B. Waber, E. Poolock, M. Cebrian, R. Crane, L. Danan, Alex 'Sandy' Pentland

Abstract

In this paper we aim to construct a curve trading off productivity with epidemic potential. This is advantageous because it will allow companies to decide appropriate responses based on the organizational context of a disease outbreak. Compared with other studies, we are able to take into account impacts on productivity that arise from social factors, such as interaction diversity and density, which studies using an individual approach ignore. We also propose new organizational responses to diseases that take into account behavioral patterns that are associated with a more virulent disease spread. We believe that as sensing data becomes more commonplace in organizational and epidemiological studies [1, 5, 7] there will be a fast uptick in the number and sophistication of disease responses, and we hope that the approach we outline here will be used as a blueprint.