Hidden Traps of Virtual Teams

Hidden Traps of Virtual Teams

A Harvard Business Review Webinar featuring

Karen Sobel Lojeski November 10, 2015

Sponsored by

© 2015 Harvard Business School Publishing. Created for Harvard Business Review by BullsEye Resources www.bullseyeresources.com

November 10, 2015

Hidden Traps of Virtual Teams OVERVIEW As technology reshapes the nature of the workplace, many employees find themselves working on some form of a virtual team. But many of these employees complain that their teams are frustrating, time-consuming, and ineffective. To overcome these challenges, companies must evaluate the “virtual distance” in their organizations and identify how and where groups are struggling. With this information they can develop a solution roadmap that promotes more effective communication and creates targeted strategies for addressing physical, operational, and affinity distance.

contributors Karen Sobel Lojeski Assistant Professor, Stony Brook University Angelia Herrin (Moderator) Editor for Special Projects and Research, Harvard Business Review

CONTEXT Karen Sobel Lojeski discussed the hidden traps that virtual teams often fall into, as well as how to improve productivity and innovation by reducing virtual distance.

KEY LEARNINGS Virtual teams encounter common pitfalls. With globalization and new technology, more people work on virtual teams. Unfortunately, there are five hidden traps many organizations fall into. • Trap 1: Thinking that not all teams are virtual. Initially, the term “virtual teams” was used for employees telecommuting or working remotely, perhaps from a client site. People in co-located teams, however, were not considered to be virtual. That assumption needs to change. Today everyone is a virtual team member. Whenever people are working at a screen, and not face to face with their communication, they are virtual. • Trap 2: Old management models work for new workforce challenges. Many traditional management models were developed in the 1950s and 1960s, when enterprises were vertically integrated and communication technologies were different. Today’s organizational and social landscapes look nothing like yesterday’s and workers now rely on communication technologies like the Internet and smartphones, which are only around 10 years old. • Trap 3: When you try and squeeze a virtual workforce into old management models, you end up with the connectivity paradox. This paradox suggests that the more connected people become, the more isolated they begin to feel. This often occurs when organizations use old management models to try to address new circumstances.

“We have to stop thinking about the workplace as a place where some people are in virtual teams and some are in ‘regular’ teams, because we are all virtual.” – Karen Sobel Lojeski


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• Trap 4: Technology is at the center of virtual teams. In reality, people are at the center of virtual teams. This is important to remember because people innovate and their connections with the real world inspire them. Although technology is powerful, it merely computes. Innovation comes from people. • Trap 5: Implementing non metrics-based virtual team models. A famous example of this trap is illustrated by the Boeing Dreamliner project. Boeing took a virtual team approach which failed. Many problems arose because the company implemented notions of virtual work that had no grounding in research. Leveraging virtual distance can avoid these traps. Virtual distance measures what is lost when a human being is translated through a machine. There are seven principles associated with virtual distance: 1. It is an emotional detachment that grows when people rely heavily on electronic communications. 2. It can be calculated. 3. It can be predicted. 4. It is found in both co-located and far-flung teams. 5. It can be reduced and this improves critical success factors for teams. 6. It can be managed. 7. Low virtual distance results in higher performance and innovation.

How Virtual Distance Hurts Companies Virtual distance is associated with: • A 90% drop in innovation. • An 83% decrease in trust. • An 80% drop in job satisfaction and employee engagement. • A 65% decrease in clarity. • A 60% decline in on-time and on-budget performance. • A 50% hit in leader effectiveness.

Each organization has a unique virtual distance profile. Even within a company, different departments can have different virtual distance profiles. By understanding virtual distance profiles, it is possible to target solutions and get the best results more rapidly.


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The virtual distance model is the key to improving virtual team performance. Understanding the virtual distance model can help organizations create more productive virtual teams. While all three elements determine the degree of virtual distance, operational distance and affinity distance are most important.

Figure 1 The Virtual Distance Model Affinity Distance Cultural Relationship Social Interdependence

Virtual Distance Model Physical Distance

Operational Distance

Geography

Communications

Temporal

Readiness

Organizational

Multi-load

Virtual distance is a three-factor model, composed of physical, operational, and affinity distance. • Physical distance. This includes the “usual suspects,” like geographic, temporal, time zone, and organizational distances. Organizational distance occurs by default when people work in different departments or companies. Physical distance isn’t the primary contributor to virtual distance and has the smallest impact on virtual team outcomes. • Operational distance. This results from a lack of shared context. Operational distance causes day-to-day communication breakdowns and barriers that prevent fluid and meaningful messages from getting through. Communications theory suggests the precursors to shared meaning are shared context and information exchange. Before shared context is established, people apply the “same as me” bias. When an individual talks with someone face to face, they assume the other person is just like them. Within the first few seconds, however, they realize that assumption is false. By adjusting their language, tone, and cadence to synchronize with the other person, shared context is created. With virtual communication, nothing exists to break the “same as me” bias. As a result, shared context cannot be created. It is impossible to leapfrog from information exchange to shared meaning. Another aspect of communication distance is that people tend to rely on one mode of communication (like email) over others. When virtual teams work together, they should use multiple modes of communication. This helps develop shared context.


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• Affinity distance. This is the source of major roadblocks that prevent deep relationships from forming. When affinity distance is high, people are electronically connected but the human factors that keep people meaningfully attached are missing. Affinity distance is composed of cultural, relationship, social, and interdependence distances. —— Cultural distance. Many falsely believe this is related to country-based cultural issues. If people are trained on country-based cultural issues, they are trained on stereotypes and never realize that individuals have their own personal value systems. —— Relationship distance. This relates to whether team members know one another. If people have worked together before, they have strong ties which reduce virtual distance. When teammates don’t know one another, but have common acquaintances, they have weak ties. Teams with weak ties also have lower levels of virtual distance, because their common acquaintances create an immediate sense of trust. —— Social distance. This relates to a person’s formal status versus what they contribute at work. When formal status is the primary reason a person is taken seriously, virtual distance increases. In contrast, when work contributions are valued more than status, virtual distance decreases. —— Interdependence distance. This is very important to virtual distance. On teams with low interdependence distance, people sense that their future depends on others and they feel an equal stake in outcomes. In the absence of face-to-face interaction or other ways to know colleagues better, it can be almost impossible for virtual teams to get a sense of a shared future. One way to significantly reduce virtual distance is through tactics that reduce interdependence distance. Virtual distance metrics and virtual distance mapping lead to targeted strategies that promote more effective teamwork. With virtual distance metrics, it is possible to identify an organization’s virtual distance footprint and understand how it compares with those of other groups. Metrics highlight how different groups have different dynamics. Even within a single group, team members can feel very differently about factors related to virtual distance. Metrics are important because: • Using the same strategies across an organization to reduce virtual distances simply won’t work. • It is possible to zoom in on individuals and find ways to reduce virtual distance between team members. • They help executives and managers prioritize work to reduce virtual distance.


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Figure 2 Examples of Virtual Distance Metrics

Once an organization has generated virtual distance reports, it can begin virtual distance mapping. Virtual distance mapping is done in three steps: 1. Identify key players. All team members are identified, as well as how they are connected. This reveals misunderstandings about where people think they fit. 2. Locate the critical relationship path (CRP). A CRP is a chain of direct or indirect relationships where people in the chain are critical to its success. If virtual distance is high along the CRP, initiatives or strategies will fail. 3. Estimate and act on virtual distance. Virtual distances can be estimated based on the nature of physical, operational, and affinity distance. This information is useful when developing a virtual distance roadmap. The roadmap identifies strategies to reduce virtual distance. An important element of the roadmap is developing TechnoDexterity. Executives and managers with TechnoDexterity thoughtfully determine the appropriate communication mode and message in any situation.


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– Learning

“We have to let go of things that we’re very used to and understand that the models we’ve relied on for many years are based on assumptions, especially about communications, that have largely ceased to exist. The models themselves don’t work very well in a virtual work environment and we need new ways of thinking about approaching the problem.”

– Organizational Citizenship Behaviors (OCB)

– Karen Sobel Lojeski

Virtual Distance Awareness

Figure 3 Virtual Distance Solution Roadmap

Affinity Distance

Operational Distance

Physical Distance

Develop TechnoDexterity Geographic Distance

Temporal Distance

Organizational Distance

Face-to-Face Decision Points

Rotation and Perspective

Realign Experience

Communications Distance

Multi-Load

Readiness Distance

Rebalance

Optimize

Provision

Cultural Distance

Social Distance

Relationship Distance

Interdependence Distance

Layering

Recognition

Seed and Enhance

Discover and Reformulate

R e s t o r e

S h a r e d

C o n t e x t

This approach to reducing virtual distance and restoring shared context works. Sobel Lojeski recently trained a financial services company with over 300,000 employees on methods for reducing virtual distance. After eight months, she returned and retested the organization. The company showed significant reductions in affinity distance and significant improvements on outcomes, including innovation and citizenship behavior. • Audit Results showed significant improvements on:

Figure 4 Financial Services Case Study Results

– Innovation – Satisfaction

– Clarity – Customer Satisfaction – Trust

• Those who were trained in Virtual Distance Management scored lower (better) on ALL Virtual Distance factors • Most significant reduction on Affinity Distance

Other Important Point Guidelines. Sobel Lojeski recommends establishing guidelines for virtual teams, but not rules. Rules imply the team leader is taking an authoritative position and telling others how to work. Guidelines about project meeting times and communication preferences are often helpful.


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BIOGRAPHIES Karen Sobel Lojeski

Angelia Herrin (Moderator)

Assistant Professor, Stony Brook University

Editor, Special Projects and Research, Harvard Business Review

Dr. Karen Sobel Lojeski is an assistant professor in the Department of Technology and Society in the College of Engineering and Applied Science at Stony Brook University.

Angelia Herrin is the editor for special projects and research at HBR. Her journalism experience spans 25 years, primarily with Knight-Ridder newspapers and USA TODAY, where she was the Washington editor. She won the Knight Fellowship in Professional Journalism at Stanford University in 1990. She has taught journalism at the University of Maryland and Harvard University.

Karen is the author of many articles as well as two books: Uniting the Virtual Workforce: Transforming Leadership and Innovation in the Globally Integrated Enterprise, and Leading the Virtual Workforce: How Great Leaders Transform Organizations in the 21st Century, detailing business cases from Western Union, IBM, Merck, HP, ATT, Alcatel-Lucent, Crayola, and more.

Prior to coming to HBR, Angelia was the vice president for content at womenConnect.com, a website focused on women business owners and executives.

Her groundbreaking work has been featured in major business publications including Businessweek, Forbes.com, Reuters.com, and The New York Times. She has also appeared on various television and radio broadcasts as an expert on the impact of technology on human relationships and society at large.

The information contained in this summary reflects BullsEye Resources, Inc.’s subjective condensed summarization of the applicable conference session. There may be material errors, omissions, or inaccuracies in the reporting of the substance of the session. In no way does BullsEye Resources or Harvard Business Review assume any responsibility for any information provided or any decisions made based upon the information provided in this document.


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