Choosing the right crowd: an iterative process for crowd specification in crowdsourcing initiatives

Crowdsourcing enables organizations to obtain dynamic solutions from large and diverse crowds of individuals. With the advent of IT-mediated ecosystems crowdsourcing initiatives readily possess a means to mediate, regulate and refine crowdsourcing sub processes including the process of vetting and selecting crowd membership (crowd specification sub process). Despite this fact there is ambiguity in current research as to what constitutes a crowd. Furthermore, traditional crowd selection processes show signs of limited application and are often conducted (i) once, at a fixed stage in the process and (ii) by the process initiators. This research-in-progress paper seeks to address constraints caused by the limited application of these processes. Firstly, a definition of the crowd is formulated from concepts identified in literature. Secondly, an iterative conceptual model is advanced from theory that facilitates the creation of a crowd tailored for tasks of varying size and complexity.