Virtual Project Teams

Another important factor that has contributed to the enormous rise in the use of virtual teams is the current trend for forging strategic partnerships and alliances. These alliances help organizations to take advantage of substantial economies of scale and scope without forming new corporate entities. Teams that operate as part of these alliances are perfectly suited to virtual teamwork.

Leading thinkers in the field of virtual teams are almost unanimous in the opinion that virtual teams are a more effective tool than actual teams. This is because, since the only criterion for selecting virtual team members is expertise, virtual team founders can bypass other factors, such as location, time and interpersonal skills, which may restrict an actual team’s performance.

Many new team models have been created to analyze the strategic use of virtual teams and to help make provision for creating successful virtual teams. One of the first such models, developed by Dr Jessica Lipnack and Dr Jeffrey Stamps, consists of three key components:

1. people
2. purpose
3. links

In this model, people are viewed as the most important element of all teams at all levels, and purpose as the glue that holds people together. Without a purpose, there would be no reason for the team to exist, as there are no physical factors to bind the members. The final component – links – provides the means of communication that allow members to operate as a team, such as telephone systems and the internet.

Each of the above primary components is divided into three sub-components called virtual team principles. These principles provide a strategic framework for managing virtual teams.

People

• Independent members. Virtual team members are selected solely for their specialist skills. Consequently, members will be independent with only a partial commitment to the team.
• Shared leadership. Since they are selected for their expertise and specialist knowledege, it is likely that almost every member will take control of the team process at some point, when his/her expertise is required.
• Integrated levels. Teams exist on a number of levels, and in order to operate effectively, virtual teams should be aligned across these levels, at the very least on the individual and team level. However, most will also interact with other teams, essentially forming super-groups of more than one virtual team on certain occasions. This represents another level of operation which requires integration.

Purpose

• Cooperative goals. To perform effectively, virtual teams must formulate clear, cooperative goals.
• Interdependent Tasks. In a virtual team environment, many tasks can only be completed using the expertise of other team members. These interdependent tasks connect the cooperative goals to the virtual team’s ultimate objectives.
• Concrete Results. The ultimate objectives are the concrete results of effective virtual teamwork.

Links

• Multiple media. In a virtual team environment, many tasks can only be completed using the expertise of other team members.
• Boundary-crossing interactions. Similarly, it is usual for virtual teams to operate across organizational and cultural barriers. Interactions that cross these boundaries using multiple media are an essential characteristic of the links that connect effective virtual teams.
• Trusting relationships. As many other leading thinkers on virtual teams agree, trust is vital for effective virtual teamwork. It is common for misunderstandings to arise in virtual team environments, especially if initial communication is irregular or antisocial.

Modified team models

Interestingly, the recent work on virtual teams has not required a complete rethink of all previous theory on traditional teamwork. In fact, many traditional team models have been adapted to reflect the differences in the way virtual teams operate and to create a framework for effective virtual team working. The much used and much respected Tuckman model has been adapted by leading thinkers on virtual teams, Dr Jessica Lipnack and Dr Jeffrey Stamps, who also created the model above.[2] The new model still incorporates the initial period of inefficiency that occurs directly after Tuckman’s ‘forming’ period, but shows virtual teams achieving a level of effectiveness in less time than traditional teams.

The stages of virtual team development are:

• Start-up: the team explores ideas, discusses objectives and gathers information.
• Launch: the team meets electronically to finalize objectives, identify information sources and establish team roles.
• Perform: the virtual team arrives at the performing stage significantly faster than the actual team and completes the majority of the work in this stage.
• Test: the virtual team reviews results and makes plans for achieving any remaining objectives.
• Deliver: the virtual team delivers its results.

According to Lipnack and Stamps, the main reason for virtual team effectiveness is the balance between cooperation and competition that is unique to virtual teams. Cooperation occurs when team members share the same goals. Competition occurs on the occasions when there is a conflict between their personal goals. They call this balance ‘co-opetition’, and they believe it accelerates the virtual team through the unproductive second phase of Tuckman’s model.

The main implication of the model is that virtual teams can attain an effective level of performance without face-to-face interaction, a process previously thought essential to high-performance teamwork.

The study of virtual teams currently dominates theory on teamwork and the benefits of the use of virtual teams are generally accepted. One of the main themes in the most recent literature is on the role of trust in virtual teams.

The role of trust in virtual teams

A recent investigation into the role of trust in the virtual team environment found evidence to suggest that virtual teams can only perform effectively if members trust one another.[3] Furthermore, it found that if a virtual team begins a project with a low level of trust, the initial time period is critical if the team is to achieve high performance. If initial communications are irregular or antisocial, team communication will continue in this way and the team will not perform effectively towards its ultimate objective. Although interpersonal communication is not required in virtual teams, it appears that a different, albeit less personal, form of communication is needed for them to perform effectively.

The investigation examined case studies of ‘typical’ virtual teams, each with the following common characteristics:

• members were physically located in different sites
• members interacted through the use of computer-mediated communication technologies
• members had no prior history of working together

Three key questions formed the basis of the research, to which the investigation found the following answers:

1. Can trust exist in global virtual teams where the team members do not share a past and do not expect to interact with each other in the future?

• Teams with consistently high trust levels were more capable of dealing with uncertainty and complexity than those with low trust levels.
• Most teams with consistently low trust levels found coping with uncertainty in the virtual team environment difficult and were unable to identify specific tasks and goals.
• Those teams that boasted high trust levels throughout were also characterized by explicit and prompt responses in their messages, despite permanent disruption. Some were even able to communicate in real time during crucial periods of the project.

2. How might trust be developed in good teams?

• Four out of 29 teams shifted from initial low levels of trust to high trust during the investigation. In these cases, the first messages between members appeared to set the tone for the rest of the investigation, adhering to the ‘creation’ theory of trust development.
• Positive action, social communication and communication that conveyed enthusiasm for the project also appeared to help teams to develop trust.
• The research suggested that trust was developed on the basis of members’ responses to messages, because given the absence of cultural differences and face-to-face communication, this is the easiest means of making stereotypical assumptions.

3. What communication behaviors may facilitate the development of trust?

• The results of the case studies show that when faced with uncertainty, virtual teams that have high trust levels are able to avoid periods of turbulence by solving problems rather than by disrupting the task.
• Teams in the study that did not communicate regularly did not develop meaningful and trusting relationships. However, the most successful teams found a balance between social and task-based communication that left productivity unaffected.
• In the teams that demonstrated consistently high trust levels, there were also explicit verbal statements about commitment, support and excitement. Although less regular than in traditional teams, such communication, if achieved, resulted in a far more cohesive group.
• An interesting finding of the study was that cultural differences had little or no effect on computer-mediated communication, since the written medium eliminates the effect of accent and gesturing. By making cultural differences less noticeable, electronic communication increases the perceived similarity among members.

Conclusions

The results suggest that trust is essential for the smooth functioning of global virtual teams. The initial stages of virtual team projects are extremely important, as this is the most important period in which trust is developed. In the most successful virtual teams, this trust is best maintained throughout the project by regular communication and is strengthened by ongoing complementary social conversing.