Disseminating for the TAP and TURA projects
Target Audiences
The Telework Europa project aims at three large user groups within the Telematic Applications Programme.
- Telematics Applications Programme Projects
- Telematics Applications Programme validation sites
- Other potential users of telematics applications
Telematics Applications Projects
It is apparent that most of the current projects have been overwhelmed with information
about support actions, and that further unsolicited information may not be welcome which
makes a standard user needs analysis difficult. Most project co-ordinators are extremely
busy and only likely to be interested in activities with a direct informational benefit to
them with least input on their part. To date demonstrations of the use of the forum and
handouts of information on Telework Europa services have been made at the concertation
meetings, avoiding the "snowstorm of information" approach in favour of
attracting interest through helpful demonstrations.
From discussions with project participants, the emphasis is now towards providing tailor
made services to those who show interest, as the user needs appear to vary wildly.
There is also an issue of nervousness within some projects about admitting lack of
telematics skills and the need for assistance, which is being addressed in our computer
based presentation and in the user manuals and sectoral information packs. Areas we are
exploring include:
- Basic assistance with Email and file transfer for novices
- Help with advanced use of Email such as off-line readers to savetime and money
- Need for secure discussion areas ("closed sections")
- Management of mailing lists and libraries for projects
- Notification to projects of new files which may be of interest to their subject area
- Providing assistance with the use of online services to project validation sites which project partners may not have the skill or resources to carry out themselves.
- Providing access to our contact lists for projects seeking to
recruit more users - Providing an e-magazine of news about use of the project’s
services - Provision of a "hot-links" WWW index page giving access to all individually held project WWW pages
Validation Sites
The validation sites as listed in the project summary forms vary widely in location, size
and type of organisation. It is not clear how many are actually using telematic tools at
the moment. However, the project has no way of contacting these sites except through
project managers, so the strategy must be to discuss with interested projects how to
reduce their su port burden for the validation sites through the Telework Europa services.
In this way the user needs for the validation sites will be established and services to
suit them can be developed.
End Users
The long-term goal is to extend the "reach" of the project, bringing realisable
benefits to those companies and individuals who, perhaps, are not aware of what telematics
can bring to their particular fields of endeavour and to establish the project as a
commercially-oriented fully supported operation, capable of continuing and expanding its
work without further EU funding.
The forum already has more than 5,000 members, and our experience as sysops over the past
four years suggests that their needs are:
- Informal discussion for teleworkers who may be isolated fromsources of support and networking Support and advice on setting up small teleworking businesses
- Technical support ranging from problems with hardware
compatibility to contact details for particular products and specific questions about how to use the forum - Work opportunities (we operate a library of several hundred
teleworker profiles) - Academic discussion about changes resulting from the
introduction of telematic techniques - Contact details and information about telework and other
telematics business tool initiatives, including those promoted by the European Commission.
Given the importance of disseminating the results of the Telematics Applications
Programme to end users, and the limited resources of the Telework Europa project,
co-operation with industry groupings is planned in order to publicise Telework Europa to
end users. To date discussions have been held with the
pan-European EDI association EFFECT (5,000 corporate members) and with EDI awareness
centres formerly involved in the TEDIS programme, as well as with the ECR initiative
(Efficient Customer Response), a European initiative to introduce telematics to the
grocery trade.
Further work to place information about Telework Europa in the member communications of
professional associations is planned as part of workpackages 2000 and 4000. The project
also plans to request permission to use the existing Telework Europa file of over 3,000
organisations which registered interest in the launch call of the ACTS programme, and
hopes to receive a similar file of contacts from the Telematics Application Programme.
End users are characterised by the need to find information quickly, and low levels of
online skills. Searching facilities are described in the platform issues, and it should be
noted that the mediated nature of the service (helpful librarians) is vital in encouraging
end user take up of Telematics Applications programme results. Every person who joins the
CompuServe forum receives a personal welcome Email inviting them to Email the senior sysop
concerning any queries,
problems or needs they may have.
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