Collaboration On-the-field: Suggestions and Beyond

In disaster scenarios, emergency operators/first responders need to collaborate in order to reach a common goal. The use of mobile devices and applications in these scenarios is very valuable as they can improve collaboration, coordination, and communication amongst team members. But there are also risks involved while using these mobile applications, e.g., decreasing of performance. Most of the tasks are highly critical and time demanding, e.g., saving minutes could result in saving people’s life. Therefore, it is unacceptable to use systems that lack proper interaction principles. In this paper, we provide some suggestions, in the form of lessons learned and/or hints for possible future research activities, on how to effectively support on-the-field collaboration of emergency operators. Such suggestions are based on the authors’ experience in a recently concluded successful research project on the use of mobile devices for supporting first responders.