March 3, 2009 | In: Management
Challenges for Virtual Teams
My father sent this article to me that was circulated within his company. In the article, Patrick Lencioni talks about managing teams virtually and the challenges inherent to being spread across the country or the world.
Given that I work at a virtual company, I found the article to be spot-on, but I thought Mr. Lencioni may have missed what I’ve found to be the biggest challenge as a manager of virtual employees all over the country. That is – everyone must understand the direction of the company, the current state of the company, and how they fit into the overall scheme of the company.
The key is to keep employees excited and energized so that you get the most you can from them each and every day. That’s a huge challenge in a virtual environment.
Do you work in a virtual environment? What challenges do you or your team face?
My Home Office
2 Responses to Challenges for Virtual Teams
rjk
March 3rd, 2009 at 4:29 pm
Yes, I work in a virtual environment. My biggest challenge is lack of communication from my boss. I feel aimless and without purpose.
Occasionally, he’ll “bungee boss” in with a list of email directives and then disappear.
It’s very disheartening.
All kidding aside, I find the biggest challenge I face actually has nothing to do with the virtual nature of the company. Rather, it’s coordinating and managing all my disparate tasks in an unstable environment.
I have a list of things I want to get done every day, but I find that too many days are consumed with unplanned interruptions. Partly this is a function of the type of work I do, but the “IM” nature of my job also seem to have a way of intruding on one’s time.
I’m sure typical office workers have the same problem: especially if they work in cube farms.
So, I think the challenges are actually very similar regardless of whether you work in an office at home, or at an office building. Finding ways to carve out productive time is what we’re all struggling to do.
–rjk
toktam Saghafi
March 8th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
I’m Irainian.We don’t have any virtual company and goverment try that we have it and I’m looking forward.but after reading your article I doubt it.please let me know about advantage.