building successful virtual teams

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International Standard Book Number: 1-58053-878-9 10987654321 Contents Preface vii Reference x Introduction xi 1 Collaboration in the Twenty-First Century 1 1.1 The Knowledge Era 1 1.2 The Knowledge Worker—The New Economic Resource 11 1.3 Knowledge Management and Collaboration 16 1.4 The Virtual Team—A Promising Investment 20 1.5 Building the Business Case 30 References 39 2 Collaborative Technologies 41 2.1 Technologies Overview 41 2.2 Selecting the Right Technology 48 2.3 Integration Issues 55 3 From the Traditional to the Virtual Team 61 3.1 The Virtual Challenge—Building Trust 61 v 3.2 Group Dynamics 67 3.3 Smart People Getting Smarter 73 3.4 Dealing with Cultures 79 3.5 Facilitating the Team 84 3.6 Measuring Results 90 4 Ecollaboration Methodology 97 4.1 A Methodology—A Basic Recipe 97 4.2 Resources, Roles, and Responsibilities 100 4.3 Plan and Deliverables 109 4.4 The Tasks in Detail 112 Phase 1 Project and Change Management 112 Phase 2 Analysis and design 123 Phase 3 Implementation 154 Phase 4 Ecollaboration management 162 5 Key Success Factors 179 6 Conclusion 187 Appendix A: List of Templates Included on the CD 193 Appendix B: How to Use the CD-ROM 195 List of Acronyms 197 Selected Bibliography 199 About the Author 207 Index 209 vi Building Successful Virtual Teams Preface In 1978, I enrolled in a bachelor of commerce degree program at McGill Uni - versity in Montreal, Quebec. Upon graduation, and with little business experi- ence, I decided to pursue a master’s degree in business administration, specializing in information systems and statistics. I remember the asynchronous terminals, the computer cards, and getting very interested and curious about the Argyris theory. His theory, as discussed in Section 3.2, focuses on organizational and action learning. It brings a new dimension to the way we learn and react to learning by integrating emotions and personal transformation into the process. Most of my peers who had been in the labor market for some time did not share this interest and were quite skeptical on the application of this theory. In fact, some were quite upset that this theory, concerned with emotions, was even in the curriculum. They were convinced that it was not applicable in business, that it was pure fiction and a total waste of their time. The traditional management approach with control at its center had already made its mark on them. Peer influence finally took hold of me and I endorsed the industrialist for - mula of management: plan, manage, and control. I turned to strategies, organ - izational structures, plans, procedures, statistics, and all those fancy management techniques aimed at improving business performance. Yet I kept the book by Argyris on my library shelves. After graduation, I joined Nortel Networks as a business systems architect. This was the start of a very interesting career in information technology. As my career progressed, I assumed various roles—as IT manager, project manager, and consultant at Bombardier, IBM Global Services, Fujitsu, and some consult - ing firms before I started my own consulting practice in 1998. vii Over these past 20 years or so, I have used many forms of media to work in teams. I can remember the electronic system on the mainframe system named PROFS. I used Lotus Notes and Microsoft Mail. I enjoyed teleconferencing, especially when I got the cameraman role! I never really liked audio conferenc - ing because of the noisy effects. Video conferencing is quite interesting if one has the right telecommunication setup. I often get overloaded with e-mails and sometimes have difficulty keeping up with the discussions and events. Overall, the best method for teamwork is collaborative technology that integrates all those features and more. Despite the technological progress, I can only bear witness to the limita - tions of the traditional management approach to teamwork. While information is more available and accessible than ever, it is often not producing the expected results in organizations. Indeed, it is not because we are more and more con - nected that collaboration happens. Things just do not change because there is a technological solution. Challenged by these issues in my work and consulting assignments, in 2001 I enrolled in a master's program at Fielding Institute in Santa Barbara, California. I specialized in organizational change, and, more specifically, in vir- tual team design. Based on a virtual collaborative approach and state-of-the-art technology, the program allows for an appropriation of the new ways of work- ing, learning, and innovating. Most importantly, it reconciles the Argyris theory with the new organizational challenge of shifting from competition to coopera- tion and collaboration. It was then that I realized that I had kept the Argyris book. I removed the book from the shelf and discovered that his theory had evolved since my under- graduate years. His theory was now very much apropos. What was believed to be fiction in the early 1980s was making sense in the context of the twenty-first century. The current trend to knowledge manage - ment and collaboration implies changes in the way we work with others. A first impact of this trend relates to the information we use and how we are using it. Indeed, we are now in a better position to question the validity of the information and assumptions so that the purpose and problems are properly defined, understood, and shared by all parties involved. Another impact con - cerns how we are choosing the course of actions. We create more opportunities to make free and informed choices. We also recognize that we share the owner - ship of the task and problems to be solved. A third impact focuses on how we are sharing knowledge. We understand better the value of learning through experi - ence and others. In this context, lifelong learning and knowledge transfer are being encouraged. Mistakes are accepted as part of the learning process. Hidden agendas and protection behaviors are being abandoned. Not surprisingly, one last impact deals with how we are taking risks. We are becoming more inclined viii Building Successful Virtual Teams to try new ventures and to discuss what we previously thought was nondis - cussable and nonnegotiable. These resulting behaviors are now the basis for the survival and growth of twenty-first century organizations. Such organizations no longer consider them - selves as pieces of clockwork machinery; instead, they see themselves as the universal understanding that they are subject to creative disorders, such as the Internet, the e-mails, and other collaborative technologies connecting the work - ers. They are becoming living systems in a complex world of interactions and unpredictability. Planning, managing, and controlling are not enough to survive and grow. Organizations in the twenty-first century must acknowledge the self- organizing capability of the emerging workplace and offer an environment where the participants can most efficiently perform. This organizational shift requires work behaviors and conditions to be redefined, with social networks, leadership, and purpose as the key elements. In simple words, these working conditions must get people to want to contribute, to make a difference, to feel good about themselves and their peers, to grow, to learn, to develop themselves, and to build healthy relationships. On the other hand, it does not mean throwing out structures and plans. It means making better use of them by integrating extraordinary management skills, or what is required for an organization to transform management in an ever-changing climate. In other words, it means getting the managers to rapidly develop agility of thought based on the fostering of diversity required to support organizational longer-term success. These extraordinary skills include the ability to build trust, to share responsibilities and roles, and to use information as well as knowledge to create more knowledge. Postindustrial managers acknowledge that the most important assets reside in each worker and that the team contributes to the creation of a work environment where the values can drive the organization. I would like to relate the story of Morihei Ueshiba, the founder of Aikido and generally considered to be history’s greatest martial artist, to illustrate the need for organizations to merge extraordinary and ordinary management to remain competitive and to survive in the twenty-first century. Apparently, Ueshiba was a small man who could win over bigger opponents. He appeared to be perfectly centered. When off-balance, he could return very fast to his center, as if disequilibrium did not exist. He explained his agility by referring to his feel - ing of harmony with life and to knowing what center feels like. From his per - spective, the center corresponds to “who we are, our pattern of behavior, our values, our intentions.” But life can be disturbing or be disturbed at times. Being always perfectly centered may not be feasible in the turbulence of the twenty-first century. This reality can be quite challenging for changes in behaviors to occur. Individuals Preface ix [...]... then innovates with a model for virtual dynamics that I have developed, namely, the Virtual Star Team model Chapter 3 also elaborates on how smart people get smarter and contribute to the emergence of true collaboration in virtual teams It emphasizes the necessity to expand people capacity to create the results desired and to encourage xiv Building Successful Virtual Teams member participation and personal... more and more in virtual teams where there will be little or no face-toface contact In fact, virtual teams are expected to multiply even more rapidly given current world events, such as September 11th, the SARS virus, the war in Iraq, and the demographic shift, to name a few xi xii Building Successful Virtual Teams It is complicated enough to team now One can only wonder how collaborative technologies... reinforces the main elements for building successful virtual teams in a knowledge management and collaborative philosophy 1 Collaboration in the Twenty-First Century 1.1 The Knowledge Era Throughout the ages, wealth, power, and knowledge have been intimately related This situation is not different for organizations of the twenty-first century that wish to implement virtual teams to improve their competitiveness... processes, the reengineering period marks the transformation of methods and procedures to the change management practice that we know today One successful reengineering initiative I remember concerned the development of a sales 4 Building Successful Virtual Teams and distribution system in a large telecommunication systems manufacturer The initiative involved key users from the beginning and focused... reside in each of us and within the virtual team The concepts discussed in this chapter are also used in the methodology, more specifically in the activities related to the task, organization and team analysis and design, and the phases of implementation and Ecollaboration management Chapter 4 proposes a structured methodology for the implementation of successful virtual teams This methodology is based...x Building Successful Virtual Teams and organizations can expect fuzzy edges on the path of transition They need to have faith in the benefits of playing with the paradoxes of group life, to let go of control, to share... this structure, they could more easily work together to exercise power against the abuse of employers Finally, their efforts resulted in the Factory Acts enacted by Parliament in the 1 2 Building Successful Virtual Teams mid-1800s, which regulated the number of hours that men, women, and children were allowed to work The industrial era is now coming to an end in many regions in the world Technology... always make teaming a successful professional and personal experience? How can the synergy be created and sustained in teams? How can people, tasks, organization, and now technology be amalgamated for the best outcomes? Are there any formulas or tricks toward such success? We are now entering the era of collaborative technologies We will soon be working more and more in virtual teams where there will... initiatives, namely, knowledge management and business intelligence Knowledge management projects include the implementation of business information warehouses linked to the ERP, B2B, 6 Building Successful Virtual Teams and CRM applications, as well as external information banks such as Dun and Bradstreet The information contained in these warehouses typically includes statistics on sales, customers,... Suppliers Supply chain Employees Employees Supply chain management B2B Figure 1.2 Ecollaboration enterprise model Client Services Management Web commerce Industry Networks Competitors 8 Building Successful Virtual Teams chain to get the right information to the right people at the right time, insuring that everyone is empowered and aligned to add value to any enterprise” [1] The transition to the knowledge . accuracy and integrity of this document Date: 2005.03.13 23:39:53 +08'00' Building Successful Virtual Teams For a complete listing of the Artech House Professional Development and Technology. warranty of any kind. Artech House, Inc. and the author and editors of the book titled Building Successful Virtual Teams make no warranties, expressed or implied, that the equations, programs, and. damages resulting from use of the programs or procedures in this book or the associated software. Building Successful Virtual Teams Francine Gignac artechhouse.com Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication