Virtual Teams: A Counterproductive Approach to Employee Productivity

Management Communication 1
VIRTUAL TEAMS
Name
Course
Professor
University
State
Date

Management Communication 2
To: Marketing Director
From: Junior Human Resource Officer
CC: Human Resource Manager
Date: November 29, 2018
Subject: Virtual Teams
Businesses operating in the modern corporate world are altering their operational structures
due to advances in communication technology, globalization, and outsourcing. Globalization
and internationalization of commercial functions push businesses to consider investing in
advanced communication technologies. The objective is to have real-time management of the
personnel. These operations create virtual teams. According to D’Souza & Colarelli (2010, p.
630), a virtual team denotes a group of people working interdependently to achieve mutual
goals via diverse forms of digital media while residing in different geographical and
organizational boundaries. Companies are continuously rushing to create virtual teams
because they present an opportunity for the organization to increase employee productivity
(Schwalbe, 2011, p. 37). Besides, virtual teams allow employees to manage their work and
home lives more flexibly and interact with peers thereby making it easy for the employer to
attract and retain workers. However, virtual teams are counterproductive to the organization
because employees in such contexts neither interact with their peers well nor accomplish their
goals. Therefore, the company should opt against creating virtual teams because the
performance and productivity of employees may suffer.
Most companies prefer using virtual teams to manage their international or expansionary
operations because they allow employees to outperform their peers who share the office
space. In 2009, Siebdrat et al. (2009) assessed the performance of 80 international software