Reference no: EM131783040

Needing assistance with these two questions based on the case study below. Nothing long, just something simple and straight to the point. Need help asap.

• What organizational culture and global strategy did you observe?
• Is this culture and strategy a good match for virtual teaming? Why or why not?

The following is taken from David Creelman's interview of Dr. Gina Walker, director of Research & Product Development for Harold Stolovitch and Associates. DC: Take me through the specifics of one project involving a virtual team. GW: In one project, a large global high-tech corpora- tion needed a learning and performance support sys- tem to help their engineers implement a new software system. There were a lot of change management im- plications and we anticipated a lot of resistance . . . .nd we had a very short timeline. . . . Our company has resources located all over so, as project director, I first talked to the client in France about their needs. One issue was that we needed somebody like myself in the same time zone to facili- tate communication with the client. The client also had some key resources in California so we needed people there who could get some face-to-face contact. We also had some people in Vancouver who had ex- perience doing this kind of work, so I wanted them on this project. And that's how I assembled the team. We went through the usual planning phases like doing front-end analysis, making sure that we were in touch with the key people, getting an idea of who the learners were, and then launching the design and development phase where we had to deal with the subject matter experts. . . . It was impossible to meet face to face, so, "We had to establish clear, unambiguous objectives for the project [and] to be very specific about budgets and timelines." With e-mail and telephone, and without face to face contact, "There is a risk of ambiguity creeping into your work. With electronic communication . . . it's very im- portant to be clear in all of our communication." And to "communicate frequently. We had, at least, a weekly discussion by phone where we would discuss the status of the work. Prior to this meeting, I would e-mail the client a status report. . . . Because of distance, frequent and regular status and review meetings are necessary to diffuse uncertainties or to redirect efforts." One communication guideline we adopted was to request our project team members respond to any questions within 24 hours. . . . However, one thing that you have to be very careful of is burdening everybody with too much e-mail. . . . We learned to filter the excess and find out what was really important. . . . With virtual teams, scheduling meetings is very important because people are in different time zones and coordination is important. . . . Try to establish specific time slots when individuals will make them- selves available. . . . [Although a face-to-face meeting was impossible] I do recommend [it]. . . . A meeting helps the team establish a sense of comfort with each other . . . [At least] have a phone launch where you work to form a sense of team identity. And I encourage people to get to know each other over the course of the project. . . . We also had to build structures of teamwork-one was a set of team leaders to manage the resources at their individual locations. . . . Another structure is a "co-director." On a recent large project spanning time zones, I was the project director in Montreal and my co-director was in Vancouver. We had our own team members as well as those of the client lo- cated across the continent. We were able to pass work back and forth across the time zones, so work could be done and on the client's desk in the morn- ing. We were able, in fact, to lengthen our work day. It's a very interesting way of working. In order to avoid rough spots, you need to establish a common set of understandings . . . common stan- dards and work practices. Shared templates and tools, samples, job aids, and process/output norms all help. I think that they will become more and more rou- tine. They provide a very positive means of accom- plishing goals. . . . Overall, we have found that virtual teams operating in virtual environments produce as high quality results as they do in live, local contexts. Project management has to be more present, however.