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Harvey, Michael; Novicevic, Milorad M.; Garrison, Garry // Global virtual teams: A human

resource capital architecture // International Journal of Human Resource Management, 2005,

16(9), p1583-1599 // ISSN: 0958-5192

Globalization has organically introduced Global Virtual Teams (GVTs) and made them

an essential part of any rapidly expanding international companies. GVTs, which are groups of

people working together even though they are geographically separated, have the potential to be

catalysts in effectively utilizing a company’s human resources (HR). Even though GTVs show

great promise, problems associated with an interconnected global work force are amplified and

new issues have arisen which include difficulty working with individuals from differing cultures,

decreased ability for members to build social/cultural capital within a team, difficultly to asses

performance, and GVTs cannot convey informal rules or norms which in turn would lead to an

increase in misunderstandings and confusion.

GVTs value-creating competencies can be broken down into: self-related competencies,

team context-related competencies, and vision-related competencies. These competencies, if

bundled together effectively, will foster a sustainable competitive advantage over the firm’s

global rivals. Another determining factor in how to efficiently use an organizations competencies

would be the balance between the development of a firm knowledge base and the knowledge

shared by collaborating GVT members, or the management of corporate HR architecture. Human

capital needs to be invested in, trained, highly adaptable to change, and most importantly and

perhaps the most difficult task, it needs to be measured in order to add value to an organization’s

GVT. Using a six-stepped approach, human capital becomes both a strategic tool and can

“directly influence dynamic capabilities.” The next critical capital is social capital, built around

associability and trust, which is loosely defined as the social relations employed to facilitate and

achieve certain goals. Having trust in another’s reliability and ethical integrity and the ability to

associate individual level goals with collective goals are the most important dimensions of social

capital. Even though social capital is conceptualized for the collective, it can enhance individual,

team, and firm level social capital. Political capital, broken down into reputational and

representative capital, is not the social grease of a firm but rather the ability of GVT members to

developed political skills throughout the global project. There are six key leadership behaviors of

GVT members that influence the building of political capital: social approximation, level/type of

interaction, scope and reach, dispersion of knowledge, durability, and degree of formality.

Although the pursuit of political capital can reduce the level of conflict and confusion among the

members of a GVT, it can also be limited in its effectiveness due to the short longevity of most

GVTs. Building political capital or skill among its GVT counterparts goes back to trust which is

strengthen the longer a relationship is fostered. Another problem that could arise when

developing a political capital strategy, especially true when merging regional operations, is the

delusion of control and a rather limited, complex hierarchy.

Each previously mentioned capital involves to some degree the final critical capital, cross

cultural capital. Cultural intelligence and cross cultural competence involves three key

dimensions which include, cognitive, motivational, and behavioral dimension. Utilizing these

facets is vital to receiving, gathering, and interpreting cross cultural information which in turn

can be used to develop and maintain cultural competence for the GVT. It is obvious that an

organization’s ability to expand its operations beyond its cultural boundaries is directly related to

how strong their cross cultural capital is within its GVTs.

In order to maintain and develop capital within a GVT, a six pronged approach has been

used successful to increase efficient use of human resources. The very first step is to formalize

the assessment process and to institutionalize it, which requires establishing the cost of the

collection process, determining who will conduct the assessment, and finally to standardize or

institutionalize guidelines of the assessment itself. The second step is to establish a monitoring

assessment team, one that is reflective of the number, diversity, and the amount of intangible

assets of the GVT, but more importantly membership should be driven by the skill set and

experience of potential assessment team members. The next step is to develop a non-imitable,

durable, appropriable, substitutable, and superior set of measurements for monitoring GVT

capital. Even though there are numerous metrics and methods in measuring GVT capital, two

metrics are more commonly used: economics value added and market value added. The fourth

step revolves around developing contingency strategies for protecting GVT capital. Effective

capital security plans protect against the sometimes inevitable depletion of capital stock and are

comprised of four elements which need to be simultaneously utilized in order to protect the

intangible core of capital in a GVT. Once a proactive strategy for developing capital stock of

GVT is implemented the final step in the capital assessment process is to monitor and account

for capital in the GVT over time. During this step capital becomes a team asset and is bundled

together with similar capitals in order to improve the GVT capabilities and performance.

In order for global firms to stay relevant in today’s hyper-competitive market an

organization needs to embrace, invest in and implement global virtual teams as incubators of

innovations. GVTs are increasingly used as strategic tools in developing and maintaining a

competitive edge for a global organizations. GVTs are made more efficient by reconfigured

human resource capital architecture to meet the demands of GVTs, a continuous assessment and

reassessment program, and enhanced competences of its intellectual capital.

Dubé, Line; Paré, Guy. // Global Virtual Teams // Communications of the ACM, 2001, 44(12),

p71-73 // SSN: 0001-0782

A study revolving around global virtual team leaders from businesses diverse in sizes and

industry all seemed to have the same challenges, recommendations, and all saw the same benefits

from their use of GVTs. Different and at times conflicting cultural norms lead to an array of

issues from management style clashes to cultural bias but most concluded that with pre-project

cultural training and education some of this avoidable cross cultural problems would be solved.

Communication barriers resulting in a loss of vital ideas and information, but could be curved by

introducing structured communication sessions, the implementation of technology to check

grammar and spelling, and use of basic foreign language training. Different levels of IT

proficiency, lack of technology training, and incompatible, unreliable, or unavailable technology

was another major issue weighing down the efficiency of their GVTs. After the daunting task of

selecting the right media for each task, GVT leaders are faced with the inherent downfalls of

telecommunication, which include the lack of physical interaction, nonverbal cues, and

synergies. Implication of an effect GVTs require the creation of a reliable electronic workplace.

Goodbody, Jenny // Critical Success Factors for Global Virtual Teams // Strategic

Communication Management, 2005, 9(2), p18-21 // ISSN: 1363-9064

Written from the experiences of BOC group’s global change manger, there are three

factors that determine the success of VGTs: team formation, trust and collaboration, and team

communication. The first stage, and most important to the health of a GVT, includes carefully

positioning and clearing defining who the GVT leader, or sponsor, should be. After individual

ownership of the collective goals is set and measured, it is important to recruit members of the

team with different functional backgrounds. As is true with any initial meeting, first impressions

are everything which holds especially true to the vitally important kick off meeting meant to

jump start the relationships between the GVT members. BOC group’s manager highlights the

most important cultural influences that a GVT should be made aware of, which includes:

individualism vs. collectivism, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and task/relationship

orientation. One should also re-evaluate previous co-located team members in order to asses if

they will be of any value to the new GVT. The final step in the first factor is to build a team

identity, which will help with associating a brand with key goals and objectives of various

GVTs. When trying to foster trust and collaboration, the second factor in the success of a GVT, it

is important to ensure consistency. Formal teleconferences, a stricter schedule and hard deadlines

are meant to combat the lack of oversight and management of a GVT, but also help with

encouraging collaboration among its members. As with any manager it is extremely important to

communicate success to its members and be aware of individual efforts in the form of

celebrating achievements. The final factor is team communication, which arguably is the most

important part of a successful VGT. Be proactive about sharing information for the next

conference call by preparing 6-10 bullet point overviews, select the appropriate technology in

relation to what needs to be communicated, and finally effectively facilitate team meetings, are

all ways to increase the GVT’s commination.

My Comments

This topic seems to have been written exclusively for myself. I hold two jobs where I am

in continuous participation within a global virtual team. Given that most of what was said I can

agree with I would like to add a couple more things. In regards to technological issues that where

stated in “Global Virtual Teams,” ten years has since passed and I think those are no longer

applicable to what one would consider a GVT in today’s business landscape. Furthermore, in

today’s global market employees that do not have technological knowhow are extremely rare. If

one has to be told how to organize your email or how to organize a CRM program, you might not

have a job in the future. Most issues presented by Line Dube and Guy Pare are solved by

technologies that have come out in the last 15 years. If I cannot speak a client’s language, I have

software that will translate it for me, if I have to use software I am unfamiliar with Youtube

undoubtedly has a tutorial for me, and if one mode of media fails me I have dozens of other

backups. Just as an example, I have split screens showing a live stream of my office in Sao Paulo

and a direct google hangout button for each of my partners from Austin, Tx to Cape Town, South

Africa. I cannot stress how important Goodbody’s categories are for effective GVTs. Without

realizing that I was following her guidelines I have managed to follow them down to the smallest

details, like the kick off meeting in which we have an initial live streamed launch event built

around a more causal vibe with music. The only addition I would have to insert would be the

value of improved technologies. We utilize a festival management software which embodies

many of Goodbody’s key categories like ensuring consistency or encouraging collaboration by

being able to give tasks to others, complete other’s tasks in order to gain more trust, and even

allows for smaller celebrations when key goals are met in the form of a competitive point

system. Interesting enough, our teams are tasked to write out 3-6 bullet point pre-conference call

notes in order to steer the videoconference in the right direction and to make sure we are utilizing

our time wisely. What we have done to combat time differences, listed as an issue with GVTs, is

to assign off hours to certain directors or purchasers, where employees have the option of

working at certain times that would coincide with our offices in Brazil or Singapore.