Global virtual teamwork:Eight key empirical findings and

related conclusions

Ned Kock

© Ned Kock

© Ned Kock

What are virtual teams?

Teams of individuals whose members interact primarily electronically in order to accomplish business tasks – e.g., develop

a new product, redesign a business process, develop a new contract

© Ned Kock

Team data used as a basis for developing the findings

• Over 400 Business process redesign teams in three countries (US, Brazil, New Zealand)

• Over 460 New product development teams in the US

• A variety of other types of teams, performing collaborative tasks of different levels of complexity, in the US, Brazil and New Zealand

© Ned Kock

Finding 1: Naturalness scale

People seem to perceive electronic media as more or less “natural” (e.g., easy to use) depending on how the media incorporate

face-to-face communication elements

E-mail Face-to-face

Video conferencing

Audio conferencingInstant messaging

Naturalness

© Ned Kock

Finding 2: Info. vs. knowledge comm.

• It is much harder to communicate knowledge than information through unnatural media (e.g., e-mail)

• It is estimated that conveying knowledge over e-mail is at least 10 times more time consuming than face-to-face (for co-located individuals)

• Information communication– Two people know how a contract should be structured, and

have to discuss some of the numbers in a few clauses (e.g., deadline for product delivery)

• Knowledge communication– One person needs to explain to another how a contract should

be structured, what clauses should be include, and why

© Ned Kock

Finding 3: Cognitive effort

It is cognitively more demanding to communicate using unnatural media

0.00

1.00

2.00

3.00

4.00

5.00

6.00

7.00

Face-to-face Electronic

Cognitive effort

Difference FtF vs. e-conferencing = 41% (statistically significant)

© Ned Kock

Finding 4: Communication ambiguity

Communication through unnatural media is more ambiguous

Difference FtF vs. e-conferencing = 80% (statistically significant)

0.00

1.00

2.00

3.00

4.00

5.00

Face-to-face Electronic

Communication ambiguity

© Ned Kock

Finding 5: The speech imperative

Support to speech significantly increases the naturalness of a communication medium

Difference IM vs. audio conf. = 46% (statistically significant)Difference audio conf. vs. FtF = 3% (not statistically significant)

0.00

2.00

4.00

6.00

8.00

10.00

12.00

14.00

Instant msg Audio conferencing Face-to-face

Mental effort

© Ned Kock

Finding 6: Cost (time spent)

Communication through certain unnatural (asynchronous) media saves time

Difference FtF vs. e-conferencing = 167% (statistically significant)

0.00

2.00

4.00

6.00

8.00

10.00

Face-to-face Electronic

Cost (time spent)

© Ned Kock

Finding 7: Costs other than time spent

• Transportation costs can be substantially higher in FtF meetings than asynchronous meetings, being usually correlated with the level of geographical distribution of the team members

• Disruption costs are significantly higher in FtF meetings than asynchronous meetings

• Other costs can be reduced as well – clerical costs, room & equipment etc.

© Ned Kock

Finding 8: Task outcome quality

Task outcome quality is not significantly affected by the use of unnatural media

Difference FtF vs. e-conferencing = 4% (Not statistically significant)

0 2 4 6 8

Task outcome quality

Cognitive effort

Communication ambiguity

Fluency

Electronic

Face-to-face

© Ned Kock

Conclusions: Global teams should …

• Break team projects down into subtasks categorized along a knowledge communication intensiveness scale; say a 4-level scale, from 1 (little KC) to 4 (a lot of KC)

• Use the following media for the tasks:– 1: E-mail or similar

– 2: Instant messaging or similar

– 3: Asynchronous audio conferencing

– 4: Synchronous audio or teleconferencing

• The above assumes that FtF communication needs to be avoided

© Ned Kock

ReferencesFinal slide

• Kock, N. and Davison, R. (2003), Can Lean Media Support Knowledge Sharing? Investigating a Hidden Advantage of Process Improvement, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, V.50, No.2, pp. 151-163.

• Kock, N. (2002), Evolution and Media Naturalness: A Look at E-Communication Through a Darwinian Theoretical Lens, Proceedings of the 23rd International Conference on Information Systems, Applegate, L., Galliers, R. and DeGross, J.L. (Eds), The Association for Information Systems, Atlanta, GA, pp. 373-382.

• Kock, N. (1999), Process Improvement and Organizational Learning: The Role of Collaboration Technologies, Idea Group Publishing, Hershey, PA.

• Kock, N. (1998), Can Communication Medium Limitations Foster Better Group Outcomes? An Action Research Study, Information & Management, V.34, No.5, pp. 295-305.

http://www.tamiu.edu/~nedkock