Much has been made over the last few years about the dawning of the information age. Many people believe knowledge and experience are an organization's most critical asset and a source of competitive advantage. In addition, the development of global competition, ever-shrinking product cycle times, and changing demographics have placed a premium on an organization's ability to quickly and effectively use resources. As a result, new technology-based collaborative tools are being developed to meet these emerging needs.

Under this backdrop, organizations are increasingly looking at collaborative technologies as a way to help. In a survey conducted by Collaborative Strategies, a collaboration consulting firm based in San Francisco, 83% of the companies interviewed replied that collaboration is critical to the functioning of their business. Other survey results showed that:

• 56% feel that collaboration is necessary to support a distributed workforce by increasing communication, coordination, facilitation and planning.
• 13% use collaborative strategies to reduce cycle times in product development, thereby realizing an increase in competitive advantage.
• 6% believe that collaborative technologies increase productivity and help coordinate or facilitate complex processes.

The results of the survey suggest that, while companies clearly recognize the importance of collaboration, only a small percentage believe that existing collaborative technologies are very effective in supporting collaboration. Why the disparity? Clearly, collaborative technologies are not yet widely adopted . But will they ever be? While there appears to be a market for them, several obstacles be must overcome to move the industry from possible to profitable.

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