Crowdfunding is an alternative, novel form of digital financing that has the potential to alter how companies and individuals organize the collection of their financial resources. Even though more traditional ways of financing still dominate and will do so in the foreseeable future, crowdfunding nevertheless 'democratized' the financing process in parts, opening up opportunities for individuals and companies who formerly did not have proper access to financial resources. Besides these and other benefits, crowdfunding also entails several risks, especially that the value promised cannot be delivered. Established financial institutions such as banks should nevertheless harness this novel form of financing by complementing their services accordingly. Banks who accompany their customers in their crowdfunding journey can not only offer them an added value, but also might gain additional insights which they can harness for other customer relationships and their own market strategies.

Germany as Europe's largest and the world's fourth largest economy is experiencing an enormous skilled labor shortage at the moment. This is especially true for the German public sector: According to recent studies, this shortage amounts to 360,000 employees as of January 2023 and could extend to 1,070,000 employees until 2030, if no corrective action is taken. One measure to potentially mitigate this lack of skilled labor can be crowdworking, work processed using digital platforms. This novel form of work organization, which is already frequently used in leading economies such as the US or China, could be part of a solution for this challenge. Using the lens of work system theory and especially its work system framework, this conceptual paper investigates which kind of work performed by employees of the German public sector could be suitable for a conduction via crowdworking platforms. It concludes that application testing, idea generation and innovation, microtask conduction and text creation are among the most promising realms for public administration crowdworking.

Based on insights from an engineering design project conducted by Airbus and Local Motors, we describe how companies can leverage hybrid working by interlinking external crowds and internal employees, to increase the agility, quality and speed of product development. We identify the benefits and risks of hybrid working and describe the different ways of interlinking external crowds and internal employees. Finally, we provide recommendations for company executives who want to explore the use of hybrid working

The competitiveness of organizations and whole economies depends on how successfully they are able to cope with the digital transformation and new technological trends. In the area of digital work, crowdworking platforms emerged as intermediaries that support a new form of service delivery and work organization. Despite their increasing importance, there is only few data about key characteristics of such platforms such as number of employees or revenues. Furthermore, extant data often focusses only on a few platforms, mostly from the US. Based on results from a study about the 32 crowdworking platforms that have their headquarters or a physical location in Germany, we provide data that for the first time allows to draw conclusions for the “total population” of crowdworking platforms in a defined larger region (Germany as Europe’s largest and the world fourth largest economy). These results are valuable for various stakeholders from economy and politics, allowing them to make economic or political decisions on a more informed basis. Furthermore, we develop an evaluation framework that depicts the implications for these groups along the dimensions costs, flexibility, “humanity”, quality, and time: Crowdworking platforms on the one hand provide several opportunities: Individuals gain more flexibility, groups can benefit from additional contributors, organizations have the potential to process work faster and cheaper. On the other hand, this novel form of work organization also includes potential threats for all groups: Low payments and ‘tayloristic’ work, insufficient quality or irritation of internal employees. Based on 12 interviews with company representatives and crowdworkers, we evaluate implications of this novel form of work organization for society.

Die Digitalisierung verändert die Art und Weise, wie wir arbeiten und leben. Eine bedeutende Entwicklung in diesem Bereich stellen Crowdworking-Plattformen dar. Sie koordinieren und managen als Intermediäre die Abwicklung von bezahlter Arbeit und steuern oftmals das gesamte Arbeitssystem inklusive Teilnehmenden, Information und Technologien. Im Rahmen des Teilprojekts „Crowdworking-Plattformen als innovative Dienstleistungssysteme“ des Projekts „Herausforderung Cloud und Crowd“ forscht die Universität Kassel über diese neue Form der Arbeitsorganisation. Der folgende Beitrag gibt eine Übersicht über die ‚Landschaft‘ der Crowdworking-Plattformen in Deutschland, Vor- und Nachteile für Unternehmen bei der Nutzung von solchen Plattformen, ein Referenzmodell für die Abwicklung komplexer Arbeit über solche Plattformen u.v.m.

Companies and other organizations have increasingly ‘discovered’ crowdsourcing as a new form how to organize their work. However, many of the platforms who manage the work system necessary to process that work focus mainly on rather simple work or work of medium complexity. Drawing on work system theory (WST) and insights from literature, in depths-case studies with 14 crowdworking platforms, a written survey among 32 platform providers and four workshops with experts from practice and research, we investigate how these crowdworking platforms can also successfully manage more complex work. Based on our analysis, we present measures to do so, classified along the core WST-elements processes and activities, participants, information, and technologies. One main measure we identified is the close gearing of external and internal crowds, fostering the advantages and mitigating the disadvantages of crowdsourcing. With our research, we aim at providing insights how to further exploit the potential of crowds.

Die digitale Transformation verändert gegenwärtig die Art und Weise, wie Arbeit erbracht und organisiert wird. Zwei Trends sind dabei besonders signifikant: Die „Plattform-Ökonomie“, mit Crowdworking-Plattformen als einer ‚Spielart‘, und die „Sharing-Economy“. In diesem Beitrag zeigen wir am Beispiel der Crowdworking-Plattform Mila und ihres Kunden und 51-prozentigen Eigentümers Swisscom AG, wie Unternehmen die Crowd für Wertschöpfung einsetzen, ihren Kundensupport ausbauen und damit Vorteile für alle Beteiligten generieren können. Die Plattform Mila verbindet in einem neuartigen Ansatz das Paradigma der Crowd, insbesondere die Nutzung einer Vielzahl von Leistungserbringern, mit den Prinzipien der Sharing-Economy, vor allem dem Einbezug der Kunden als Produzenten von Dienstleistungen. Basierend auf Experten-Tiefen-Interviews mit Verantwortlichen von Mila und Swisscom analysieren wir in diesem Beitrag dieses neuartige Arbeitssystem und leiten Handlungsempfehlungen für Unternehmen ab.

In the last decade, crowdsourcing has emerged as a new form of work organization. Crowdworking platforms as intermediaries between crowdsourcing companies and crowd workers have gained importance in this process. Currently, many of these platforms manage rather simple work systems. Using the case of the German Hamburger Hochbahn AG and the innovation platform Phantominds, this paper investigates measures necessary for crowdworking platforms to be able to manage also more complex work systems. To derive such measures, we analyze the work system of Hamburger Hochbahn and Phantominds, explore the interplay between the crowd and the platform provider and subsequently provide recommendations for companies that would like to use crowdworking platforms for the processing of work and for platform operators. With this paper, we extend current knowledge in the realms of IS, organizational theory, and platform ecosystems.

Crowdsourcing has the potential to change the way how companies and other organizations are working currently. Numerous companies are already exploiting this new form of work organization and are utilising the “wisdom of crowds”. Crowdworking platforms as intermediaries that manage the work system including customer companies and crowd workers play an important role in this context. Nevertheless, they currently mostly manage rather simple work systems that process rather plain work. In this summary for the HICSS 2018 Doctoral Consortium, we depict our current work in progress that aims at investigating how such platforms could also manage more complex work systems – a question that is crucial for the future success of this business model. Using the case of Intel and the crowdworking platform Hyve, we investigate one successful approach to tackle this challenge, elaborate on our method used as well as the theoretical background and communicate our first, preliminary findings.

Crowdsourcing has evolved into a powerful new instrument for companies. In the last years, crowdworking platforms that manage work systems as intermediaries between crowdsourcers and crowd workers have increasingly been used. Nevertheless, they currently often manage rather simple work systems. Although they have the potential for managing more complex ones, there is still little knowledge how this can be done and what measures are necessary to do so. To explore this question in more detail, we investigate three seminal projects that Deutsche Bank completed with the crowdworking platform Jovoto and that aimed at exploring AI trends and developing concepts for the future of banking. We derive measures necessary for the successful management of complex work systems and provide a model as guidance for both companies and crowdworking platform operators. With our findings, we extend current knowledge in the realm of IS, organizational theory, and platform ecosystems.

Despite the increasing importance of digitization for economy and society, there is few structuring of the very heterogenous kinds of digital work. Representatives from business, politics and science need a basis for the development of strategies to encounter the challenges that result from this digitization. We aim at delivering a contribution to that basis by systematically investigating what different types of digital work exist and by developing a taxonomy. As a first important step towards this goal, we investigate in this paper what digital work tools exist since such tools are a major constituent element of digital work. Using a hybrid approach including both a deductive conceptual-to-empirical and an inductive empirical-to-conceptual procedure, we create an artifact that gives business leaders an overview of existing digital work tools as a basis for strategic decisions and at the same time provides researchers with stimuli for future investigations in the dynamic domain of digital work.

Whereas crowdsourcing as a topic has often been addressed in recent literature, web-based crowdworking platforms that manage the interface between crowdsourcers and crowdworkers have not received much attention so far. Furthermore, most of these platforms focus on either the management of external or internal crowds; platforms that handle both groups are rare. This paper investigates such a provider: the German company Across Systems. It uses a hybrid model, offering an individual "mini crowdworking platform" that enables the simultaneous government of external and internal crowds as well as a more traditional marketplace crowdworking platform (crossMarket) where supply and demand meet. Using a single-case study approach, the main contribution of this paper is to shed light on a model that has the potential to change the current crowdworking platform market. We show that managing both external and internal crowds on one platform can increase the acceptance, quality and speed of task completion.

Despite the increasing importance of digitization for economy and society, there is few structuring of the very heterogenous kinds of digital work. Representatives from business, politics and science need a basis for the development of strategies to encounter the challenges that result from this digitization. We aim at delivering a contribution to that basis by systematically investigating what different types of digital work exist and by developing a taxonomy. As a first important step towards this goal, we investigate in this paper what digital work tools exist since such tools are a major constituent element of digital work. Using a hybrid approach including both a deductive conceptual-to-empirical and an inductive empirical-to-conceptual procedure, we create an artifact that gives business leaders an overview of existing digital work tools as a basis for strategic decisions and at the same time provides researchers with stimuli for future investigations in the dynamic domain of digital work.

Die „Plattform-Ökonomie“ verändert gegenwärtig die Art und Weise, wie Arbeit erbracht wird. Insbesondere Crowdworking-Plattformen haben in den letzten Jahren starken Zulauf erfahren und können von Unternehmen mittlerweile für eine Vielzahl von Tätigkeiten entlang ihrer Wertschöpfungskette genutzt werden. Ein Beispiel ist der Kundensupport, dem angesichts immer komplexerer Endprodukte große Bedeutung zukommt. Anhand der Crowdworking-Plattform Mila und ihres Kunden und 51-prozentigen Eigentümers Swisscom AG wird in diesem Beitrag aufgezeigt, wie Unternehmen die Crowd zur Erweiterung ihrer digitalen Schnittstelle zum Kunden einsetzen, ihren Service ausbauen und damit Mehrwert für alle Beteiligten generieren können. Die Crowdworking-Plattform Mila verbindet in einem neuartigen Ansatz das Paradigma der Crowd, insbesondere die Nutzung einer Vielzahl von Leistungserbringern, mit den Prinzipien der On-Demand und Sharing-Economy, vor allem dem Einbezug der Kunden als Produzenten von Dienstleistungen. Ähnlich wie bei prominenten plattformbasierten Beispielen der Sharing Economy wie Airbnb und Uber erfolgt auch hier die Anbahnung der Arbeit sowie die Schnittstelle zum Kunden auf digitalem Wege, während die Arbeit selbst meist direkt vor Ort beim Kunden erbracht wird. Basierend auf Experten-Tiefen-Interviews mit Verantwortlichen von Mila und Swisscom und weiteren Quellen analysieren wir in diesem Beitrag dieses neuartige Arbeitssystem inklusive des Zusammenspiels aller Beteiligten. Im Anschluss daran zeigen wir Vor- und Nachteile der Nutzung von Crowd Services auf und leiten konkrete Handlungsempfehlungen für Unternehmen für die Gestaltung der digitalen Schnittstelle zum Kunden ab.

Besides seminal effects and implications on individual’s lives and their social interactions, the increasing digitization also offers individuals new opportunities for casual work and additional earnings. One ‘instrument’ to exploit such opportunities are crowdworking platforms – electronic platforms that act as intermediaries between organizations who offer work and individuals who process it. These platforms include a paradigmatic change – work is not assigned to individuals anymore, they instead choose themselves what kind of work and when they proceed it. Such work is often done to ‘make some money on the side’, using mobile devices such as smartphones or tablets and exploiting idle time such as waiting time respectively leisure time. This paper examines current working opportunities for individuals via such crowdworking platforms. We show which kind of platforms are especially suitable for such individual casual work and derive possible future implications.

Das Teilprojekt der Universitat Kassel befasst sich mit Crowdsourcing-Plattformen als Intermediaren zwischen denjenigen, die Arbeit auslagern (Crowdsourcern), und denjenigen, die diese Aufgaben ubernehmen (Crowdsourcees). Hierbei liegt das Augenmerk auf Plattformen, auf denen bezahlte Tatigkeiten abgewickelt werden, dementsprechend wird die Art der Tatigkeit dann als Crowdwork, die Arbeiter als Crowdworker und die Plattformen als Crowdworking-Plattformen bezeichnet. Dieser Literaturreport fokussiert auf Crowdworking-Plattformen; Beitrage mit Fokus auf andere Crowdsourcing-Plattformen wie Crowdfunding- oder Crowdvoting-Plattformen und allgemeine Beitrage zu Plattformen werden nur betrachtet, wenn sie relevante Aussagen und Erkenntnisse zum Untersuchungsgegenstand dieses Teilprojektes liefern.