commerce center of economic life; use the platform to have cultural education
and so on.
Our virtual organization can
exhibit two major functions:
1. It
plays a buffer role of social pressure. The virtual organization supports two
key interventions. First is in the weak crisis or crisis occurs before the
generated pressure. Social support can help the disabled
to take a more optimistic attitude or proper preparation to reduce the pressure
affected. Second, social support can also be generated before the formation of
pressure to help them. These support systems include
relatives, friends, and mutual support groups and caring groups. They include
psychological and emotional support to help them in the daily life, and provide
material, money, technology and opinions to them.
2. It
can help the disabled directly and protect them. This virtual organization can
help the disabled to integrate into the social network, and
strengthen their psychological and physical health. When disabled people ensure
that they are living in a warm social network, they will naturally feel more confident,
safe and can even control the surrounding environment. This healthy state of
mind will naturally be able to help disabled people to defense crisis and
prevent them from the disease and the pressure generated.
1.4 Mission & Vision
The mission for our virtual
organization is “maximize the benefit of disabled community”. Our collaborative
organization not only makes it easier for disabled people to deal with all
kinds of things, it also provides a platform for them to fully express ideas
and comments. The disabled can break through physical
and psychological barriers to get into the field they have never touched before.
They can participate in e-commerce, education, entertainment, make friends,
work and community activities through this organization. The most obvious
feature of the organization is to provide inexhaustible information services
and interactive communication to all of the disabled. This will make it easier
for disabled people to get information just like ordinary people.
1.5 Operating process
The virtual organization use
information technology to integrate information resources. According to certain
criteria, it is a higher-performance information resources system by evaluating,
clustering, sorting, and building a database. It achieves the goal about
cross-platform, cross-database information retrieval,
and ensures the users can use one search platform to get relevant information
resources.
1.6 Virtual organization features
In order to concern all the
disabled, our virtual organization uses Multimedia Application Mode (voice,
text, images, and data) to in the website. Thus, users can accept information three-dimensionally.
For example, in order to help blind people overcome the obstacles of reading
and communicate; our website will provide Braille software, speech sounds, and
language tips system and mp3 technology for them. Similarly, the screen
magnification technology can help deaf people to overcome the obstacles on the
auditory and verbal communication. In this way, the efficiency of disabled
people’s life will be improved significantly.
Why HKCSS
& HK government collaborate and set up
this virtual organization?
The
collaboration between the government and HKCSS is to create a virtual community
for the disabled. Specifically, the community will be an on-line virtual
community. Compared to a physical community, the on-line virtual community can
respond quickly and more incentive to the needs of its stakeholders because
information access more easily through the Internet. In addition, it provides a
platform for users to interact through specific social media which the physical
community cannot provide. Compared to a portal, the on-line virtual community
provides not only all types of information accessible to the audience, but also
the freedom for geographical dispersed users to provide comments. There are a
number of reasons why HKCSS collaborate with the government.
First
of all, both two parties can satisfy their own needs through collaboration. For
HKCSS, it needs to get more information about the shopping malls, hotels, or
other services which are more convenient for the disabled and the government
can provide the information. In addition, the HKCSS needs to share information
and feedback from the disabled so that the government can hear the voice of the
public and help improve insufficient service for the disabled. At the same
time, the collaboration between HKCSS and the government can raise public
attention of the disables. On the other hand, the government can make further
improvement about their services to the disabled through collaboration. The
operation of each department will be more effective and they will focus on
providing more superior services for the disabled. It will help promote the
social responsibility of the government and increase public credibility. 
The
second benefits resulted from the collaboration is that both two parties will
mutually monitor each other. For HKCSS, it will be monitored by regulations and
laws which were set up by the government. It will promise the legality and
ethics of it operation. On the other hand, the budgeting or other operating
activities of the government will be monitored by the HKCSS. It will enable the
government to fully utilize money and make sure no waste of money from
taxpayer. Furthermore, the mutual monitoring will help reduce and eliminate
corrupted phenomenon. Because the monitoring makes sure both parties can
utilize resources. It will guarantee the operation of both parties more
transparently and effectively.
Thirdly,
the collaboration enables both parties to provide better customized services
for the disabled. HKCSS will get support such as financial support from the
government to help them respond more quickly to the disabled who needs
assistance. With the support from the government, the HKCSS is able to provide
better individually customized services for the disabled. For the government,
it can better understand the needs of the disabled and fill in weak spots of
services to better fulfill needs of the disabled. Previously, the government
may provide facilities and services for the disabled from its own perspective.
The virtualhomeofdisabled.com currently allows the disabled to write down the
feedback so that the government can resolve and fix the problems if any. Two
parties will collectively provide services to the disabled that could not be
provided by the individual organization.
All
in all, the collaboration of HKCSS and the government will be beneficial for
their own needs as well as the services for the disabled. Thus, it is of
necessity for both parties to build up a virtual website which facilitates the
improvement of services for the disabled.
Why HKCSS and the government collaborate virtually
instead of working on physical locations?
Here
comes a question, why HKCSS and the government collaborate virtually instead
of working on physical locations? Again, virtual collaboration has plenty
of benefits than collaborate in a same working environment or the same office. According
to the , the virtual organization works because it has “a powerful
set of mutually reinforcing motivations, including a share in collective
success”, “self-governance”, “effective work structure and process” and “technology
for communication and coordination”. (Markus, Manville & Agres, 2000)
To
begin with, the virtual team will help both parties save substantial costs,
spaces, and relocation time. If the government and the HKCSS decide to work in
the same office, they need to spend money and time for office building or
renting. The number of employees will require quite a lot of physical spaces to
create a workplace for them. Meanwhile, employees need to relocate their
workplace which requires them to readjust to the new environment and
colleagues. On the contrary, the virtual team will eliminate these challenges
and it will create a freedom workplace for employees. IBM, for example,
estimated that it saved more than $50million in travel-related expenses by
using virtual teams in 2007. Therefore, it will be cost-efficiency for HKCSS
and the government to collaborate virtually. (Sadri & Condia,2012)
Secondly,
the virtual collaboration between two parties will promote creativity and
originality. Because every employee can
express their opinions through asynchronous computer meetings at the same time
and fewer ideas are forgotten and more ideas will generate. In addition,
employees in a diverse group think differently and “speak” freely which will
also lead to more creative ideas born. The virtual will more information at
their disposal and they can make better decisions. If HKCSS and the government
do not choose virtual collaboration, conflicts may exist because different
perspectives from employees. For instance, meetings or discussions will be
monopolized by certain team members because of their positions, their character
or other reasons. It will kill creative ideas while generate conflicts and
other collaborate problems.
Last but not least, the
virtual collaboration discourages discrimination and creates equal
opportunities for every employee. Some talent employees may self-confident and
they may not happy to work with someone with physical disadvantaged. Meanwhile,
people may have more or less prejudice to those from different countries or
regions because their value and culture are different. The virtual workplace
enables geographically dispersed and physically disadvantaged employees to gain
access easily. Otherwise, conflicts and discrimination may exist if they work
in a physical workplace. It will decrease productivity and efficiency in both
organizations.
Based
on the analysis above, it is obviously that the virtual collaboration will be a
favorable way for each party’s development. So what makes a successful virtual
organization? Next, the critical successful factors for the virtual
collaboration will be discussed.
Critical Successful Factors
According to the RW3 CultureWizard analysis in Virtual Teams Survey
Report, a virtual team will probably meet a lot of general challenges, such as
time zones, time to reach decisions, different accents, culture differences,
language, holidays, local laws, customs, technology and so on. (2012) In our organization’s situation, we may also encounter
difficulties to collaborate these two original organizations. Thus, below are
several critical success factors for us to avoid the obstacles of virtual team
and get succeed.
First of
all, wealth of technological knowledge in senior managers of the virtual community is critical for
virtual collaboration between two parties. The senior managers should be able
to understand how to deal with technological sophistication as well as lead the
virtual team effectively. With the communication-supporting systems, the senior
managers are required to organize team meetings and discussion. Their excellent
technological knowledge will facilitate the process of making decisions which
will increase productivity in the organization. Therefore, the government and
HKCSS will be required to provide training to employees, especially the senior
managers.
The
second critical successful factor will be employees understanding of the nature
of virtual communication and interaction. The government and HKCSS need to
inform the employees the plan of virtual collaboration. It will help employees
from different departments understand the purpose and the importance of
collaboration. If employees are not able to understand the nature of virtual
collaboration, the team building process will be difficult and it will result in
role ambiguity in both organizations. As a result, employees may feel confused
about the virtual collaboration and will be passively involved. It means
employee engagement will decrease and job performance will be affected. In
addition, both parties should provide training to employees in order to equip
them with knowledge and skills. It will make employees become more capable to
perform in the virtual teams.
Thirdly,
the organization’s
environment should be fit for the virtual community. It is normally to see some
of organizations fair to collaborate effectively. For the government and the
HKCSS, both of parties need to become learning organizations which encourage
employees to learn and grow through virtual collaboration. In addition, both
parties need to be able to take advantage of diverse talents in appropriate
time with a responsive manner. The culture of promoting creativity is also a
critical successful factor for virtual collaboration. For example, both
organizations can build up a program to reward creativity and innovation. The
creative ideas will be beneficial for both organizations to provide superior
customized services for the disabled creatively.
How to management the
virtual organization?
When creating a new
collaboration organization, it is important to know how to operate and manage
it by the two parts; especially the organization is a virtual one.
According to the CORPS model
from Situ, (2002), a non-profit
organization is formed by clients (C), operation (O), resources (R), participation
(P), and services (S). In our virtual
organization-vitualhomeforthedisabled.com, here is the CORPS in specifically.
Clients: disabled people,
families & friends of disabled people, ordinary people
Operation: information
collecting/integrating
Key resources: human
resource, financial resource, information resource, and resources from other
NGOs, IT company, medical company and job agency.
Participation: Hong Kong government
staffs, HKCSS staffs, and volunteers
Services: information
providing/sharing
To specific the business
model of our virtual organization, table 3 lists the detailed information.
Table 3
In order to make our strategy for virtual organizing, here is the method of three vectors and three stages as table 4 shows. We analyze our organization through this method.
Customer interaction
Stage 1 - remote experience
of product and service
In this stage, customers can be
provided various kinds of services from our virtual organization as following
shows:
- visit the official website
of virtual organization to scan latest news
- information searching
In this way, customers can
search information about what they what. E.g. using this table to find needed disable
facilities in the specific range.
- RSS/e-mail subscription
Customers can subscribe the
latest news as their taste by e-mail or RSS. We recommend customers to use RSS,
because it is more efficient and no rubbish than e-mail to subscribe as they
can choose the news what you need.
- advertisement
We will put advertisement in
public, like MTR, Facebook, etc. to attract people to promote.
- online donation
In our official website,
there is a link for online donation. It will make it convenient for public to
donate.
- virtual volunteer
This program can allow people
who might find volunteering difficult or impossible because of disability.
Stage 2 - dynamic
customization
One of our basic services is
everyday newsletter release in the official website and sent by email and RSS
subscription. Besides, we also provide the information according to different
kinds of disabilities. For example, we will provide special reading tools to blind
people and deaf people to make them convenient to reading the website like
normal people.
Stage 3 - customer
communities
- forum
We have a forum for disabled
people to communicate each other. For example, if they used some disabled
facilities or enjoyed rehabilitation services, they can provide their
suggestion or comments on the forum to other disabled people. Also, other
people like the families or friends of disabled people can talk about their
comments too on it. It will make public to communicate with disabled people
much easier.
- online consulting
Besides, we create an online
consulting system for disabled to ask for help from experts about professional
problems.
Asset configuration
Stage 1 - sourcing modules
We divide our asset into two
parts, the internal one and external one. Here are how our asset forms.
Internal resources include:
- Hong Kong government makes law/policy
for disabled people
- HKCSS provides first-line
service to disabled people
- finance aid comes from government’s
allocate fund, donation and sponsors
- human resource concludes
ordinary staff and specialist
- information technology
means the website support
External resources include:
- other NGOs who can provide
various kinds of service to disabled people
- disabled people who give
the feedback from facilities and services
- public who can provide
donation or comment
- medical company provide the
disabled equipment
- expertises who can provide
consulting information to disabled people
- job agency which offer job
searching for disabled
Stage 2 & 3 - process
independence & resource coalitions
According to our competitive
advantage, which is high quality of information serving, the chart shows how
our information resource flows in virtual organization.
From this picture, we can see that NGOs, medical company, expertise and job agency can provide their relative information about disabilities to our virtual organization. At the same time, government and HKCSS can share their information to each other. Staffs as human resource operate this organization. Disabled people and public can search information through this website and they will give feedback in return. Public will also give financial support to the organization. For information technology, it is special because we will make it outsourcing since IT is not our advantage but we need professional IT technology to operate our virtual organization successfully.
Knowledge leverage
Stage 1 - work unit expertise
Each employee is an
individual who get the knowledge by their own. The basic knowledge is their
specific information based on their own work situation. In this stage, we will
make our staffs to e-learning so that they can have their personal knowledge
innovation, sharing and knowledge applying.
Stage 2 - corporate asset
Once the staffs in HKCSS
acquire their own knowledge, they will have virtual meeting with staffs in government,
and we will have a common reposity to know each other better.
Stage 3 - professional
community expertise
The final and the most
difficult stage for knowledge leverage is acquiring professional knowledge from
external expertises. Our virtual organization will use information-sharing
tools with our partners, customers and experts to get external expertise
knowledge.
In conclusion, the virtual organization we create is a
win-win way for both HKCSS and Hong Kong government. It provides convenient
information service to the whole disabled people not only in Hong Kong but
disabled who come here. The organization also let public to know disabled
people better and make it easier for them to help the disabled. In order to ensure our site visitors become members and welcome all of customers, we would like to connect our website
account to other famous webs, such as Facebook and Twitter, so that people can
easily log in our web. We will also change to create disabled families online,
which means people can be served and provide service as long as they have one
disabled relative in their home.
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