Geographically Dispersed Teams

Introduction

The need for outstanding talent continues to push most industries toward further limits. Organizations have critical roles that they need to fill, mainly involving the skills they can source from other places and different experts worldwide. The concept of remote working has helped offer many digital skills to all the participants. The geographically dispersed organizations, therefore, come in handy with many people who have good skills working for the company and from different locations. However, they need effective management and communication tools for efficiency in operations.

Effective collaboration in the teams

Timely communication is a critical component within the teams. Communication is essential to keep people in similar united tasks and enable them to seek their roles. Timely communication has to happen to all regardless of the location of the organization members (Eisenberg et al., 2019). Communication delays within the team can lead to problems in fulfilling their issues and managing their operations. Therefore, it is essential to use the ways of the leader as models for the practices they have to maintain within the team. That can keep all people informed and aware of their surrounding activities.

The team leader is most important in ensuring that members participate in activities. However, they are in different places and follow different ways of life in their operations. That makes it essential for the leader to have more flexibility and patience. Patience will help them understand all members and how to handle them effectively (Hill & Bartol, 2016). The flexibility will allow for differences in work execution. The two factors can help the team attain a united front in addressing their organizational tasks. The leader has to recognize all their contributions as well as individuality.

Establishing accountability is also crucial within the team to measure the progress of all individual members. It is easy to lose track of how the members work in different buildings. A system for evaluations would, in turn, helps in having the members claim and induct accountability and progress (Eisenberg et al., 2019). It can help reveal all employees’ participation in the tasks and their contributions to work. They would serve as an evaluation platform for their performance. In addition, it would help resolve the critical issues within the team and ensure that they key track of their work records.

Emotional connection is one thing that needs to get improved in dispersed teams. Creating ways for the team to connect would help the members bond. Most people within the environment work in isolation. The ability to help them connect emotionally may lead to the creation of a high-performance team (Hill & Bartol, 2016). Some of the ways of creating the teams can be seeking out ideas in a way that will ensure every person participates within the teams. There must be a facilitator for opportunities to make the team bond well. That would help the members recognize the talents of others and also build trustworthy relationships among them.

Collaboration tools

Smart file

The tool lets the users have any files they want from different locations. They have operations using any device, browser, and also API. The tool’s benefits include granular permissions that give control over what to share. The auditing trial is essential in tracking the source of files, and it is possible to send multiple files. The con is that the file has limitations in the size of files they can send.

Google Hangouts

It is a tool that allows all forms of communication with members and is also an active product of Google. That makes it better with support and availability on Google platforms. Using it can accommodate large teams and has no limit on the personnel within the channels (Malhotra & Majchrzak, 2014). It can also send any file, such as videos and audio. It also allows chat communication among the members. One can also use different devices with similar accounts. The con is that the tool limits the number of people to 250.

Slack

The tool allows the teams to communicate and contains direct chats with messaging. It also allows other features, such as GIFs. The tool is efficient and makes it easier to use communication channels. It has features that are outstanding from other applications.

Preferred Tool: Slack

Slack has better advantages over other tools to use in dispersed teams. The tool allows for communication by creating channels. The teams only get to meet sometimes. Therefore having a tool that can allow for channels that contain the conversations all through is better (Malhotra & Majchrzak, 2014). They also allow the creation of private channels suitable for employees at different ranks or departments within the organization. They also allow for direct messaging making the tool the perfect one to use for the activities.

Conclusion

Geographically dispersed teams will continue within organizations. Most of them seek skills, and since they can find them worldwide, they opt for the option. That means they need to hire people who have access to the internet and cut costs within their operations. Some tools and ways can improve the connections and communication among the team members. The constant use of the tools would ensure more bonding within the team and enable them to work together.

References

Eisenberg, J., Post, C., & DiTomaso, N. (2019). Team dispersion and performance: The role of team communication and transformational leadership. Small-Group Research, 50(3), 348-380.

Hill, N. S., & Bartol, K. M. (2016). Empowering leadership and effective collaboration in geographically dispersed teams. Personnel Psychology, 69(1), 159-198.

Malhotra, A., & Majchrzak, A. (2014). Enhancing the performance of geographically distributed teams through targeted use of information and communication technologies. Human Relations, 67(4), 389-411.