Technology, Organisation & People

The interdisciplinary team TOP is dedicated to the interplay of people, organisation and technology with the aim of helping shape the digital transformation in a sustainable way. Together with our research partners, we develop technological solutions with people and organisations in the center in order to create an attractive future.

Our Vision

We leverage emerging technologies through practice-oriented research and learning for a meaningful value contribution to people and organisations.

Main Topics

Social Robots
Social robots are increasingly present in organisations. A new generation of humanoid, i.e., human-like, robots is increasingly used in education, public space and health care. Robots can communicate with humans, other robots, machines and the Internet of Things and are equipped with artificial intelligence. Our research team is dedicated to different types of robots, their potentials and risks as well as their possible fields of application, paying particular attention to value-oriented design and cultural embedding in organisations.

Augmented and Virtual Reality
The technologies of augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR) have been subject to research and practice for quite some time. Due to the rapidly advancing miniaturization in recent years, business cases in the field of AR/VR have been identified and developed. Interest from the entertainment sector is particularly strong. But online shops, tourism and the cultural sector have also discovered the potential of these technologies and can benefit from virtual illustrations of their products and offers. Our team focuses on adapting technologies in new markets. For example, we are currently researching the application possibilities of AR and VR in the field of tourism in Switzerland.

Data Analytics
Data analytics deals with the collection and interpretation of data as well as the aggregation of the insights in a form tailored to the needs of decision-makers. For this purpose, various methods and technologies are used, which are partly to completely automated, depending on the maturity level of the analysis process. The tools used include specially developed algorithms as well as complete learning systems in the field of machine learning. Our team deals with data analytics especially in the fields of culture and sports.

Technology-Driven Business Models
Integrating innovative technologies, such as AR/VR and social robots, into practical, efficient and sustainable solutions for the business world is becoming increasingly important. Technologies need to be systematically investigated in order to identify business-relevant applications and, based on them, develop concepts for their development or integration. Our research team deals with the potential of applying new technologies in different business areas. Our focus is on the development of functional prototypes in the context of applied research.

Process Management
Successful digitalization is based on innovative and lean processes that allow rapid and dynamic changes in new technologies. Against this background, sustainable process management is a central task for organisations. Our research team therefore focuses on holistic process management as a modern discipline, which takes into account not only methodological and technical foundations but also strategic and structural as well as human and cultural aspects and thus creates sustainable foundations for technology-driven organisational developments and digital transformation.

Learning Communities
The future of work is life-long learning. It will therefore be essential for learning communities to learn continuously and tirelessly and reflect on how learning can be designed, carried out, analyzed and adapted to new learning needs with and without technological support. One of the main goals of our team is to enable our students, our colleagues, our business partners and ourselves to acquire new strategies and meet new challenges through learning-research-based projects. It is important to adapt new didactic approaches specifically to new and old learning needs.

Culture and Value-Sensitive Design
More than ever, culture and value orientation play an important role in our rapidly changing society. Shared value orientations keep us grounded. Culture gives identity. Against this background, it is becoming increasingly important to consciously manage culture and value orientation in the context of digitalization. Our team deals with the consideration and design of cultural values in business informatics and studies topics such as value-sensitive robot design and the development of a robot culture.

Digital and Technological Skills
Digital and technological skills relate to the ability to deal with digital media and technologies and to use them to solve problems. This is highly relevant in almost all areas of life in today's digital age. From our point of view, it is important for companies and students to understand technologies and their influence on society and to be able to recognize their potential for value creation. This requires a basic understanding of the functioning and fields of application of different technologies. In our research, we focus on potential applications of innovative technologies as well as the basic prerequisites for this.

Didactics
Didactics and teaching design are the building blocks of learning. Theories and principles of how people learn, as well as interdisciplinary research in didactics with and without new technologies, are essential in this context. Our team conducts research based on the latest results from the field of education and science for business and educational partners. Our research results are applied to organisational workflows to enable our partners to achieve their own academic and professional goals.