Team Members’ Perspectives on Factors Affecting Virtual Team Working in Information Technology Consulting Firms

Abstract

This study aims to explore team members’ perspectives on factors affecting virtual team working in information technology consulting firms. Using semi-structured interviews with 25 research participants, this research adopted 2 virtual teams in different contexts. One that had no face-to-face interaction whereas and the other one had the initial face-to-face meeting. The results showed that communication, trust, socialization, cultural diversity and leadership were factors affecting virtual team working for both teams. Communication was the main challenge due to different time zones but both teams overcame by organizing overlapping hours to have online synchronous meetings. The initial face-to-face meeting and open lines of communication developed affect-based trust among team members whereas cognition-based trust based on consistent work performance existed in virtual teams that lacked physical interaction. Conducting virtual bonding exercises occasionally is necessary for virtual team members in order to renew interpersonal ties among team members. In terms of culture diversity, team members from individualistic cultures favored direct communication whereas team members from collectivistic cultures soured out group-based information before reaching unanimous decisions. In terms of leadership, managers of both virtual teams ensured that work progress was on schedule and maintaining positive leadership attitudes is the key to lead virtual teams.