Abstract
Large Organizations like businesses, governmental agencies and universities are rich with experts. However, finding out "who knows what" can be very difficult. Faced with the need for specialized information on some issue or problem, people typically search for accessible experts through their own communication networks. Put simply, they ask around to see if coworkers know anything about a given problem. But the reach of anyone's personal network has practical limitations, and in large organizations personal networks alone do not provide efficient access to the total body of availble expertise.Researchers at Arizona State University's Department of Communication have invented software that virtualizes expertise networks in large organizations. It allows users to find out who has knowledge on specialized topics without relying on their network of personal relationships to locate the experts. It can be implemented as an e-mail or web based application, and is based on natural language processing and word network analysis of user requests and documents describing the experts.
| Original language | English (US) |
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| State | Published - Apr 5 1996 |