Working outside

Extra-institutional individuals are individuals who work outside of a bureaucracy. I argue that, in the absence of a bureaucracy organizing their work, the professional communication of extra-institutional individuals is organized by the problems they are trying to solve. Grouping extra-institutional individuals by the problems they are trying to solve instead of their field or area allows for deeper analysis of the communication needed in individual fields. The problems-based approach also allows comparison of extra-institutional individuals across fields, which can result in interdisciplinary knowledge sharing. This interdisciplinary knowledge sharing can help designers of communication to better understand their extra-institutional users and develop tools appropriate to the needs of audiences across fields with shared problems.