Product Code Database
A virtual team (also known as a geographically dispersed team, distributed team, or remote team) usually refers to a group of individuals who work together from different geographic locations and rely on communication technology such as email, instant messaging, and video or voice conferencing services in order to collaborate.Gibson, C. B., and S. G. Cohen (2003). Virtual Teams That Work: Creating Conditions for Virtual Collaboration Effectiveness. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.Martins, L. L., L. L. Gilson, and M. T. Maynard 2004 "Virtual teams: What do we know and where do we go from here?" Journal of Management, 30: 805–835. The term can also refer to groups or teams that work together asynchronously or across organizational levels. Powell, Piccoli and Ives (2004) define virtual teams as "groups of geographically, organizationally and/or time dispersed workers brought together by information and telecommunication technologies to accomplish one or more organizational tasks."Anne Powell, Gabriele Piccoli, and Blake Ives. Virtual teams: a review of current literature and directions for future research. The DATA BASE for Advances in Information Systems - Winter Vol. 35, issue 1, 2004 As documented by Gibson (2020), virtual teams grew in importance and number during 2000-2020, particularly in light of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic which forced many workers to collaborate remotely with each other as they worked from home.
As the proliferation of Optical fiber technology has significantly increased the scope of off-site communication, there has been a tremendous increase in both the use of virtual teams and scholarly attention devoted to understanding how to make virtual teams more effective (see Stanko & Gibson, 2009;Stanko, T. L., C. B. Gibson. 2009. Virtuality here and now: The role of cultural elements in virtual teams. R. S. Bhagat, R. M. Steers, eds. Cambridge Handbook of Culture, Organization, and Work. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 272–304. Hertel, Geister & Konradt, 2005;Hertel, G., Geister, S., & Konradt, U. (2005). Managing virtual teams: A review of current empirical research. Human Resource Management Review, 15(1), 69–95. and Martins, Gilson & Maaynard, 2004 for reviews). When utilized successfully, virtual teams allow companies to procure the best expertise without geographical restrictions,Kirkman, B. L., B. Rosen, C. B. Gibson, P. E. Tesluk, and S. O. McPherson (2002). "Five challenges to virtual team success: Lessons from Sabre, Inc." Academy of Management Executive, 16 (3): 67–79. to integrate information, knowledge, and resources from a broad variety of contexts within the same team,Kirkman B. L., Gibson C. B., & Kim K. (2012) Across borders and technologies: Advancements in virtual teams research. Kozlowski SW, eds. Oxford Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, (New York: Oxford University Press) vol. 1: 789-858. and to acquire and apply knowledge to critical tasks in global firms. Virtual team, Mastering virtual teams: strategies, tools, and techniques that succeed By Deborah L. Duarte, Nancy Tennant Snyder According to Hambley, O'Neil, & Kline (2007), "virtual teams require new ways of working across boundaries through systems, processes, technology, and people, which requires effective leadership." Such work often involves learning processes such as integrating and sharing different location-specific knowledge and practices, which must work in concert for the multi-unit firm to be aligned.Maloney, Mary M.; Zellmer-Bruhn, Mary E. (2006). "Building bridges, windows and cultures: Mediating mechanisms between team heterogeneity and performance in global teams". Management International Review. 46 (6): 697–720. ISSN 1861-8901. Yet, teams with a high degree of "virtuality" are not without their challenges, and when managed poorly, they often underperform face-to-face (FTF) teams.
In light of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, many industries experienced a rapid and overnight transition to virtual work as a result of "social distancing." However, some scholars have argued the phrase "social distancing" in reference to the practice of physical distancing between colleagues may have dangerous connotations, potentially increasing prejudice based on age or ethnicity, isolation due to limited options for interpersonal contact, and hopelessness, given the focus on prohibitions rather than solutions. Today, most work teams have become virtual to some degree, though the literature has yet to incorporate the dynamic urgency of the pandemic and the impacts of rapid-fire learning of new technology and communication skills.
Investigations of such flexible work locations began in earnest over 30 years ago (see Ramsower, 1983).Ramsower, R. M. (1983) Telecommuting: An investigation of some organizational and behavioral effects of working at home. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. Distributed work and telecommuting have become widespread practices, growing steadily in the United States and abroad. A 2002 study by the Gartner Group indicated that more than 60% of professional American employees worked in teams characterized by virtuality,Kanawattanachai, P., and Y. Yoo (2002). "Dynamic nature of trust in virtual teams." Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 11: 187–213. and by 2012, nearly 3.3 million American workers telecommuted for at least half of the time. Globally, an international survey of 254 senior-level executives revealed that staff in two thirds of their global firms were involved in distributed work.AT&T. (2004). The remote working revolution. Retrieved November 8, 2005, from http://www.business.att.com/resource.jsp?&rtypeWhitepaper&rvaluethe_remote_working_revolution .
Early research heralded virtual teams as a promising design for integrating firms and taking maximum advantage of innovation-creating capabilities.Nonaka, I., and H. Takeuchi 1995 The Knowledge Creating Company. New York: Oxford University Press. They were likewise touted as means to permit flexibility in the "where" of tasks, to allow workers to meet household needs, and to enable organizations to adapt work arrangements to changing environments and labor needs.Nickson, D., & Siddons, S. (2004). Remote working- Linking people and organizations. Burlington, MA: Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann.Igbaria, M., & Guimaraes, T. (1999). Exploring differences in employee turnover intentions and its determinants among telecommuters and non-telecommuters. Journal of Management Information Systems, 16(1): 147-164. According to Gibson and Gibbs (2006: 453), the term "virtual" represents a wide variety of teams that are at least to some extent geographically dispersed (consisting of members spread across more than one location), mediated by technology (communicating using electronic tools such as e-mail or instant messaging), structurally dynamic (in which change occurs frequently among members, their roles, and relationships to each other), or nationally diverse (consisting of members with more than one national background). Much of the literature has focused on the challenges of virtual teams, while few have identified their assets and benefits, identifying strategies by which to increase team effectiveness and satisfaction. As technological ability and industry contexts are rapidly and continuously changing, virtual work represents a promising avenue of research as an ever-evolving, fundamental shift in how organizations have historically done business.
National diversity refers to the number of different nationalities represented on the team. Virtual teams may consist of members of a single nationality (e.g. a software team split between the American East and West Coasts, but who all share American nationality or a global team of Germans who work in different countries, but all share German nationality).Gibbs, J., & Gibson, C. B. (2016). Making virtual teams more innovative through effective communication. In K. E. A. K. D. C. K. (Ed.), Contemporary Organizational Behavior: From Ideas to Action (pp. 331-339). Pearson. Colleagues from different nations may bring different cultural values, mindsets, allegiances, and communication styles to the team.Gibson, C. B., and F. Vermeulen 2003 "A healthy divide: Subgroups as a stimulus for team learning." Administrative Science Quarterly, 48: 202–239.Watson, W. E., K. Kumar, and L. K. Michaelson 1993 "Cultural diversity’s impact on interaction process and performance comparing homogeneous and diverse task groups." Academy of Management Journal, 36: 590–602.Brown, S. L., and K. M. Eisenhardt (1995). "Product development: Past research, present findings, and future directions." Academy of Management Review, 20: 343–378.
Dynamic structure/membership refers to how often members leave and join the team, and to how stable or changeable members’ roles are. Rather than having stable membership, many virtual teams are short-term and project-based, or involve frequent member turnover.
Shared understanding is the degree of cognitive overlap and commonality in beliefs, expectations, and perceptions about a given target. Virtual teams need to develop a shared understanding about their goals, their tasks, how to achieve them, and what each team member brings to the team.
Integration is the process of establishing ways in which the parts can work together to create value, develop products, or deliver services.Lawrence, P., and Lorsch, J. (1967). "Differentiation and Integration in Complex Organizations" Administrative Science Quarterly 12, 1-30. The parts of the organization represented by virtual team members are likely to be highly differentiated in response to global competitive pressures and uncertain business environments, potentially hindering effective collaboration. Notably, the lower the level of integration, the greater the difficulty of developing shared understanding.
Mutual or collective trust is a shared psychological state that is characterized by an acceptance of vulnerability based on expectations of intentions or behaviors of others within the team.Rousseau, D.M., Sitkin, S.B., Burt, R.S. and Camerer, C. (1998) Not So Different after All: A Cross-Discipline View of Trust. Academy of Management Review, 23, 393-404.Cummings, L. L., & Bromiley, P. (1996). The Organizational Trust Inventory (OTI): Development and validation. In R. M. Kramer & T. R. Tyler (Eds.), Trust in organizations: Frontiers of theory and research (pp. 302–330). Sage Publications, Inc. As members are geographically dispersed and often from different backgrounds, experiences, and cultures, trust is difficult to establish in virtual teams. Thus, it is how the team is designed and managed that creates enabling conditions.
First, those structures that comprise the organizational context include education and training, rewards, reviews such as performance evaluation systems, and selection. Second, the virtual team’s structure works to promote task accomplishment through goals, leadership, task design, and social structures. Third, information technology provides the infrastructure for virtual collaboration by allowing teams to communicate and coordinate their work. The challenge here is determining which technologies are appropriate for what tasks and when. Fourth, the people who work in virtual teams should possess certain capabilities to work effectively with others, such as sufficient task related knowledge and skills. Further, team members need to have a tolerance for ambiguity to deal with the unstructured communication that characterizes virtual teamwork. Finally, one’s team and work processes can help or hinder the creation of enabling conditions. This includes the creation of effectives means of communication, decision making, and conflict resolution by leaders and managers.
Often, these judgments of performance are subjective and depend on the team’s manager or other stakeholders in its social system. Studies have found that effectiveness can increase the greater the virtuality of a team, but only when many of the features in the framework are in place. For example, teams which fostered a shared identity by communicating consistently, developing relationships, and openly acknowledging cultural differences were better able to harness the energy and commitment of members. Such strong team identity may help to allow for constructive controversyJohnson DW, Johnson RT and Tjosvold D (2006) Constructive controversy: The value of intellectual opposition. In: Deutsch M, Coleman PT and Marcus EC (eds) Handbook of Conflict Resolution. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 69–91. which enables the open sharing of views, knowledge and perspective coinciding with members’ identities. As Gibson and co-authors (2020) found, teams with high resilience, tolerance for ambiguity, and strong team identification experienced less intrapersonal identity conflict and therefore thrived more at work. Likewise, formalization processes that help to establish the global team as a source of identity, such as implementing rules and procedures early on and clarifying team boundaries, increase knowledge sharing and thus improve team effectiveness.Gibson, C.B., Dunlop, P.D. & Cordery, J.L. (2019). Managing formalization to increase global team effectiveness and meaningfulness of work in multinational organizations. J Int Bus Stud 50, 1021–1052.
Gibson and her colleagues (2021) further found that virtual teams were more effective when they were able to recognize cues indicating when existing technologies had become constraints and strategically change their technology affordances to accommodate shifts in knowledge management activities. Teams which used a "dynamic connection repertoire" to co-evolve their purpose and technology were highly successful, as opposed to teams which failed to shift to different technologies as task needs changed.
Other studies have compared students working in purely virtual teams to purely face-to-face teams and found mixed results.Powell, Piccoli and Ives (2004) p.13, Anne Powell, Gabriele Piccoli, and Blake Ives. Virtual teams: a review of current literature and directions for future research. The DATA BASE for Advances in Information Systems - Winter Vol. 35, issue 1, 2004. Tan et al.Tan et .al (2000), Bernard Tan, Kwok-Kee Wei, Wayne Huang, Guet-Ngoh Ng, A Dialogue Technique to Enhance Electronic Communication in Virtual Teams, IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, Vol. 43, issue 2, 2000, p. 153-165. found that teams which used their dialogue technique were more satisfied with decisions made in the team. One study found that a traditional team started out more satisfied than a virtual team. Then, in less than a year, the satisfaction of the virtual team rose and exceeded the satisfaction of the traditional team.(Lind, 1999; Savicki et al., 1996) Women were more satisfied than men with virtual teams and were also more satisfied compared to women in face-to-face teams.(Tan et al., 2000) Team members that were more satisfied were more likely to have had training(Kayworth & Leidner, 2000) and used more communication methods compared to unsatisfied team members.
1. Networked teams
2. Parallel teams
3. Project development teams
4. Work, production or functional teams
5. Service teams
6. Offshore ISD teams
7. Global Virtual Teams
1. Preparations
2. Launch
3. Performance management
4. Team development
5. Disbanding
Getting acquainted, goal clarification and development of intra-team rules are also usually accomplished during this phase. Initial field data that compares virtual teams with and without such "kick-off" meetings confirm a general positive impact on team effectiveness, although more differentiated research is necessary. Experimental studies demonstrate that getting acquainted before the start of computer-mediated work facilitates cooperation and trust.
Leadership is a central challenge in virtual teams, as direct control is difficult when team managers are not at the same location as the team members. As a consequence, delegative management principles are considered that shift parts of classic managerial functions to the team members. However, team members only accept and fulfill such managerial functions when they are motivated and identify with the team and its goals, which is typically more difficult to achieve in virtual teams.Empirical research summarizes three leadership approaches that differ in the degree of team member autonomy: (1) electronic monitoring as an attempt to realize directive leadership over distance, (2) management by objectives (MBO) as an example for delegative leadership principles, and (3) self-managing teams as an example for rather autonomous teamwork.
With regard to conflict, predominant research issues have been conflict escalation and disinhibited communication ("flaming"), the fit between communication media and communication contents, and the role of non-job-related communication. One of the important needs for successful conflict resolution is the ability to have every member of the group together repeatedly over time. Effective dispersed groups show spikes in presence during communication over time, while ineffective groups do not have as dramatic spikes.[2], Geister et al. (2006)
For the management of motivational and emotional processes, three groups of such processes have been addressed in empirical investigations so far: motivation and trust, team identification and cohesion, and satisfaction of the team members. Since most of the variables are originated within the person, they can vary considerably among the members of a team, requiring appropriate aggregation procedures for multilevel analyses (e.g. motivation may be mediated by interpersonal trust[3], Curseu et al. (2008)).
Virtual teams have become more pertinent due to COVID-19. For managers, some of the ways to foster virtual team growth and success include monitoring trust levels, focusing on communication improvements, fostering inclusion via emotional safety within a group, and actively discussing teamwork with the group frequently.Shachaf, Pnina. "Cultural diversity and information and communication technology affects global virtual teams: An exploratory study." Information & Management (2008): 131-142. November 11, 2014.
Moreover, virtual teams’ use of communication technologies also helps to mitigate some problems of cultural diversity.Paul, Souren, et al. "Impact of heterogeneity and collaborative conflict management style on the performance of synchronous global virtual teams." Information & Management 41 (2004): 303-321. November 12, 2014. For instance, email as a medium of communication does not transfer accents and carries fewer noticeable verbal language differences than voice communication. Cultural barriers are not removed from the team, but are instead shielded from view in situations where they are irrelevant. In fact, simply understanding team diversity and accommodating it can strengthen the relationship between team members of different cultures.
Chidambaram and Bostrom (1993) found that virtual teams generate more ideas compared to traditional teams.(Archer, 1990; Lind, 1999; Sharda et al., 1988, Chidambaram & Bostrom, 1993) Part of this effect can be attributed to cultural diversity, which has been shown to positively impact group decision-making. Combined with collaborative conflict management, groups of individuals from different cultural perspectives are more likely to actively participate in group decision making.Bergiel, Blaise J, Erich B. Bergiel and Phillip W. Balsmeier. "Nature of virtual teams: a summary of their advantages and disadvantages." Management Research News 31.2 (2008): 99-110. November 14, 2014. The differing backgrounds and experiences of these group members also encourage creativity and create conflicting viewpoints, which make it more likely that multiple options are explored and considered.
However, Haas (2006) discovered that a mix of locals and cosmopolitans was optimal for global virtual team performance.Haas, M. (2006). Acquiring and Applying Knowledge in Transnational Teams: The Roles of Cosmopolitans and Locals. Organization Science, 17(3): 367-384. Research examining product development efforts in over 20 firmsDougherty, D. 1990 "Understanding new markets for new products." Strategic Management Journal, 11: 59–78.Dougherty, D. 1992 "Interpretive barriers to successful product innovation in large firms." Organization Science, 3: 179–202.Dougherty, D., and S. M. Corse 1995 "When it comes to product innovation, what is so bad about bureaucracy?" Journal of High Technology Management Research, 6: 55–76. has shown that when diverse members of project teams combined their perspectives in a highly iterative way to improve integrated information flow, they were more innovative. This is echoed by Gibbs and Gibson’s 2006 study which established that a psychologically safe communication climate where members feel comfortable asking questions can help bridge national differences, reduce ingroup/outgroup bias, and resolve conflicts, as teams who communicate openly are more likely to develop a common frame of reference and shared mental model.Klimoski, R., and S. Mohammed (1994). "Team mental model: Construct or metaphor?" Journal of Management, 20: 403–437. Ultimately, the exchange of diverse perspectives and information among global team members has been found to improve team and organizational performance through the generation of better knowledge sharing and higher quality solutions.Cummings, J., 2004, ‘Work Groups, Structural Diversity, and Knowledge Sharing in a Global Organization’, Management Science, no. 50, pp. 352-364.Stahl, G.K. et al., 2010, ‘Unraveling the Effects of Cultural Diversity in Teams: A Meta-analysis of Research on Multicultural Work Groups’, Journal of International Business Studies, no. 41, pp. 690-709.Gibbs J. L., Grushina S. V., Gibson C. B., Dunlop P., Cordery J. (2013). Encouraging participation in global teams: Unpacking the role of language, culture, and communication practices." In T. Lee, K. Trees and R. Desai (Eds.), Refereed Proceedings of the Australian and New Zealand Communication Association 45 conference: Global Networks-Global Divides: Bridging New and Traditional Communication Challenges, ISSN 1448-4331.
However, virtual work has implications for relational impoverishment at work due to lower frequency of face-to-face interactions and lowered richness of communication.Daft, R. L., R. H. Lengel. 1986. Organizational information requirements, media richness and structural design. Management Sci. 32(5) 554–571.Nardi, B. A., & Whittaker, S. (2002). The role of face-to-face communication in distributed work. In P. Hinds & S. Kiesler (Eds.), Distributed work: New ways of working across distance using technology (pp. 83-110). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. One major hurdle in drawing definitive conclusions is that studies of this innovation appear in dispersed literatures including information systems, logistics, industrial relations, psychology, operations, real estate, management,Bélanger, F., & Collins, R. W. (1998) Distributed Work Arrangements: A Research Framework. Information Society, 14, 137-152. attracting the interest of scholars in multiple disciplines. Findings regarding challenges are presented below, but it is important to note that many mainstream models, largely developed with face-to-face workers in mind, often fail to account for the way telecommuters and virtual workers have challenged traditional labor structures.Avolio, B. J., Kahai, S., & Dodge, G. E. (2000). E-leadership: Implications for theory, research, and practice. The Leadership Quarterly, 11(4), 615–668.
One way to develop common ground in virtual teams is to develop a psychologically safe communication climate which acts as a moderating variable that can overcome mistrust and turn the team’s fluid membership into a source of new ideas and expertise.Dougherty, D. 2001 "Re-Imagining the differentiation and integration of work for sustained product innovation." Organization Science, 12: 612–631. A supportive communication climate includes variables such as participation in decision-making,Trombetta, J. J., & D. P. Rogers (1988) "Communication climate, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment." Management Communication Quarterly, 1: 494–514. encouraging members to speak up, raising differences for discussion, engaging in spontaneous and informal communication, providing unsolicited information, remaining open to new ideas and perspectives, and bridging differences by suspending judgment. This helps to create trust and reduce perceptions of risk and uncertainty about members’ motives, in turn creating incentives to build a shared history.Das, T. K., and B. Teng (1998). "Between trust and control: Developing confidence in partner cooperative alliances." Academy of Management Review, 23: 491–512.Zaheer, A., B. McEvily, and V. Perrone 1998 "Does trust matter: Exploring the effects of interorganizational and interpersonal trust on performance." Organization Science, 9: 141–159.
Another way to develop common knowledge rests on managers’ ability to act as politicians to manage the power dynamic inside and outside the team. This may reduce members’ hesitancy to share information, leading to enhanced innovation. A study by Gibbs and her colleagues (2021) indicates that managers can also bridge imbalances in situated knowledge during meetings by discussing trivial topics and surfacing taken-for-granted assumptions as a way to elicit differing opinions and hidden knowledge.Gibbs, J. L., Gibson, C. B., Grushina, S. V., & Dunlop, P. D. (2021). Understanding orientations to participation: overcoming status differences to foster engagement in global teams. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 1-19. In one instance, a manager increased dialogue among team members by deliberately refraining from giving people answers in order to encourage them to cooperate and co-create knowledge. Though more difficult than in collocated teams, careful management and co-presence strategies can successfully establish common ground among members of a virtual team.
Simultaneously, differences in native language and status- the "prestige, esteem, worth, or relative social position of an individual or group"Neeley, T. B., & Dumas, T. L. (2016). Unearned status gain: Evidence from a global language mandate. Academy of Management Journal, 59(1), pp. 14. .- inhibit open dialogueHoegl, M., & Gemuenden, H. G. (2001). Teamwork quality and the success of innovative projects: A theoretical concept and empirical evidence. Organization Science, 12, 435–449. . 435.10635. and can lead to uneven participation, one-way flows of knowledge, and exclusion. These status differences are subjective and socially constructed through interpersonal processes of stratification that play out in both verbal and nonverbal communication. Consequently, teams which foster an open dialogic environment through conversational turn-taking, active listening, and energy-enhancing practices achieve better participation and overcome status differences, in turn boosting collective intelligenceWoolley, A. W., Chabris, C. F., Pentland, A., Hashmi, N., & Malone, T. W. (2010). Evidence for a collective intelligence factor in the performance of human groups. Science, 330(6004), 686–688. . and limiting miscommunications.
Strategies to mitigate uneven distribution of information include structure-enabling practices which promote equal participation, such as regular calls, clear agendas established in advance of meetings, rotating presentations to give voice to lower-status members, and post-call follow ups to ensure a sense of role clarity and predictability.Gibbs, J. L., Gibson, C. B., Grushina, S. V., & Dunlop, P. D. (2021). Understanding orientations to participation: overcoming status differences to foster engagement in global teams. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, pp. 13-14. Furthermore, fostering knowledge repositories which seek to not only create new knowledge but record and catalogue existing knowledge helps to mitigate uneven information distribution and facilitate ongoing knowledge transfer. Managers can make a big difference in team participation by establishing dialogic practices which build rapport and trust, strengthen team communication and participation, and invite input from everyone.Gibbs, J. L., Gibson, C. B., Grushina, S. V., & Dunlop, P. D. (2021). Understanding orientations to participation: overcoming status differences to foster engagement in global teams. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, pp. 17. These practices help to bridge status differences and ensure team members are on the same page.
In face-to-face interaction, the speaker makes the importance of a message known through tone of voice, facial expression, and bodily gestures. The receiver may acknowledge understanding through exact feedback called "Return channel" communication, such as head nods, brief verbalizations like "yeah" and "okay," or smiles. These methods of emphasis and feedback ensure parties are on common ground. However, these methods are often lost in digital means of communication. For example, in an e-mail exchange, the point of the message as intended by the sender may be overlooked, misinterpreted, or given different priority. Furthermore, messages met with silence are highly ambiguous and can act as a barrier to establishing common ground. For instance, silence can be due to technical problems within the technology that mediates the parties involved in communication, or it can be due to the fact that one of the partners is out of town and cannot reply to the message. Silence can also be taken in many ways, as agreement, disagreement, passive aggression, and indifference, or in the case of dispersed groups, that the message was undelivered. Silence may lead to conflict because it blurs the notion of what is known and unknown in the group, signaling the absence of common ground. Fully implementing "back-channel" communication can be time-consuming. The lack of convenient cues in digital communication make dispersed collaboration less conducive for the establishment of mutual knowledge.
The challenges presented by electronic dependence may be mitigated through the use of technologies allowing for higher media richness, which help to provide context and nuance in virtual communications.Klitmøller A., & Lauring, J. (2013). When global virtual teams share knowledge: Media richness, cultural difference and language commonality. Journal of World Business, 48, 398-406. Remote collaborations may be enhanced by co-presence design or the development of tools to enhance perceived co-presence such as online avatars or added conference call features like visual representation, turn taking, or private chat. Further, Maznevski and Chudoba (2000) found that developing predictable temporal rhythms of technology and routines of media usage improved close working relationships. Subsequent research has also highlighted the importance of co-presence for psychological well-being and productivity.Brdiczka, O., N. M. Su, J. Begole. 2009. Using temporal (T-patterns) to relieve stress factors of routine tasks. Extended Abstracts of the ACM Conf. Human Factors (CHI’09), ACM, New York, 4081–4086.
Moreover, practices such as informal conversations among colleagues, virtual "water cooler chat," personal introductions, and discussions on trivial topics help to build connectedness and trust among virtual teams. For instance, many companies during the COVID-19 pandemic introduced 1:1 buddies, virtual coffee breaks, and digital town halls in order to increase co-presence and team identification. Team members who trust one another are more likely to ask follow-up questions for clarification, avoid snap judgments born out of miscommunication, and accept others’ advice and information. This in turn reduces the challenges associated with lost social cues during digital communication.
In some cases, the problems arising from differences in relative speed may be attributed instead to a lack of conscientiousness on the part of the slower partners. In fact, a fluctuating feedback cycle is more destructive than a uniformed feedback cycle of a slower pace. Further, McLarnon et al. (2019) uncovered that regular feedback exchanges demonstrated a more substantial indirect effect on team performance than scenarios where feedback was only provided post-project or obtained weekly without distribution to peers. Consequently, establishing a structured system for regular peer feedback can significantly enhance intra-team processes and overall functionality within virtual teams."
In other instances, low responsiveness stems from cultural norms which dictate how quickly workers are expected to respond and when they can be reached. For example, one study found that Western Australians may express a "can do" attitude and a direct communication style while Jamaicans tend to be more conflict-avoidant in organizational settings and have a more fluid orientation to time. These cultural differences play an important role in how power and status differences are fostered and how they impact participation in teams. Rather than "sweeping them under the rug," it is important to acknowledge differences in culture or opinion so they can be addressed through adaptation and agreeable solutions. Shared norms which bridge the differences can help resolve potential conflicts in preferences.
Virtual teams have also historically highlighted a generational gap, as many older executives and senior managers do not have as much experience with computer technology as their younger counterparts. These senior members must then exert extra energy to catch up to the younger generation and navigate new means of communicating. This difficulty is less pertinent today, as most workers have some level of fluency with digital media and firms often provide training to equalize workers’ knowledge of communication tools.
Within this, the employee satisfaction and health outcomes associated with virtual work, largely neglected by pre-pandemic literature, have quickly come to the forefront of management research. Pre-pandemic studies found that the high levels of perceived electronic dependence and lack of copresence which often accompany virtual work can negatively affect critical psychological states of experienced meaningfulness, experienced responsibility, and knowledge of results.Gibson, C. B., Gibbs, J. L., Stanko, T. L., Tesluk, P., & Cohen, S. G. (2011). Including the "I" in Virtuality and Modern Job Design: Extending the Job Characteristics Model to Include the Moderating Effect of Individual Experiences of Electronic Dependence and Copresence. Organization Science, 22(6): pp. 1496. Likewise, while a supportive communication climate predicts satisfaction and commitmentGuzley, R. M. 1992 "Organizational climate and communication climate." Management Communication Quarterly, 5: 379–402. and includes variables such as participation in decision-making and communication openness, these factors are more difficult to establish in virtual settings. Thus, satisfaction among the team members of a virtual team has been shown to be less positive than satisfaction among face-to-face teams. This drop in satisfaction is due in part to difficulties building trust without face-to-face communications, a necessary part of high-performing virtual teams. However, effective management and adherence to proper goal setting principles specific to the nature of work virtual teams require can lead to improved team effectiveness. If a team and its corresponding management is not prepared for the challenges of a virtual team, this will be difficult to achieve.
Recent research by Zhang, Yu, and Marin (2021: 802) discovered that workers had a generally positive attitude towards working at home, citing the availability of collaboration and communication tools, increased productivity, and remote learning and flexible work hours. Conversely, workers frequently complained that long hours of teleconferencing could be draining, individuals’ capacity to work remotely was impeded by suboptimal home office setups, information-sensitive work was susceptible to cyber-security attacks, and that decentralized set-ups harmed work team engagement. While some workers experienced improved work-life balance due to spending more time with family, others reported their work-life balance was harmed due to difficulties maintaining the boundary between family and work.
Care in Connecting creates inclusion when diverse voices are heard and incorporated online. A number of scholars addressing inclusionRobert Jr., L. P., Dennis, A. R., & Ahuja, M. K. 2018. Differences are different: Examining the effects of communication media on the impacts of racial and gender diversity in decision-making teams. Information Systems Research, 29(3): 525–545.Brewer, M. B. 1991. The social self: On being the same and different at the same time. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 17(5): 475–482. and intercultural collaborationSwaab, R. I., Phillips, K. W., & Schaerer, M. 2016. Secret conversation opportunities facilitate minority influence in virtual groups: The influence on majority power, information processing, and decision quality. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 133: 17–32.Magni, M., Ahuja, M. K., & Maruping, L. M. 2018. Distant but fair: Intra-team justice climate and performance in dispersed teams. Journal of Management Information Systems, 35(4): 1031–1059.Cramton, C. D., & Hinds, P. J. 2014. An embedded model of cultural adaptation in global teams. Organization Science, 25(4): 1056–1081. have revealed the importance of recognizing the uniqueness of individual constituents while also cultivating a sense of belonging to a collectivity. Research shows that members who identify with their team are more likely to display desirable individual workplace outcomes such as helping behavior, organizational citizenship behavior, lowered social undermining and social loafing, lessened workplace bullying, and fewer turnover intentions.Chan SCH and Mak W (2014) Team identification and interpersonal helping behaviour in work teams: A hotel industry study. Journal of Human Resources in Hospitality & Tourism 13(1): 17–33.Ramarajan L, Berger IE and Greenspan I (2017a) Multiple identity configurations: The benefits of focused enhancement for prosocial behavior. Organization Science 28(3): 495–513.Janssen O and Huang X (2008) Us and me: Team identification and individual differentiation as complementary drivers of team members' citizenship and creative behaviors. Journal of Management 34(1): 69–88.Olkkonen M and Lipponen J (2006) Relationship between organizational justice, identification with organization and work-unit, and group related outcomes. Organizational Behaviour and Human Decision Processes 100(2): 202–215.Al-Atwi AA and Bakir A (2014) Relationships between status judgments, identification and counterproductive work behaviour. Journal of Managerial Psychology 29(5): 472–489.Enns JR and Rotundo M (2012) When competition turns ugly: Collective injustice, workgroup identification, and counterproductive work behavior. Human Performance 25(1): 26–51.Duffy MK, Scott KL, Shaw JD, et al. (2012) A social context model of envy and social undermining. Academy of Management Journal 55(3): 643–666.Stewart MM and Garcia-Prieto P (2008) A relational demography model of workgroup identification: Testing the effects of race, race dissimilarity, racial identification and communication behavior. Journal of Organizational Behavior 29(5): 657–680.Escartin J, Ullrich J, Zapf D, et al. (2013) Individual- and group-level effects of social identification on workplace bullying. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology 22(2): 182–193.Ramsay S, Troth A and Branch S (2011) Work-place bullying: A group processes framework. Journal of Occupational & Organizational Psychology 84(4): 799–816.Cicero L and Pierro A (2007) Charismatic leadership and organisational outcomes: The mediating roles of employees’ work-group identification. International Journal of Psychology 42(5): 297–306.Li Y, Zhang G, Yang X, et al. (2015) The influence of collectivist human resource management practices on team-level identification. The International Journal of Human Resource Management 26(14): 1791–1806. Organizations prioritizing inclusion during the pandemic have adopted approaches including overtime pay, unlimited sick days, paid leaves of absence, free trials of higher education to help connect job seekers to opportunities, and donated medical supplies. These inclusionary practices involve understanding employees’ unique experiences and avoiding assumptions, stereotypes, and grand generalizations.
Care in Connecting also creates co-presence, the experience of psychological proximity achievable online, to counteract feelings of isolation felt as a result of social distancing (Gibson, 2020: 166). Key to virtual team effectiveness is the team’s ability to understand which tool is most effective given the task and to selectively tailor combinations of technology to achieve copresence. Many organizations have sought to implement new practices during the pandemic to build a sense of copresence by ensuring access to technology and establishing the human element. Examples include purchasing laptops and audio equipment for workers, loaning tablets to students, implementing virtual coffee breaks or lunches, inviting workers’ children to join meetings, and promoting opportunities to connect as human beings.
Finally, Care in Connecting can enable vitality, a sense of psychological and physical energy, to address the sense of hopelessness engendered by social distancing. A significant body of research indicates that people both mimic and feel the emotions displayed by others and can receive and experience energy from interpersonal interactions.Barsade, S. G. 2002. The ripple effect: Emotional contagion and its influence on group behavior. Administrative Science Quarterly, 47(4): 644–675.Butts, M. M., Becker, W. J., & Boswell, W. R. 2015. Hot buttons and time sinks: The effects of electronic communication during non-work time on emotions and work-non-work conflict. Academy of Management Journal, 58(3): 763–788.Chartrand, T. L., & Van Baaren, R. 2009. Human mimicry. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 41: 219–274.Derks, D., & Bakker, A. B. 2014. Smartphone use, work– home interference, and burnout: A diary study on the role of recovery. Applied Psychology, 63(3): 411–440.Ferguson, M., Carlson, D., Boswell, W., Whitten, D., Butts, M. M., & Kacmar, K. M. 2016. Tethered to work: A family systems approach linking mobile device use to turnover intentions. Journal of Applied Psychology, 101(4): 520–534.Joshi, A., Lazarova, M. B., & Liao, H. 2009. Getting everyone on board: The role of inspirational leadership in geographically dispersed teams. Organization Science, 20(1): 240–252.Olszanowski, M., Wr´ obel, M., & Hess, U. 2020. Mimicking and sharing emotions: A re-examination of the link between facial mimicry and emotional contagion. Cognition and Emotion, 34(2): 367–376.Williams, T. A., Gruber, D. A., Sutcliffe, K. M., Shepherd, D. A., & Zhao, E. Y. 2017. Organizational response to adversity: Fusing crisis management and resilience research streams. Academy of Management Annals, 11, 733–769.Collins, R. 2004. Interaction ritual chains. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Owens, B. P., Baker, W. E., Sumpter, D. M., & Cameron, K. S. 2016. Relational energy at work: Implications for job engagement and job performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 101(1): 35–49.Quinn, R. W., Spreitzer, G. M., & Lam, C. 2012. Building a sustainable model of human energy in organizations: Exploring the critical role of resources. Academy of Management Annals, 6: 337–396. Organizations which provided examples of positivity and resilience in online interactions were able to spark positive emotional contagion and increased vitality. Many organizations communicated simple messages of care and composure, offered morning meditation sessions, allowed pets on screen for relaxation, conducted online yoga and fitness sessions, and sent out care packages to employees.
Another research concern centers on the nonnegligible chance of community transmission in the workplace which poses a threat to returning workers. While many workplaces shut down following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, others in essential industries had to remain operational, thus exposing employees to virus dangers.Steinbach, A. L., Kautz, J., & Korsgaard, M. A. (2021). Caring for their own: How firm actions to protect essential workers and CEO benevolence influenced stakeholder sentiment during the COVID-19 pandemic. Journal of Applied Psychology, 106(6), 811–824. However, firms varied significantly in the degree to which they took action to protect their employees. Steinbach, Kautz and Korsgaard (2021) found that these firm compensation actions were associated with a growth in positive stakeholder sentiment. The reintegration of workers into face-to-face work settings has also launched academic debate on privacy and ethical concerns surrounding mandatory vaccination requirements and/or weekly testing. While our knowledge of online collaboration has yet to incorporate the dynamic urgency created by the pandemic, it is very likely that closures of traditional workplaces, physical distancing requirements, and the difficulties firms face reopening sites will fundamentally shift research on virtual work.
/ref> Asynchronous communication tends to be more difficult to manage and requires much greater coordination than synchronous communication. As Gibson et al. (2011) found, developing consistent, time-patterned routines of communication may help to build close working relationships. Technology affordances such as a public forum where team members can post and reply to questions may also encourage timely responses and enhance ongoing knowledge transfer.
Emerging issues
COVID-19 pandemic
As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the virtual dimension of teamwork has gained greater prominence everywhere from social media to academic scholarship. Research on remote work has largely focused on outcomes differentiating between individuals who do and do not engage in remote work.
. Accessed March 21, 2020.
Care in connecting
Rather than "social distancing," Gibson (2020) proposes the approach Care in Connecting, which acknowledges the need for caution in terms of physical proximity, but also promotes the urgent need for compassion that individuals and organizations provide and receive. Care in Connecting centers around three principles which counter the prejudice, isolation, and hopelessness associated with social distancing: inclusion, copresence, and vitality.
Emerging research
There is still much unknown about the impact of COVID-19 on virtual teamwork, particularly in how employees will respond in the long-term to the blurring of public and private space and how the reorganization of reopened sites will unfold. Emerging research suggests that returning to work in the "new normal" after being out of work or teleworking to some capacity creates issues with employee focus, engagement, and mental reattachment to upcoming work.Yuan, Z., Ye, Z., & Zhong, M. (2021). Plug back into work, safely: Job reattachment, leader safety commitment, and job engagement in the COVID-19 pandemic. Journal of Applied Psychology, 106(1), 62–70. Furthermore, Shao et al. (2021) argue that workers’ newfound flexibility in working from home or at the office is impacted by stressors they encountered on the previous day.Shao, Y., Fang, Y., Wang, M., Chang, C.-H. (D.), & Wang, L. (2021). Making daily decisions to work from home or to work in the office: The impacts of daily work- and COVID-related stressors on next-day work location. Journal of Applied Psychology, 106(6), 825-838. This research has implications for understanding the driving factors of daily work location choices, and how telework will unfold in a post-Covid world.
See also
Further reading
External links
|
|
