Initiated and received task interdependence and distributed team performance: the mediating roles of different forms of role clarity

Distributed agile teams are increasingly employed in organizations, partly due to the increased focus on digital transformation. However, research findings about the performance of such teams appear to be inconsistent, calling for more research to investigate the conditions under which distributed agile teams may thrive. Given that task coordination is particularly challenging when team members are not co-located, the present study investigates the roles of the two types of task interdependence, i.e., initiated versus received task interdependence. Survey results from 191 participants working in distributed agile teams within three companies in Norway confirm our hypotheses. Specifically, we show that high initiated task interdependence is associated with higher role clarity of others, while received task interdependence is associated with higher role clarity of self, and that both subsequently result in higher team performance in distributed agile teams. Thus, we argue that each type of task interdependence contributes in a unique way to team performance in distributed agile teams.

An infrastructure-assisted job scheduling and task coordination in volunteer computing-based VANET

Vehicular networks as the key enablers in Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) and the Internet of Things (IoT) are key components of smart sustainable cities. Vehicles as a significant component of smart cities have emerging in-vehicle applications that can assist in good governance for sustainable smart cities. Most of these applications are delay sensitive and demand high computational capabilities that are provided by emerging technologies. Utilizing the distributed computational resources of vehicles with the help of volunteer computing is an efficient method to fulfill the high computational requirements of vehicles itself and the other components of smart cities. Vehicle as a resource is an emerging concept that must be considered to address the future challenges of sustainable smart cities. In this paper, an infrastructure-assisted job scheduling and task coordination mechanism in volunteer computing-based VANET called RSU-based VCBV is proposed, which enhances the architecture of VANET to utilize the surplus resources of vehicles for task execution. We propose job scheduling and task coordination algorithms for different volunteer models. Further, we design and implement an adaptive task replication method to seek fault tolerance by avoiding task failures due to locations of vehicles. We propose a task replication algorithm called location-based task replication algorithm. Extensive simulations validate the performance of our proposed volunteer models while comparing average task execution time and weight ratios with existing work.

Hybrid Task Coordination Using Multi-Hop Communication in Volunteer Computing-Based VANETs

Computation offloading is a process that provides computing services to vehicles with computation sensitive jobs. Volunteer Computing-Based Vehicular Ad-hoc Networking (VCBV) is envisioned as a promising solution to perform task executions in vehicular networks using an emerging concept known as vehicle-as-a-resource (VaaR). In VCBV systems, offloading is the primary technique used for the execution of delay-sensitive applications which rely on surplus resource utilization. To leverage the surplus resources arising in periods of traffic congestion, we propose a hybrid VCBV task coordination model which performs the resource utilization for task execution in a multi-hop fashion. We propose an algorithm for the determination of boundary relay vehicles to minimize the requirement of placement for multiple road-side units (RSUs). We propose algorithms for primary and secondary task coordination using hybrid VCBV. Extensive simulations show that the hybrid technique for task coordination can increase the system utility, while the latency constraints are addressed.

Human-Agent-Robot Teamwork (HART) Over FiWi-Based Tactile Internet Infrastructures

To facilitate making the human-machine co-activity-based human-agent-robot teamwork (HART) task execution process more efficient, this chapter first discusses related work and open challenges for latency-sensitive HART task. To speed up the HART task execution, this chapter next presents a latency sensitive HART task migration scheme for efficiently orchestrating tasks among human mobile users (MUs), central and decentralized computational agents (cloud/cloudlets), and robots across converged FiWi network infrastructures. Moreover, this chapter describes a bandwidth allocation scheme that allocates timeslots to MUs' broadband and task migration traffic at the same time. Furthermore, this chapter presents performance evaluation results of the proposed scheme. Importantly, this chapter compares the performance of the proposed task migration scheme with traditional schemes. This chapter is finally concluded by summarizing important findings and outlining open research issues for HART task coordination over FiWi-enhanced tactile internet infrastructures.

Individual preferences for task coordination strategies in multitasking: exploring the link between preferred modes of processing and strategies of response organization

Recent investigation of individual differences in multitasking revealed evidence for individual preferences for modes of task processing (serial vs. overlapping) in a task switching with preview (TSWP) paradigm and different strategies of response organization (blocking, switching, and response grouping) in a free concurrent dual-tasking (FCDT) paradigm. However, this research on individual differences at the levels of cognitive task processing and behavioral response organization has been pursued separately, thus far, by testing independent samples of participants. In the current study, we investigated whether these two levels of task coordination were linked intra-individually. As individuals preferring an overlapping task processing mode can generate time gains particularly at task switches, we predicted that they prefer a switching strategy of response organization. In contrast, individuals preferring a serial processing mode are expected to prefer a blocking strategy to reduce dual-task demands. These predictions were confirmed in an experiment based on n = 70 participants. Indeed, most serial processors preferred a blocking strategy, whereas overlapping processors predominantly preferred to switch between the tasks. This finding suggests a strong correspondence between individual preferences emerging in both aspects of task coordination, which might reflect a common basic difference in the preferred style of cognitive control (flexible vs. persistent). Moreover, in case the preferred modes of task processing and strategies of response organization did not correspond to each other, the overall multitasking efficiency was comparably low. Thus, the distinction between the preferences for both aspects of multitasking seems to be an important aspect of understanding multitasking performance and should be considered in future studies.