Problem structuring without workshops? Experiences with distributed interaction within a PSM process

PSMs have been widely and successfully used in many organisations, but the reliance on face-to-face meetings and workshops makes a typical PSM project difficult and time-consuming to organise, and means that the process may only involve a narrow cross-section of the organisation. Yet much interaction in organisations is neither face-to-face nor even synchronous. This research seeks to 1) explore how the issues which arise in moderating such distributed interaction differ from the issues involved in facilitating a workshop; and 2) identify the circumstances under which it makes sense to consider using the distributed mode of interaction within a PSM process. Three pairs of action research case studies using a distributed variant on the SODA process are described, together with our answers to the above questions. Introduction In contrast to traditional methods of OR analysis, Problem Structuring Methods (PSMs) and related methodologies such as Decision Conferencing focus on helping organisational actors arrive at a shared understanding and way forward on some issue of concern. Such methodologies have been widely and successfully used in organisations (Rosenhead and Mingers, 2001). A characteristic of PSMs is their extensive use of workshops, where participants will create a model “on-the-fly”. Because of this reliance on workshops, while delivering significant value to the organisation overall, PSMs can be very costly in terms of participant time, as well as in financial terms if the organisation is not physically collocated. Moreover, because involvement is restricted to