Power and Trust in the Virtual Workplace

Abstract

How we work in an increasingly computer-mediated world requires new ways of understanding the construction of teams, their co-construction of tacit knowledge to make sense of the organization, and their use of emergent technologies. We posit an alternative research perspective –that of the communities of practice construct – allows a fuller understanding of the relationships of power and trust in team behaviors and processes. The communities-of-practice model provides an avenue to examine the intricate dance that trust and power perform in virtual environments, with people as the focal point. It is how people interact with each other, with in technology, to be or become successful virtually that is the focus of this chapter. We explore trust and power in virtual or blended work environments using a reflexive autoethnographic narrative, comprised of three case studies, grounded in the larger context of the organizational communication literature.