Virtual Teams

”For example in a campus environment, professors working on the same project can send broadcast messages to one another without the necessity of belonging to the same department. This can reduce traffic if the multicasting capability of IP was previously used”[2]. The concept of Virtual work groups seems to be a good one in theory but in practice this does not work properly.

Group members can achieve consensus in their decision making when they follow all of these steps except

This would minimize the crossing of time zones and the process can increase team effectiveness. The author, as a project manager can establish a common time to interact face-to-face through video conferencing.

Hertel, Guido, Susanne Geister, and Udo Konradt. 2005. “Managing virtual teams: A review of current empirical research.” Human Resource Management Review 15 (1): 69-95. doi: 10.1016/j.hrmr.2005.01.002.

Virtual Team on the other hand is a group of people working across time, space, and organizational boundaries which communication links are strengthened by the internet. It should be noted that virtual teams can also mean individuals spread across different cultures and languages. (“Virtual Team - Origin, Definition and its Scope,” 2016). More so, this team of geographically dispersed professionals working together as a unit despite distance are committed to achieving a single objective, holding one another mutually accountable.

Globalisation has led to many changes in the international marketing and global advertising industry. Many international companies have projects spanning a variety of nationalities, involving great geographical distances and a range of time zones. In this scenario, companies are forced to make virtual teams - which are comprised of members who are located in more than one physical location (Peters and Manz, 2007). This virtual team trait has fostered extensive use of a variety of forms of computer-mediated communication that enable geographically dispersed members to coordinate their individual effort and inputs (Attaran, 2002). In addition, commitment to a virtual team goal may be further complicated by the single or coherent line of

Ebrahim, A., Shamsuddin, A. & Taha, Z. (2009). Virtual Teams: A Literature Review. Australian Journal of Basic and Applied Science, 3(3), 2653-2669.

Virtual Organization- Thomas and Turner (2016) describes the term virtual in this sense with roots in the computer industry. According to Thomas and Turner (2016) virtual organization is used to describe a network of independent firms that join together, often temporarily, to produce a service or product. Virtual organization is often associated with such terms as virtual office, virtual teams, and virtual leadership. The ultimate goal of the virtual organization is to provide innovative, high-quality products or services instantaneously in response to customer demands (Thomas and Turner, 2016).

Virtual organization structure – companies that are dependent on communication technology for their day to day working.

Every person in the world perceives life in a different way. From these various viewpoints, we, as humans, create stereotypes, myths, and legends. Our eyes see things distinctively and our minds shape concepts uniquely. From this disconnect from others, we enable misconception and foster misunderstanding. One beautiful thing about perception is that from it, we can develop our own interests. Thus, out of my personal curiosity, I have chosen to study Organizational Leadership – which, in turn, led me to this course. As I continue to further my studies, I look ahead to my required check sheet and already have my options drawn about all the courses I need to take. “Virtual Teams and Organizations” attracted my attention – mainly for the myths and preconceptions that I have regarding online teams. Originally more negative, my outlook has changed to a more positive one about working with others virtually.

Having a clear and specific job description would create organization within a team; this would generate a better organization as a whole for teams working together both nationally and internationally.

This illustrates that effective leadership is required for the success of virtual teams. To maintain strong client connections and growth of the business into new markets, Delphine and DLA piper funded an important training program to develop methodological skills & expertise in lawyers to encourage virtual team cooperation. In order to keep powerful customer relationships in firms and increase income, virtual communication and providing training and education are vital factors when promoting virtual teams (Kuzuhara 2015). Leadership helps to make standards, solve problems and to build strong relationships in virtual teams to achieve company objectives in attaining revenue and employees’ s security. According to Fisher (2011), a virtual team 's success mainly relies on the efficiency of the leadership.

Virtual organisation refers to a design that involves flexible network of independent entities associated by telecommunication and computing technologies to share skills, services, knowledge and access to expertise in non-traditional ways. Virtual organisations have long relationships that are shorter and temporary with the organisations in its network. It allows organisations that are involve in the network to share all costs involved as the members of the network combine equal level of efforts in fulfilling the needs of consumer by producing the best products and services in all

A team comprised of international components presents an interesting challenge in regards to management. Various problems can potentially arise in regards to organizing the team, developing rules that govern the team and assigning tasks. One method in which to mitigate all of the above mentioned rules is by setting performance standards for the entire team to adhere (Alexander, 2000). One such standard involves the use of a balanced scorecard. A balanced scorecard allows each individual irrespective of their position within the team to have a core set of standards in which to abide by. These standards will also include the job function and the roles of each member with the job function. The scorecard provides an ideal medium in which to judge performance as well. By viewing the scorecard management can easily pinpoint areas of opportunity and improvement (Blair 2010).

The world is becoming smaller and smaller and the advancement in technology has enabled a diversity of communication and collaboration tools that were unaffordable for most companies to implement. Most of these companies have employed the use of virtual groups to deal with their business endeavors because of many reasons. Some of them include the urgency to address their customer problems, developing products and delivery services. With the ability to create virtual teams, these teams are operating without limitations of distance, time and global boundaries. These