“…You cannot build network organizations on electronic networks alone…If so we will probably need an entirely new sociology of organizations.”

Nohria & Eccles, 1992, pp. 304–305.

 

Nowadays, Company management, including its top executives, is distributed geographically so the companies use virtual teams to support major global corporate customer sales and post sales services.

A virtual team is an evolutionary form of a network organization (Miles & Snow, 1986) enabled by advances in information and communication technology (Davidow & Malone, 1992; Jarvenpaa & Ives, 1994). According to other autors, a virtual team " is a temporary, culturally diverse, geographically dispersed, electronically communicating work group" The concept of virtual implies permeable interfaces and boundaries, project teams that rapidly form, reorganize, and dissolve when the needs of a dynamic marketplace change, and individuals with differing competencies who are located across time, space, and cultures (Kristof et al, 1995; Mowshowitz, 1997)

 

Retieved From  www.skype.com

Retrieved From www.teamviewer.com

Companies today face increasing challenges to remain competitive and to develop products that reach a sustainable success over time, with virtual teams a company ensures “flexibility, responsiveness, lower costs, and improved resource utilization necessary to meet ever-changing task requirements in highly turbulent and dynamic global business environments” (Jarvenpaa &  Leidner, 1998).

However a virtual team has its downsize:

• low individual commitment
• role overload
• role ambiguity
• absenteeism
• social loafing ( people exerting less effort to achieve a goal when they work in a group)

 To avoid such problems, the team leader must held face to face meetings in orther to create a link between members and also to enhance the communication flows and to increase trust between team members. " only trust can prevent the geographical and organizational distances of global team members from becoming psychological distances (O'Hara-Devereaux & Johansen, 1994)"

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Must of the time, team members have never worked before and/or have never seen eachother in the "real life" becaus of that the reltionships between member are not developed and can affect the team's performance. Leaders have the responsabily to implement a strategy so the team's dynamics operate the proper way and that the work relations have more harmony. 

“Time, Interaction, and Performance (TIP) theory describes work groups as time-based, multi-functional, and multi-modal social systems. Effective groups are engaged simultaneously and continuously in three functions: (1) production (problem solving and task-performance), (2) member-support (member inclusion, participation, loyalty, commitment), and (3) group well-being (interaction, member roles, power, politics). Member-support and group well-being relate directly to relationship development.” (McGrath's ,1991).

Retrieved from ounae.com

From my experience, you don't have to be in another country to engage into a virtual team. I some cases there is just no time to meet with the team and waiting till you can face eachother can affect theresult if you are tied to a deadline. I don't know if this happens to other people, but for example is easier for me to reach my mom via e-mail than calling her or waiting until she gets home. 

Virtual tools are not just to get a business done, and although the communication and the relationships are not exactly the same, virtual tools can bring people closer together :)