Successful Virtual Team
Question One
Successful teams play an essential role in improving organization performance and giving it a competitive advantage over their competitors. With the advancement of technology and globalization, many organizations are facing barriers in coping with emerging business trends. For instance, multinational companies have teams located in different countries or geographical locations, creating a unique challenge in communication (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Consequently, it is essential for companies to implement strategies that promote high team performance to increase efficiency and performance.
First, excellent communication skills foster team cohesion and enhance performance. Without proper communication media, a team can feel disconnect and isolated. Hence, the organization should identify common barriers to communication and develop strategies to overcome them. Such plans include use of technology to facilitate information sharing with virtual teams, for instance, synchronized communication through video conferencing (Prystupa-Rządca & Latusek-Jurcza, 2016).
Secondly, the organization should train employees on excellent communication skills and how to use different communication Media. The two approaches will facilitate the free flow of communication among members. Secondly, goal setting helps in aligning the group performance with the expectation of the company. It creates a sense of purpose that enhances team cohesion and efficiency, empowers team members, and reduces ambiguity in production (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Thus, it is crucial for teams to be assigned both short-term and long-term goals to increase performance. For virtual teams, there should be a clear understanding of the organization’s mission and vision to foster commitments to organization mission and vision.
Moreover, leadership skills play a significant role in building team cohesion and promoting organizational culture. Necessary leadership skills include the ability to build trust and confidence, respect, and a sense of purpose in the teams. A good leader can establish trust among members, develop coordination, and enhance team performance to achieve the mission of the company (Prystupa-Rządca & Latusek-Jurcza, 2016). Furthermore, a leader helps in promoting team cohesion, motivation, and reduces interpersonal conflicts. Therefore, an organization should have leadership training programs on successful team building and supervision.
Interpersonal conflict is a common occurrence in a team, especially in a diverse environment. Conflict may arise due to communication barriers and cultural differences in the workplace. They can negatively impact on the team cohesion, hence should be depersonalized and solved in a fair and transparent manner. Nonetheless, the conflict also creates a positive impact on team performance by nurturing diverse views that enhance learning and innovation (Prystupa-Rządca & Latusek-Jurcza, 2016). Therefore, it is essential for an organization to promote practical conflict management skills to ensure early dispute resolution. Such an approach may include facilitating communication between the virtual teams and strong organization policies that establishes a conducive work environment (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). The organization should also enhance positive interaction among employees and team members to develop trust and foster positive interpersonal relationships.
Lastly, collaboration plays a significant role in bringing together different teams to achieve organizational goals. Therefore, coordination skills are an integral component in any high-performance groups. Through a positive interpersonal relationship, team members show commitments and interdependence towards the shared goals and task accomplishment. Human resource managers should ensure collaboration is a core component in the organization values and align it with individual expectations of employees (Lepsinger, 2019). Hence, organization leadership should promote coordination of different teams to encourage team performance.
Question Two
Globalization and advancement of technology have also created diversity in the workplace. Nowadays, organizations have team members distributed in different geographical locations and can only communicate virtually. Notably, effective communication with the virtual team enhances innovation, performance, and gives an organization a competitive advantage over its competitors (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). However, numerous challenges come with virtual teams. Thus it is crucial to consider several aspects when working with such organizations. Some of the elements to consider include leadership, communication, trust, motivation, and autonomy (Lepsinger, 2019).
Communication is the primary component in virtual teams’ management and success. Since the units are dispersed over different geographical regions, it is essential for a company to have efficient and reliable communication means (Lepsinger, 2019). The media of communication must allow teams to communicate in open and real-time communication. Therefore organization should adopt a technological tool that helps synchronized communication, for instance, video conferencing. Open communication is beneficial to an organization since it promotes trust, fosters interpersonal relationships, and facilitates accountability.
Secondly, autonomy allows virtual teams to assume responsibilities and motivate them in achieving organizations goals. It also enables team members to assume delegated roles, make proactive choices, and enhances commitment. Through such initiatives, teams can achieve cognition and institute self-correction measures such as holding regular debriefs and pre-briefs among members (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Moreover, autonomy gives virtual teams’ collective identity that increases team performance through shared beliefs and perceptions. Independence gives teams the authority to determine how goals are going to be achieved and motivate employees to achieve set goals. Therefore, it is essential to identify resources and standardize work process to guarantee the independence of virtual teams.
Additionally, team building and motivation are vital in reducing in promoting performance and conducive work environment. Through team building activities, human resource managers can refocus teams energy to meeting the company’s expectation, and build trust, and team cohesion (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Motivation also helps teams to remain focus and have a drive towards achieving assigned tasks. Moreover, it empowers the teams to align their personal goals with expectations of the business. Organizations implement different strategies to motivate virtual teams, for instance, by involving them in decision making, recognizing their performance and also monetary rewards (Lepsinger, 2019).
Another critical aspect to consider in a capable virtual team is trust. Studies have shown that enhanced trust level increases the performance of a virtual team. For many companies, building trust remains a significant challenge, especially in a culturally diverse and geographical dispersed business environment (Lepsinger, 2019). Therefore, it is essential for virtual teams to implement strategies that nurture trust over time. A common approach is to allow open communication to enable members to understand each other, build confidence, and improve interpersonal trust. Besides interpersonal trust, task-based trust is also crucial in virtual teams (Lepsinger, 2019). Task-based trust promotes accountability and commitment to completing allocated duties.
Lastly, leadership critical for any successful performance and management of virtual teams. Effective leadership ensures collaboration between the teams and strict adherence to company goals and expectations. They help the organization in the decision-making process and giving teams a sense of direction (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Leadership also plays a crucial role in promoting teams cohesion in a culturally diverse environment, and leverages members strengthens to achieve desired goals. Moreover, they play a pivotal role in the adoption of new technological, for instance, communication software that increases efficiency in team management.
In summation, it is necessary to have effective virtual teams by carefully recruiting employees with good work ethics and the potential to work in remote geographical locations. The organization culture should promote workplace diversity and cultivate a culture of open communication, trust, collaboration, and effective conflict resolution mechanisms. In so doing, virtual teams will be well engaged, motivated, and work efficiently to achieve organizations missions.
References
Goetsch, D. L., & Davis, S. B. (2014). Quality management for organizational excellence. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.
Lepsinger, R. (2019). 5 Key Elements of Successful Virtual Teamwork. Retrieved from https://www.onpointconsultingllc.com/blog/virtual-team-collaboration-5-key-elements-for-success
Prystupa-Rządca, K., & Latusek-Jurczak, D. (2016). Role of the Virtual Team Leader: Managing Changing Membership in a Team. In The Laws of the Knowledge Workplace (pp. 93-110). Routledge.