These developments in portal technologies have led to an entirely new level of agility and flexibility in portal design to support virtual teams. These developments taken together are also creating an increasingly higher level of cross-department and cross-functional collaboration and knowledge transfer across corporations globally (Lin, Chiu, Joe, Tsai, 2010)
0 design objectives, companies with virtual teams are finding they can attain higher levels of shared task ownership as well. This is because there are significantly greater levels of trust overall throughout an organization based on the collective contributions of every member of a virtual and in-office team when they share their knowledge and information together (Mancini, 2010)
For the majority of virtual teams in private industry however, the Secured Sockets Layer (SSL) is sufficient in terms of its levels of security. The use of SLL for ensuring VoIP security has also led to the widespread adopti9on of voice-supported VPNs connections across virtual teams as well (Middleton, 2011)
Figure 1: Web 2.0 Design Criterion as shown as a Meme Map Source: (O'Reilly, 2005) Web 2
Social networks are the catalyst of disruptive innovation in smartphones as they have overtaken operating systems as the primary focus within many companies as to how they can collaborate more effectively and create knowledge sharing processes that can quickly scale globally (Bernoff, Li, 2008). The egalitarian nature of social networks is also fueling the development of rapid advances in portal software, with Microsoft SharePoint emerging as the dominant leader in this area of technology adoption globally (Turban, Liang, Wu, 2011)
These Web conferences are often required as team members often have two-way webcams set up to communicate and be seen on the call. Skype has become the free platform of choice for many of these Web conferences in small businesses, despite the lack of security (Whitman, Mattord, 2005)
Team members must take extra care to engage with the team in a socially intelligent manner, maintaining awareness of other's perceptions and emotional responses to self and others, communicate clearly, and provide and attend to additional interpersonal cues of other members. For a virtual project to be successful developing trust, group identity, clear structures, as well as sharing information and understanding information is vital (Adams, Jan 1997)
Virtual teams may not have face-to-face interactions, which make relationship building difficult, cultural differences can break down understanding in communications, the lack of shared experience have negative effects on sense of trust between members, and time zones can create problems with setting up meetings. Research found that virtual teams are significantly less socially aware than collocated teams (Branson, Feb 2011)
Virtual Team Coordination Communication is more difficult for a virtual team because relationships are more geographical distributed, more asynchronous, temporary, more multicultural, and more likely to extend outside the organization (Kokko, Mar 2007)
Communication can become limited due to not understanding how a team member values the goals and tasks of the project. The biggest obstacle for successful implementation is the lack of incentive for sharing intellectual capital across boundaries (Loughran, n
Moreover, management needs to hold frequent meetings with team representatives and stakeholders as a way of keeping the team's activities in check and ensuring that the purpose is being achieved (Lepsinger and DeRosa, 01). Trust and Relationship Building Face-to-face engagements provide the most ideal platforms for relationship building (Chavaren, 2003)
This acceptance and appreciation of others' cultures drives innovation, as team members seek to engage in developments that satisfy the cultural needs of a diverse audience. Drawbacks (factors that derail the utilization of benefits resulting from cultural diversity): First, a false cultural similarity assumption creates a false impression that it would be easy for one to integrate with a certain group because of similarities in some aspects of culture, such as a common language (Connolly, 2013)
Possible Steps: Taking time to learn the aspects associated with different cultures from documented literature, background research, etc. (Hawkins, 2011)
The effectiveness of an organization's virtual teams depends on the management's ability to exploit the opportunities while minimizing the pitfalls associated with the same (IRMA, 2001). The Building Blocks for Effective Virtual Teams Creation of Rules, Mission, and Goals A Clear-cut mission, set of goals, and established rules are crucial to the success of any team, virtual or otherwise, as they provide a sense of purpose and ensure that team members orient their individual activities in line with their requirements (Lepsinger and DeRosa, 2010)
In such a case, team members would not have to physically work together - under one roof. With the help of wireless systems and the internet, brought about by fiber-optic technology, team members are able to work from their preferred locations, and still maintain constant communication with each other (Lekushoff, 2012)
Virtual team leaders have to contend with all of these dilemmas and challenges in order for guide their organizations towards the attainment of their goals and objectives. Overcoming the Dilemma of Virtual Teams Through Leadership The continual adoption of virtual teams continues to completely re-order the culture, nature and trust levels across organizations (LaBrosse, 2008)
The leading consultancies of the world have been able to use the virtual team model for decades to quickly create and assign virtual teams to complex projects. Large system integration companies including Deloitte, IBM, Price Waterhouse Coopers (PwC) and others typically populate their virtual teams with individual contributors who have deep expertise in a given field or specialty (Shriberg, 2009)
large corporations with thousands of remote or virtual employees. There are many factors that contribute to this, and the most dominant is the innate ability of virtual teams to form and quickly function, often in highly targeted, specific areas of a business (Purvanova, Bono, 2009)
" The leader can then set the norms for the group according to the common culture, so that members of these disparate cultures do not find themselves facing adverse cultural circumstances. Some of these individuals will come from high power distance cultures (Hofstede, n
The functioning of the team should also be designed with the Nike culture in mind, since that is the common culture between the different team members. According to the Tuckman Model of Group Development (Atherton, 2004), announcing leadership and roles from the outset will result in a reduction in "storming