Managing Virtual Teams
Managing Virtual Teams
1. Introduction
Virtual teams have emerged to mitigate the challenges of managing teams that are distributed across different regions, and are a sustainable component of global business. A project manager managing a virtual team would have to integrate communication strategies, project management techniques including human and social processes in order to support the team, (Kimball, 1997). The author is a project manager assigned to lead a virtual team of 300 volunteers located across the globe to develop recommendations for regulating carbon emissions in the world. As indicated Kimball (1997), this kind of a virtual team usually supports people working in the same professional field and most of the time focuses on learning.
2. The best way to structure this large virtual team
The project would be divided into tasks and responsibilities. The team would be divided into sub-teams basing/depending on the regions where the individuals come from, and let these sub-teams work in isolation to deliver their completed task of the project within the stipulated time frame. It is very important that the tasks and responsibilities are evenly distributed between the sub-teams to create the feeling of fairness among team members, (Edwards & Wilson, 2004). Sub-team leaders can hold a face-to-face meeting in the same location with the author at the start and at the end of the project.
3. Important issues that the author foresee in managing this team
a) Different time for interaction
Communication across time zones as indicated in OB Week2 Lecture Notes (2013) would be a worrying issue because there might be a difference of 10-12 hours between working days of regions where team members are based. In situations where the author request for urgent response on a particular issue, the information may be sent to the location at a non working time hence causing delay. To solve this problem, the author would
1. Introduction
Virtual teams have emerged to mitigate the challenges of managing teams that are distributed across different regions, and are a sustainable component of global business. A project manager managing a virtual team would have to integrate communication strategies, project management techniques including human and social processes in order to support the team, (Kimball, 1997). The author is a project manager assigned to lead a virtual team of 300 volunteers located across the globe to develop recommendations for regulating carbon emissions in the world. As indicated Kimball (1997), this kind of a virtual team usually supports people working in the same professional field and most of the time focuses on learning.
2. The best way to structure this large virtual team
The project would be divided into tasks and responsibilities. The team would be divided into sub-teams basing/depending on the regions where the individuals come from, and let these sub-teams work in isolation to deliver their completed task of the project within the stipulated time frame. It is very important that the tasks and responsibilities are evenly distributed between the sub-teams to create the feeling of fairness among team members, (Edwards & Wilson, 2004). Sub-team leaders can hold a face-to-face meeting in the same location with the author at the start and at the end of the project.
3. Important issues that the author foresee in managing this team
a) Different time for interaction
Communication across time zones as indicated in OB Week2 Lecture Notes (2013) would be a worrying issue because there might be a difference of 10-12 hours between working days of regions where team members are based. In situations where the author request for urgent response on a particular issue, the information may be sent to the location at a non working time hence causing delay. To solve this problem, the author would
References: Edwards, A. & Wilson, J.R. (2004) Implementing virtual teams: a guide to organizational and human factors, University of Liverpool Online Library [Online]. Available from: http://site.ebrary.com.ezproxy.liv.ac.uk/lib/liverpool/docDetail.action?docID=10048150 (Accessed: 14th February 2013). Kimball, L. (1997) Managing Virtual Teams: text of speech given by Lisa Kimball for Team Strategies Conference sponsored by Federated Press, Toronto, Canada [Online]. Available from: http://www.groupjazz.com (Accessed: 15th February 2013). University of Liverpool/Laureate Online Education (2013) Lecture notes from Organizational Behavior and People Management week 1 [online]. Available from: University of Liverpool/Laureate Online Education (Accessed: 07 February 2013)