Shouldn’t Collaboration be social? - Proposal of a social Real Time Delphi

Real Time Delphi (RTD) is an advanced online implementation of the Delphi Method (DM), designed to speed up the period of time needed to conduct a survey using nowadays internet technology. However its overall design is still very restricted and does not leverage the full potential for collaboration of this new Information and communications Technology (ICT) channel. In this paper we propose two design elements that introduce social interaction in RTD to leverage positive effects, while not harming anonymity as a key feature of the DM. The contribution of this work is to enhance the RTD Method in a way that allows anonymous but social interaction amongst participants, addressing weaknesses of the current method regarding drop-outs of participants and the organizing and control of content.