Qualities of an Inspirational Leader and their Benefits
Effective leaders have great inspirational qualities. True leaders are gifted with exceptional influencing and charismatic qualities, which can drive others for delivering their best or demonstrate excellence in performance for exceeding expectations. Managers ensure smooth organizational functioning by merely taking care of the policy related matters, strategies, system, structure, technologies, and people issues. On the […]
Using Internal Loss Data to Mitigate Operational Risks
The modern approaches to risk management are data-driven. There are four basic steps to this approach which we will study later in this module. The first step contains information about how data related to internal losses suffered by an organization needs to be collected and studied in order to better mitigate risks in the future. […]
Emotional Intelligence for Leaders
An organization is made up of people and when people are involved, emotions automatically come into play, and a workplace is no different. It would be unwise to assume that a workplace is all objective, no-emotion only performance kind of a packed room where hormones have no scope to creep in however the fact is […]
Importance of Communication in Change Management
For implementing a change program successfully, communication is the key and one of the most complex parameters as it involves an exchange of ideas and feelings with people in an organization through various mediums. It is one of the toughest issues which an organization is faced with during the entire process of implementation of change. […]
What is Bureaucracy? – Definition and its Purpose
Definition and Purpose of Bureaucracy What comes to your mind when you encounter the term bureaucracy? More often than not, you would think of slow moving, obstacle filled, and tedious processes that do not get your job done but instead, make you run around from pillar to pillar for your work. Though most of us […]
Conflict is an inevitable characteristic of all work teams. Considering the complex dynamics of virtual teams, understanding and managing conflict becomes a big challenge. Conflict can be both - constructive and destructive.
When members of the team present different viewpoints about a task and positively contribute to decision making, it leads to constructive conflict. Destructive conflict results when group members doubt each other’s intentions behind difference in opinions.
Virtual teams present a very paradoxical situation because on one hand virtual team members are more task-oriented and therefore do not get into any interpersonal issues, while on the other hand, due to the lack of face-to-face interactions, task related conflict transpires into interpersonal/relationship conflicts. This impacts collaborative efforts, hinders productivity and decrease morale.
It is the key responsibility of a virtual team leader to prevent task-related disagreement to devolve into interpersonal conflict. A strong leader who can anticipate team members’ expectations and disagreements acts as the lifeguard when any problem arises.
The first and foremost task is to ensure a strong and well-planned orientation at the time of project initiation. This is the time when ground rules are set, expectation clarified and responsibilities delegated. Good team building activities and icebreakers should also form part of the virtual team orientation session. Members should be encouraged to share their backgrounds, past experiences and other informal information about themselves. This would help members to relate to each other.
Constant flow of communication should be encouraged. Different media can be used to share information and knowledge. Online discussion board in a shared virtual workspace is a great platform for virtual team members to discuss their opinions openly, voice their concerns and connect with each other in a relaxed and casual way. This generates transparency and builds trust among the members. Thus people do not attribute any hidden agenda behind a task related disagreement.
During the course of project, virtual team leader should promote team bonding activities outside work such as a 5 minute small talk session before project meetings etc. Such actions keep the members engaged as well as committed to the common goal. A daily updates from all the members about the four things - work completed, issues/challenges faced, assistance required and next day agenda - goes a long way in avoiding any seeping conflicts.
Virtual team leaders are mainly responsible for dealing with conflicts but a lot of time, effort and energy that goes in resolving the conflicts, can be saved if utmost care is taken during hiring & selection of virtual team members. Hiring people with right attitude along with their technical skills and knowledge is necessary. Right attitude in the context of virtual teams means intercultural competence, tolerance and understanding. This would reduce the situations of interpersonal conflicts among the members.
Another cause of conflicts in virtual teams is lack of non-verbal features of communication including gestures, body language and facial expressions, especially when communication is done through emails. For example, many a times a simple question/query sounds interrogatory and reproachful resulting in negative feelings and misunderstandings. Therefore, as much as possible the problem discussions should be done via videoconferencing and other rich synchronous media.
Thus we see by keeping in mind such simple and inexpensive action steps, virtual team leaders can increase the productivity and commitment of their dispersed work teams.
 |   Total Slides: 145  | “These presentations are Packed with Real Life Examples on the Largest Range of topics across Management Subjects” “All Presentations contain Optimum Lively Graphics & Animations to make the Concept Easy to Understand” |
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Advantages and Disadvantages of Working from Home and Organizational Policies
February 12, 2025
