The assignment discusses the benefits and drawbacks of managing virtual teams, highlighting the importance of communication, leadership, and management in overcoming challenges. It also provides recommendations for effective team management, making it a valuable resource for students and professionals alike.
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Running head: MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION Management Communication Name of the Student: Name of the University: Author Note:
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1MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION To: Alec Simpson From: Christine Grey Date: 12thApril 2017 Subject: Leading and managing virtual teams Virtual and remote working is the reality of modern workplaces. According toHoch and Kozlowski (2014), sound communication is the critical part for the success of virtual teams. However, I have designed a new marketing virtual team, which is located at several places like Sydney, Beijing, Mumbai and New York. In this memo, I am going to discuss about the advantages as well as disadvantages of leading and managing a virtual team. It is also important to identify some of the critical areas which need to be addressed while leading such teams. In addition to this, I will provide some recommendations and finally the conclusion. Let me first start by giving an introduction of virtual teams. A virtual team usually refers to the group of individuals who perform together from various geographic areas by relying on the communication technology, like FAX, video conferencing, email or other services to collaborate. The term, in simpler way, refers to the work groups who work together across all the organizational levels, asynchronously.Mukherjeeet al. (2012) define the term as a group of organizationally, geographically and time dispersed workers, who are brought together by telecommunication and information technologies in order to accomplish organizational tasks. Advantages With the advancement of information technology, ever growing demand of the target consumers,employeeexpectations,globalizationandtheeverincreasingcompetitive environment, organizations have started adopting the culture of virtual teams. The virtual teamsaregrowingintopopularityandhavetheirownbenefits.Atfirst,comesthe
2MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION affordability factor. Companies pay only for the support level they require for setting up the virtual teams. The overall costs are much lower than the ones with professional support. There are no overhead costs as well for the associated services like office space, computer, communication between the virtual teams and in-house staffs and benefits. In addition to the above mentioned factors the companies are able to provide the teams with flexible support. They identify the requirement easily, like the need for junior recruiter or senior compensation analyst and others and the virtual teams fill up the needs. As per their needs, the companies set their service length. Moreover, the virtual teams offer accessibility to a multiple number of disciplines in various geographical regions. Another advantage of the virtual team is their ability to assemble the most talented group of individuals from various parts of the world, in order to complete a complex project. This in turn, will bring in huge creativity as well as innovation within the teams. On the practical level, virtual teams have the power to save the employees’ time and also cut their travel expenses (Morgan, Paucar- Caceres and Wright 2014). Disadvantages With advantages, come certain disadvantages as well. There are some disadvantages or say challenges,ofmanagingandleadingvirtualteams.Gaininganunderstandingofthe disadvantages those are inherent in the virtual teams enable the organization become more efficient and successful. This can be done by particularly avoiding those mistakes which lead to nothing, but failure. The challenges lie in various areas like communication, poor leadershipandpoormanagement.AccordingtoAyoko,KonradandBoyle(2012), communication can be a major factor here, as the employees do not belong to the same physical location and can present some communication issues.
3MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION However, the organizations can leverage technology in order to reduce this major problem that is, video conferencing, detailed email updates, phone discussions, project management software and others. In addition to this,Daimet al. (2012) mentioned that poor leadership as well as management can also affect the concept of virtual teams. It is highly essential for the team leaders of the virtual teams to have the capability of managing virtual employees and take initiatives so that they have a clear vision of the organizational goals. Moreover, incompetent team members also pose a great threat to the concept of virtual teams. A weak team member can affect the whole team, adversely. Furthermore, recruitingthe right members plays a very critical role in the overall success of the virtual teams. Recommendations I would like to recommend my team members to manage and lead virtual teams effectively as a virtual team has the power to yield several benefits for the organization. It can be an ideal solution for a start up or many business needs of small organizations. The organizations which are delivering these business services are finding themselves in the growing and innovative niche. To sum up, organizing virtual teams can prove to be highly beneficial for the companies. It is true that there are certain disadvantages but managing them in an effective manner can change the business pattern and yield better outcomes. Finally, I hope that this solves the query of virtual teams and I am happy to be a part of it. For further information, feel free to contact me. Thank you
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4MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION References Ayoko, O.B., Konrad, A.M. and Boyle, M.V., 2012. Online work: Managing conflict and emotions for performance in virtual teams.European Management Journal,30(2), pp.156- 174. Daim, T.U., Ha, A., Reutiman, S., Hughes, B., Pathak, U., Bynum, W. and Bhatla, A., 2012. Exploring the communication breakdown in global virtual teams.International Journal of Project Management,30(2), pp.199-212. Hoch, J.E. and Kozlowski, S.W., 2014. Leading virtual teams: Hierarchical leadership, structural supports, and shared team leadership.Journal of applied psychology,99(3), p.390. Morgan, L., Paucar-Caceres, A. and Wright, G., 2014. Leading effective global virtual teams: Theconsequencesofmethodsofcommunication.SystemicPracticeandAction Research,27(6), pp.607-624. Mukherjee, D., Lahiri, S., Mukherjee, D. and Billing, T.K., 2012. Leading virtual teams: how dosocial,cognitive,andbehavioralcapabilitiesmatter?.ManagementDecision,50(2), pp.273-290.