Making Virtual Teams Work: Management Strategies

Introduction

Creating virtual work teams nationally or even globally, as opposed to teams that are centralized, requires two fundamentally different organizational strategies, each demanding a different skill set on the part of managers and their staffs. The employees who comprise virtual work teams need higher-than-average levels of initiative, resourcefulness, self-motivation, organization, and effective time management. Kerber and Buono (2004), in their article "Leadership Challenges in Global Virtual Teams: Lessons from the Field," provide an excellent analysis of what it takes to create strong virtual work teams. One of the most important attributes they identify is the level of experience and maturity of team members when those members are located across a broad geographic region. Combs and Peacoke (2007) offer a series of pragmatic insights into the management of virtual teams, including the development of team etiquette and ground rules for making geographically dispersed teams work efficiently.

When the research analyzed for this paper is organized into a framework, the role of the manager for virtual teams emerges as more that of a facilitator and coach than an autocrat. The role of process and communications enabler — a distance learning coach, in effect — is what best practices in managing virtual teams are fundamentally about. Among all the process areas that cause virtual teams to fail, a lack of focus on knowledge transfer and accumulated organizational learning is among the most damaging. Conversely, best practices in managing virtual teams have more to do with enabling and fostering high levels of knowledge sharing and group-level learning. When these processes are integrated into virtual teams, those teams become highly effective at synthesizing information and reacting to it quickly. This paper analyzes the characteristics of successful distance managers and the strategies they use to manage virtual teams.

Characteristics of Successful Distance Managers

The unique set of skills required to make a virtual team effective begins with a strong focus on creating credibility for the remote team, whose members are rarely seen together in one physical location. Kerber and Buono (2004) highlight the heightened need to establish credibility for virtual teams, in contrast to the more gradual, organic process of building credibility that is available to managers of collocated teams. Creating and sustaining trust and credibility form the foundation of any successful virtual work team. This credibility must be fostered alongside the growth of processes necessary for ongoing learning and thought leadership emanating from the virtual team.

Once the manager of a virtual team has established that foundation of trust and credibility — primarily by producing results quickly — the team needs to begin contributing to more strategic and longer-range projects, despite being geographically dispersed. These strategic projects require each team member to fulfill the tactical requirements of their role without becoming entirely consumed by them. This can be difficult when tactical, often urgent activities in regional offices dominate team members' time. Managing remote team members so they remain focused on strategic priorities requires significant skill and the ability to clearly articulate the outcomes tied to the many tasks at hand. The virtual team manager must find innovative approaches to keep the team oriented toward strategic priorities and to synchronize its efforts with the attainment of specific performance goals. Achieving strategic goals as a virtual team creates even greater levels of credibility and establishes the team as a respected contributor within the broader organization.

To reach this level of performance, the manager of a virtual work team must be more proactive and focused than counterparts managing collocated teams. To manage performance effectively, the virtual team manager must create structures and routines that compensate for the absence of continual in-person contact, while simultaneously raising the level of accountability and expectations placed on virtual team members. As Bell and Kozlowski (2002) note, the virtual team manager must also ensure that leadership functions and values are distributed to each team member. A very clear definition of roles is essential in virtual teams to eliminate confusion, conflict, and wasted effort.

To accomplish these two critical leadership steps, the virtual team manager should first bring team members together in person, giving everyone the chance to meet one another and to begin forming relationships. The best virtual teams invest in these in-person activities regularly to strengthen bonds between members and to clarify each contributor's unique role. Getting together in person also provides an opportunity to plan, initiate, and put in place both asynchronous and synchronous forms of electronic communication. Conference calls should be scheduled for a maximum of 90 minutes every other week, supplemented by one-on-one telephone meetings between the leader and each team member. Additional structures should include evaluation of progress toward objectives, measures of client satisfaction, quarterly departmental accomplishment reports, timely performance appraisals, and personal development plans.

Given the significant responsibilities each virtual team member carries for strategic projects and individual contribution goals, the virtual team manager must quickly adopt a leadership style centered on leading by example — in attitude, work ethic, and passion for achievement. Virtual team leaders need to be the "true north" of attitude, direction, and achievement. They must model what it looks like to be passionate about one's work and its contribution to the broader organization. A leader must serve as the emotional foundation of strength for a virtual team; to be dispassionate is to fail in the role. According to Mindell (1993), the best-performing virtual teams demand a manager who exceeds team members' expectations in terms of commitment, attitude, and focus on results.

Ultimately, the success or failure of any virtual team rests with the manager and their ability to motivate experienced team members to consistently deliver above-average performance. Managing a virtual team must center on exceptional results, and obtaining that level of performance from seasoned, capable team members requires nothing less than a leader with total commitment and a clear vision for the team.

Conclusion

Ultimately, virtual team members must perceive that their position has been designed to allow them to excel — that roadblocks and distractions have been cleared so they can perform at their best. Once these conditions are created and a strong leader injects a positive, "whatever it takes" attitude into the team culture, a virtual team will excel. Team members will find it in their own best interest to fulfill their potential within a fast-moving organizational structure that rewards initiative and results.

References

Bell, B. S., & Kozlowski, S. W. J. (2002). A typology of virtual teams. Group & Organization Management, 27(1), 14–49.

Combs, W., & Peacoke, S. (2007). Leading virtual teams. T&D Magazine, 61(2). Retrieved from EBSCO Host.

Kerber, K. W., & Buono, A. F. (2004). Leadership challenges in global virtual teams: Lessons from the field. SAM Advanced Management Journal, 69(4), 4–10.

Mindell, A. (1993). The leader as martial artist: An introduction to deep democracy. HarperCollins.