Virtual Team

Communication Training
H E AR TL AND H OSPIC E - ANN AR BOR
WELCOME!!
This training was designed with your direct
input. Through an initial survey and
subsequent focus group meetings,
communication themes were chosen. This
training seeks to address communication
challenges faced by this virtual team.
Opening
Exercise
Instructions

If you have experienced

A group of "Have you any of the following
Hold up 1 hand. ever" statements will
statements, lower one
show on the screen. finger on your hand.
Let's begin! Put one finger down if
you have ever:
Needed help with an issue but didn't know who to ask

Felt that important information was withheld from you

Wished you knew a fellow co-worker better for a stronger working relationship

Needed assistance but either did not receive a response, or response was not received in a timely
manner

Been promised a solution but there was no follow-through

Felt that communication would have been better delivered face-to-face vs. Electronically

Learned something that affects your job from someone not a part of your team/organization
How did you do?

Did you run out of fingers on one hand? If so, that's ok. This
training is designed to address these communication challenges
and suggest ways to improve communication.
Training
Objectives
 Identify Identify common communication challenges in virtual teams

Following
this Demonstrate Demonstrate effective communication skills with fellow team members

training,
you will be Describe Describe the role of trust in communication

able to:
Comprehend Comprehend the importance of collaboration and teamwork
What is a virtual team?
A virtual team is one in which team members
are not co-located. Our team has members
that work in several different settings (in our
Ann Arbor office, at corporate, in facilites, in
patient homes, etc.), making us a virtual
team.
Pillars of
Communication
in Virtual Teams

Relationship Building/ Cohesion

Trust/Transparency

Collaboration/Teamwork

Effective Leadership
 The single, most
important pillar of
communication in a
virtual team.
Relationship-
building
When relationships
are not built from
the start, team
performance
suffers.
 Relationship-building

“Recent research on geographically dispersed, or

virtual, teams has found that friendly personal
acquaintanceships were the number one contributor
to productivity within these teams. Moreover, in
virtual teams, building relationships with peers may
be more important than in face-to-face or co-located
teams.”
Hart & McLeod, 2003
Activity: Relationship-
Building/Cohesion
A facilitator who felt awkward calling people to “chat about
life” preferred to “get down to business”. However, this
facilitator experienced a number of miscommunications with
a team member that he attributed to a lack of prior
relationship building. He realized he was going to have to
make a serious effort in the future to get to know his team
members better before settling into work relationships.

Discuss with the person sitting next to you a time

when you've experienced something similar, whether as a
leader or as a team member.
Final Word on Relationship-
building/Cohesion

"...face-to-face meetings give facilitators the opportunity to understand individual team

member communication styles and personal and professional motivations, making it
easier to then move into virtual working relationships.” (Hart& McLeod, 2003)

When face-to-face meetings are not possible, every effort should be made to utilize
different forms of telecommunication such as phone calls or videoconferencing.
Trust/Transparency
Two types of trust:
Affective trust- Consists of emotional bonds
between members in a team.
Cognitive trust- When members
reasonably trust others will play their
roles appropriately and finish their jobs.
“Trust has been referred to as the “glue” that propels
a team toward the successful completion of its
project. When team members are geographically
dispersed, it is trust that must hold them together in
place of direct supervision or a common social and
work environment.”
Altschuller & Benbunan-Fich, 2010
 By creating "virtual copresence".
But how do
we learn to
trust??
Virtual copresence is the subjective feeling of being
together with others in a virtual environment. Presence
connotes "being there"; copresence describes "being
there together".

Virtual copresence not only creates a "sense of

connection" and "closer ties" among team members, it is
also closely related and is a prerequisite for interpersonal
trust.
Developing Trust Within a Virtual
Team

Design team-building exercises that highlight common experiences or

dependencies to help strengthen the potential for trust and high performance
of a virtual team.
Collaboration &
Teamwork

“When you’re working virtually, you are really flying blind.

You are dependent on other people for keeping you up-to-
date with what’s happening on their side.” (Pauleen &
Yoong, 2001)
➢ Virtual teams have an interdependency
which rivals that of traditional teams.

➢ Virtual teams must quickly learn to work

together in order to succeed.

➢ All team members must have a team

mentality, not an individualistic view.
 Stand in a circle

Teamwork Split into groups of

eight.
facing one another,
shoulder to
shoulder.

Exercise:
The Human Everyone should
reach into the
Now figure out how
to untangle the
Knot circle with your
right hand and
grab the hand of a
knot. On the first
try, do not speak. If
unsuccessful, try
person across from again while
you. speaking.
 oCould a single person have figured out how to become
untangled on their own?

oWas it difficult to untangle the knot when no one was

Exercise verbally communicating?

Reflection oWas it challenging to untangle the knot when people

talked over one another?

oHow can this exercise be applied to communicating in

a virtual team?
Effective
Leadership
IN A VIRTUAL TEAM
Unique Role of
Leadership in Virtual
Teams
In a traditional,co-located team, leadership is fairly
straight-forward. You can see who leadership is, their
roles are clearly defined and felt.

“Leadership in virtual teams must be experienced by

the team members, thus leaders in virtual teams need
to project some level of telepresence to be felt, and
ultimately to be effective. The effectiveness of
leadership is also due to what the leader does.”
(Zigurs, 2003)
 Frequent communication is even more important in virtual teams
than in traditional teams.

“Leaders need to learn how to use the vividness and interactivity

of media to make their presence felt in a positive way, and to
What does a exercise appropriate influence to move the team forward.” (Zigurs,
2003)
leader have
The key challenge for virtual team leaders is to make a conscious
to do? and concerted effort to develop personal relationships with team
members through the use of available communication channels.

“The development of personal relationships... would make the

building of a team “culture of cooperation” more likely. In order to
build relationships, facilitators need to strategically use the
communication channels they have available to them.” (Pauleen
and Yoong, 2001)
Connection to Other Communication Themes

Relationship-building: “Managers must focus attention on building such social intimacy for virtual
team members instead of only focusing on the task dimensions, such as how to distribute and
coordinate the tasks.” (Liu, 2011)
Trust: “Even in virtual teams, where there are few cues, initial impressions are formed quickly and
they persist in the face of new evidence, making it difficult for members to develop a real
understanding of one another, potentially eroding levels of trust.” (Zigurs, 2003)
Collaboration: “It is the role of the leader to promote task-related interaction by promoting
interdependence and reliance on one another for learning and development. This could be
accomplished by dividing work in such a way that team members must pair up, or by assigning
team members to one another for mentoring or help on particular task-related concerns.” (Hart &
Mcleod, 2003)
"IT STARTS AT THE TOP"
We've all heard that saying. Leadership sets the tone for the team. Particularly in a
virtual team, leadership must:

❖Be reliable/dependable

❖Be trustworthy

❖Bring the team together

❖Follow through when asked for help

❖Be responsive

❖Listen to their team

❖Remember to focus on social relationships in addition to task-related concerns

 Our team faces challenges unique to the
virtual nature of our organization.

Ultimately, communication can be improved by

remembering these four pillars of
communication:
CONCLUSION
• Relationship-building/cohesion
• Trust/transparency
• Collaboration/teamwork
• Effective leadership

We are all responsible for the success of our

team.
Questions/Feedback?
THANK
YOU!
 Please click the link to fill out a
training evaluation form:
Training
Evaluation
Training Evaluation Form
References
Altschuller, S., & Benbunan‐Fich, R. (2010). Trust, performance, and the communication process in ad
hoc Decision‐Making virtual teams. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 16(1), 27-47.

Hart, R. K., & Mcleod, P. L. (2003). Rethinking team building in geographically dispersed teams: One
message at a time. Organizational Dynamics, 31(4), 352-361.

Kock, N. (2010). An empirical study of building social relationships within virtual teams IGI Global. ch016

Pauleen, D. J., & Yoong, P. (2001). Facilitating virtual team relationships via internet and conventional
communication channels. Internet Research, 11(3), 190-202.

Zigurs, I. (2003). Leadership in virtual teams: Oxymoron or opportunity? Organizational Dynamics, 31(4),
339-351.