Review States What We Know About Virtual Teams

Three management professors reviewed all 93 studies and theory articles published at the time (2004) on virtual teams to look at what we knew about them. (Not surprisingly, 70 had been published in the prior decade). There are still far more questions than answers, but the article was the most complete look to date at this newest form of work team.

The researchers defined virtual teams as those that use technology to overcome differences in location; time or availability; and/or organizations. So "virtualness" is a characteristic of any team that, for example, occasionally uses e-mail. The authors grouped their findings using a typical framework for looking at team operations: inputs-processes-outputs.

Team Inputs

• Group Size
• • The "number of ideas generated in VTs has been found to increase with group size," while in regular teams the number goes down as the team gets too large.
  • On the other hand, increased VT size made audio-conferencing more difficult.
• Technology
• • Higher technical expertise is linked to VT success.
  • Technology that engages more senses improves VT performance: for example, "the addition of video resources results in significant improvements to the quality of a team's decisions."
  • The lack of nonverbal and visual cues in most interactions is part of why VTs take longer to make decisions, and why members have a harder time determining each others' area of expertise or predicting what another member will do in a given situation.
• Task: Task type strongly affects the success and speed of VT decision-making; for example, when a task is unclear, virtualness increases the time to create a goal, but may also increase the quality of that goal (the article didn't specify which tasks have been studied and the results).
• Diversity
• • Status differences (management level, tenure in company, etc.) among members tend to have less of an impact on VTs than on regular teams.
  • The effects of personal diversity (race, gender, etc.) are mixed; though they seemed to carry less weight in VTs than in regular teams, VT members still tended to create subgroups along those lines.
  • Cultural differences hurt coordination and communication, just as they do in face-to-face teams.
  • Though it may seem better to have a bunch of extroverted people on VTs, diversity on that trait did not hurt VTs enough to worry about it.

Team Processes

• Planning
• • As with regular teams, setting goals for VTs is very important for commitment, decision quality and other traits.
  • It is "harder for members to establish a unified sense of purpose…"
  • "Nonetheless, formalizing work processes and strategies has been found to be critical for VT performance."
  • Virtual teams have a much harder time with project management.
• Implementation
• • The overall amount of communication is lower in VTs, as you might expect, but there are exceptions.
  • One situation in which a VT has higher participation is when members use technology to overcome differences in work schedules.
  • Virtual communication raises unique issues, "such as how to react to no participation and the multiple meanings attributed to silence."
  • "Likewise, human-computer interface mistakes and technology failures…hamper communications," but these errors often are mistakenly blamed on personal failings such as a poor work ethic.
  • New members on VTs are more active in seeking information than those on regular teams.
  • Members of VTs are more likely to participate equally than those of regular teams.
  • The technology used by VTs makes it easier to track individual performance and thus reduces social loafing (the tendency for some people on teams to let others do the work).
• Interpersonal Issues
• • VT members are more likely to use inappropriate behavior such as swearing and name-calling.
  • VT members are less likely to discuss personal matters with each other initially, though the differences in that versus regular teams goes away over time.
  • Trust is especially important in VTs because it can balance out the lack of professional intimacy.
  • A face-to-face meeting early in a VT's life helps develop trust significantly.
  • One study found VTs have lower cohesiveness ("members' attraction to the group and its task") than regular teams; for teams in general, cohesiveness improves satisfaction and performance.
  • A "shared group identity" is even more important to VTs than to regular teams.

Team Outcomes

• Emotional Outcomes
• • Overall, VT members are less satisfied with the team experience than regular team members.
  • However, brainstorming and decision-making are more satisfying when done virtually.
  • Using instant messaging increases frustration levels.
• Performance Outcomes
• • Virtual work "increases the amount of time required to accomplish tasks."
  • We don't know yet whether virtual teams perform better or worse than regular teams as a rule.

The researchers' bottom line: compared to face-to-face teams, there still was a lot we didn't know about virtual teams. Source: Martins, L., L. Gilson, and M.T. Maynard (04), "Virtual Teams: What Do We Know and Where Do We Go from Here?" Journal of Management 30(6):805.