Response to paper

The principal school of thought for this set of weeks revolves around the concept of virtual teams and the diversity of those teams. The concept of globalization and the rapid advancement in technology has increased the need and importance of virtual teams in multinational corporations and most multinational corporations have embraced diversity in virtual teams as a form of competitive advantage. Ferrazzi (2014) suggests as companies expand geographically and as telecommuting becomes more common, work groups often have dispersed offices, shared workspaces, private homes, and hotel rooms. With the recognition of the importance virtual teams, organizations have established the need to encapsulate the multicultural members of those teams and to make them effective. Gatlin-Watts et al. (2007) suggest in an increasingly interdependent world, it is crucial that organizations capture the available global and cross-cultural knowledge for effective leadership, competitiveness, and security. Carlson et al. (2013) claim that organizations are increasing the uses of virtual teams to accomplish a variety of tasks and traditional organizations shift to integrated technologies, the nature of team interaction and the relationship between teamwork and outcomes is evolving.

Virtual Teams

Lu et al. (2006) state that a virtual team is a team of people from different physical locations, time-zones, and/or countries that work together asynchronously or across a multitude of organizational levels. These teams sometimes have barriers that are physical, cultural, time-related, etc. they must rely on communication technology such as email, text, phone, internet, intranet, FAX, and video conferencing to maintain effective communication and to accomplish the organizational tasks given. For virtual teams to be effective, there are several aspect that must exist, such as proper and reliable communication, cohesiveness between team members, the proper leadership, and the team must be comprised of the right and properly diverse members, the team size must be the right fit, and member roles must be established and correct. Because there are so many variables in this common equation and the fact that virtual teams are so prevalent and are relied upon for organizational goals, organizations and their managers have been battling the concept of creating the perfect virtual team.

Communication

Bergial et al. (2008) suggest some of the elements that have created successful face-to-face teams are also the elements needed to create successful virtual teams. Bergial et al. (2008) claim the key factors of any successful teams are high levels of trust, clear communication, strong leadership, and appropriate levels of technology, but there are additional barriers virtual teams must overcome, such as multiple time zones, language, and different approaches to conflict resolution.

Berry (2011) states that communication, whether virtual or face to face, is fundamental to getting any organizational work accomplished because as communication provides the rudimentary building blocks with which “people collaborate, make decisions, and act to achieve organizational objectives” (p. 192). Proper and effective communication is essential for any team but Lu et al. (2006) suggest that virtual teams face challenges in communication that can lead to conflict escalation, misattribution, or difficulties with team building and timely task completion (p.7). In addition, proper and effective communication of virtual teams have additional considerations due to the non-face-to-face nature. Chhay and Kleiner (2013) suggest that location, culture, nonverbal communication and trust are the most influential components that directly impact whether a team can communicate effectively and fulfill its objectives. Because team members are typically scattered across many geographical areas, it is vital to coordinate times of contact between team members to assure each member’s time is considered. Understanding the members geographic divisions, team member coordination must also consider the potential of cultural diversity. This is essential for establishing an effective relationship amongst team members, as Chhay and Kleiner (2013) claim that each team member s culture, particularly in multinational companies may limit availability. As effective communication barriers are being attended to, Bergial et al. (2008) suggest that managers consider that their team is comprised of individuals from different national cultures and their communication styles and group behaviors may vary greatly, so there are additional motivation factors to seek and disclose individuating information and the need to engage in self-categorization. Paul et al. (2016) claim that coordination represents the degree of unity of effort and that this coordination requires a common definition of the work, sharing of information, and synchronization of activities.

In addition to the coordination of timely communications amongst the members of the team with management and their organization, effective communication in virtual teams is a key to strong performance. As managers develop strategies and processes that are often the result of fluid communication patterns, understanding the necessity of nonverbal communication amongst teammates is a crucial aspect of proper communication. Chhay and Kleiner (2013) have claimed that 80 percent of all communication is nonverbal. In co-locational teams, nonverbal cues are an important part of communication. With the lack of face-to-face interactions, there is a gap in nonverbal communications and Lu et al. (2006) suggest to fill this gap, teammates should engage in casual conversation with co-workers to minimize misunderstanding because of fewer gaps in context.

Leadership

The global leadership insights related to the promotion of intercultural collaboration are essential to managers within a multinational and multicultural organizations. Understanding the concept of multicultural teams and having the knowledge to properly manage the effectiveness of those teams has proven vital to managing for a multinational and multicultural organization. Black and Gregersen (2000) claim that fundamentally, global leaders require training programs that will help managers adopt a global mindset. As organizations attempt to train their virtual teams and managers, organizations have the availably to provide additional training through virtual learning centers. Gatlin-Watts (2007) claim that web-based education and training programs are becoming widely offered at educational institutions and companies today and they have developed “new electronic learning systems contained in these programs may also be used by work teams at organizations for facilitating creative energy in a virtual context to enhance team performance” (p. 48).

To be an effective manager of virtual teams, it is essential to understand managing across cultures and because diversity in the multicultural development of team members is common in virtual teams. Staples and Zhao (2006) suggest the effect of cultural diversity is different for teams communicating electronically versus those communicating face-to-face and this may have important implications for the design of virtual teams.

Managers of virtual teams are tasked with developing an effective team and the no team, whether virtual or traditional, cannot be effective without team cohesion and trust. Team trust is a team member’s perception of another team member and how their teammates will meet their expectations. Paul et al. (2016) claims trust is composed of ability, benevolence, and integrity of the team and while trust in teams is vital to achieve objectives, the “need for trust in virtual teams is heightened due to the difficultly in establishing the ability, benevolence, and integrity of other team members” (Paul, et al., 2016). Paul et al. (2016) goes on to state that the team’s ability the teams perception of another teammates’ skills, knowledge, connections, and systems. Paul et al. (2016) states the team’s benevolence refers to a teammate’s dependency on other teammate’s goodwill and team integrity refers to your teammates will abide in accordance with rational principles. Managers must be aware that trust begins at an individual-level and can be directed toward individuals, groups, teams, and organizations. Jarvenpaa et al. (2004) suggest in a global virtual team, trust is particularly prominent due to the added difficulty of cultural and temporal differences.

Carlson (2013) claim that a virtual team‘s cohesiveness describes the strength of the bond that allows team members to focus on the assigned tasks and when team members feel the sense of belonging to a team, team members tend to experience friendships and mutual trust., cohesive teams are more likely to communicate and share information thus reducing communication demands. Paul et al. (2016) suggest team cohesion can range from a general social cohesion, to task-specific cohesion. Although studies suggest that virtual team cohesion is harder to accomplish because of before mentioned obstacles, Carlson et al. (2013) suggest when teams achieve a high level of cohesion, and members seem fully engaged in the task and thus more likely to build shared team knowledge.

Advantages and disadvantages

There are many advantages to working with multicultural and global virtual teams. One advantage is the benefit of a greater talent pool. Because virtual teams do not meet face-to-face as often as traditional teams, virtual teams allow all organizations to recruit the most talented employees in the global field and are not limited to a small geographic location like traditional teams. In addition, Bergiel et al. (2008) suggest an additional advantage of to a diverse virtual teams is they stimulate creativity and originality among team members. Since they are diverse and heterogeneous, Bergiel et al. (2008) suggests that virtual teams are not limited by time and place and are much more powerful and effective structures compared to traditional team structures. Virtual teams member also have a tendency to have more focus on the task at hand because virtual team traditionally have a more autonomous and flattened organization structure. Virtual team members deal with less organizational restrictions that may retard their decision making process. Another advantage to virtual teams is equal opportunity employment is increased because physical advantages can be thwarted in a virtual world and virtual teams discourage race and gender discrimination because Bergiel et al. (2008) suggest the performance management of employees is primarily based on their productivity as opposed to other attributes. And more importantly, organizations have an obligation to their stakeholders and virtual teams can drastically reduce travel time and costs associated with traditional face-to-face meetings and the expenses associated with traditional brick-and–mortar establishments.

Some disadvantages of virtual teams stem from the fact that the teams are traditionally comprised of multiple cultures and geographic areas, so management must understand the possibility of conflict amongst team members. Due to the lack of face-to-face time amongst virtual teams, it is harder to establish trust within the team, Paul et al. (2016) mentions that trust is composed of ability, benevolence, and integrity of the team. Another disadvantage of virtual teams is some employees do not have the qualities needed to be on a virtual team. Some employees lack the technological sense needed to be part of a virtual team and even with training will limit their abilities to contribute because they are stepping outside of their comfort zone. In addition, some employees lack the discipline that being a member of a virtual team requires. Being part of a virtual team requires an employee to work semi-autonomously, where some employees require the rigid structure of a traditional workplace and do not have the capability to adapt. Lastly, having virtual teams sometimes does not fit the organization from a cost or structure standpoint. Some organizations work on a tight budget and cannot afford the costs associated with starting up a virtual team. Bergiel et al. (2008) suggest the virtual structure may not fit the operational environment: virtual teams may not be an appropriate tool organizations that require a sequential or integrated process.

Future research

The opportunities for new research regarding multicultural and virtual global teams are limitless. From my personal experience as a pharmaceutical sales manager, I am always looking for ways to encourage and motivate my sales representatives past traditional intrinsic and extrinsic motivational rewards and would like to see the motivational factors contributing to successful virtual team members across multiple industries and multiple cultures. Carlson (2013) suggests future research could expand the number of team interpersonal processes examined to see if they are also moderated by communication medium experience in virtual teams.

Although there is a fair amount of research and literature on the multiple dimensions of virtual teams, the subject has not been intellectually saturated and more concrete and viable data can be applied to the current literature. For my part, I intend to seek the motivational factors contributing to the makeup of virtual team members within the pharmaceutical and medical device sales industry. Understanding that my study and contribution may prove insignificant piece in the grand scheme of virtual teams, but until a fully comprehensive study is done, each industry will need to focus their thoughts on their particular industry and use that as a foundation for their situation.

References

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Black, J., & Gregersen, H. (2000). High impact training: Forging leaders for the global frontier. Human Resource Management, 39(2/3), 173-184.

Carlson, J., Carlson, D., Hunter, E., Vaughn, R., & and George, J. (2013). Virtual team effectiveness: Investigating the moderating role of experience with computer-mediated communication on the impact of team cohesion and openness. Journal of Organizational and End User Computing, 25(2). Doi: http://dx.doi.org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.4018/joeuc.2013040101

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Ferrazzi, K. (2014). Managing yourself getting virtual teams right. Harvard Business Review, 92(12), 120-123. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2014/12/getting-virtual-teams-right.

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Lu, M., Watson-Manheim, M. B., Chudoba, K. M., & Wynn, E. (2006). Virtuality and team performance: Understanding the impact of variety of practices. Journal of Global Information Technology Management, 9(1), 4–23.

Paul, R., Drake, J., & Liang, H. (2016). Global virtual team performance: The effect of coordination effectiveness, trust, and team cohesion. IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, 59(3), 186-202. Doi: 10.1109/TPC.2016.2583319.

Staples, D. S. & Zhao, L. (2006). The effects of cultural diversity in virtual teams versus face-to- face teams. Group Decision and Negotiation, 15(4), 389-406.

Tuleja, E. (2014). Developing cultural intelligence for global leadership through mindfulness. Journal of Teaching in International Business, 25(1). 5-24. Doi: 10.1080/08975930.2014.881275.