Management - Virtual organization - Essay Example

Management Building Virtual organization as defined by DeSanctis and Monge (1999) is a collection of geographically distributed, functionally and/orculturally diverse entities that are linked by electronic forms of communication and rely on lateral, dynamic relationship for coordination. As discuss is Chapter 9 cohesiveness is important in attracting members of the team. In virtual organization the important thing is the cohesiveness of the team. Building an effective virtual workgroup depends on the cohesiveness of the team.

The building of this kind of group involves a lot of brainstorming. This kind of group undergoes the same stages of development. In virtual group cohesiveness and norms are both important. Cohesiveness is the ability of the team to attract the members to be involved and really focus on the development. Norms are standards that are set by the member of the team that can either be a pro-management or anti-management. Building an effective virtual workgroup involves activity facilitated by computers.

Interactions of the members are done thru the internet. In a normal workgroup they meet most of the time to talk about the project while in virtual group the communication and brainstorming are done thru the use of the web. Since there is no need to ask many questions the forming stage in the development are not the evident in the virtual group. The group understand what they need to do just by handling them the outline of the work. There are seldom storming stage in the virtual group. Although they have different ideas on their mind the focus is on the development of the IT.

Leading Leadership is important in any project. Virtual team leaders are operating within a different framework. Some of the behaviours considered good management practices were changed, or even eliminated, because the team was physically separated. In the virtual team the leader usually conducted meetings thru conference call. Like in normal group, once a member was able to present a good job appraisal and thank you's are done thru e-mails or conference call. In virtual group it is important that a leader should be able to have an open line to any of his member.

Communication in this group is one of the important to be able to have an effective virtual group. There is a lot of theory involving the attitude of a good leader. The virtual group leader must also possess the qualification of a good leader. Although there is no direct communication with the team, frequent communication with them is important. Virtual leadership is about keeping everyone focused as old structures, including old hierarchies, crumble." The issue of trust is at the center of successful virtual team management.

The fact is that old-style command and control management, based on constant scrutiny, is simply impossible in a virtual environmentReference:DeSanctis, C. and Monge, P. (1999) Communication Processes for Virtual Organization, Organization Science, 93-703Leading Virtual Teams http://www.seanet.com/daveg/ltv.htm