Simple material on remote teams management skills development, material collected and prepared on 14-Jan-2016

2. INTRODUCTION
Leading and managing a virtual team presents its own challenges,
as team members usually don’t meet face to face, but interact
remotely with their manager or leader.
It is becoming more common for some team members to work
remotely. It has been estimated that around 70% of managers
have responsibility for a virtual team member, and this will only
increase as technology advances.
This means that an understanding and appreciation of the issues
affecting virtual teams, and the particular skills required to
manage a high performing virtual team, is now a “must – have”
management skill.

3. There are several reasons why virtual teams exist .We usually think of
homeworkers first and foremost but in today’s world there are many reasons
for virtual teams.
The team may be spread nationally or internationally, with members covering a
specific geographical area. Or they may be attached to different teams, and are
seconded to a virtual team for a specific project. Perhaps they work in different
time zones, or cover different shifts.
Use of portable devices has caused an explosion in the development of virtual
teams. There are new economic pressures on companies to deliver globally and
cost effectively. In many countries, legislation to allow staff to request flexible
working has come into force.
The team leader has to work using technology to overcome the issues of time,
distance, culture, and other pressures. Their objective is to integrate the team
and optimize performance.
To develop and run a high performing virtual team requires new skills and
attitudes that are not yet widely understood.

4. As always, as defined by John Adair, the team leader has three objectives:
- Achieve the task.
- Develop the team.
- Develop Individual team members.
Often there is virtually no contact between the team members, and the
responsibility for effective communication falls squarely on the manager’s
shoulders. They need to work with each team member, by technological means
such as phone, email, face time and messaging.
The leader will need to ensure that team members do not feel isolated or
disconnected, and that they have a high level of trust and empathy with the
organization. They need to develop a relationship with each one and
understand their needs and priorities.

5. The manager will probably try to visit each team member personally from time to time, so that
they develop a working relationship with them. This in itself can produce pressure for the manager
in terms of time away from their family, exhausting travel schedules and a lot of time spent in
airports and hotels.
This means that the leader or manager has to critically evaluate the best use of their time to benefit
the team, ensuring that meetings are productive, communication is effective, and everyone is kept
up to date.
A key issue that will demand the manager’s attention is encouraging best practice. There is usually
little opportunity for best practice to pass between virtual team members. It will always have to be
picked up and disseminated via the manager or team leader. Knowledge sharing must be positively
encouraged.
Any absence or sickness will produce an extra demand on the team leader, as they may well find
they have to plug the gap. It is useful to have a plan to spread the work across the team in this
instance, perhaps by utilizing the nearest team member to help share the load.
There are some factors that will affect performance in a virtual team .The managers
communication style is crucial, as is the process they use. The team structure must be clearly
defined, and expectations managed.

6. Team Agreement
In any team it is the managers’ role to offer a clear vision to the team, to make sure
everyone understands the team objective, their individual objective, what they
must personally achieve to make sure the team meets its target.
They need to know what is ahead in terms of objectives, timescales, new
developments, expected changes, leadership changes, and direction of travel. The
manager must clearly signpost theVision.
An effective tool is to draw up a team agreement, or rules of engagement, which clearly specifies
objectives, defines outputs, allocates responsibility, specifies working standards, quality, response
time, and defines priorities, core working hours, regular team communications that members are
expected to participate in, reporting structure, and any other relevant point which should be
explicitly set down.
It is important to establish the best time to schedule live group meetings such as video
conferencing. If the group is global it will not be easy to find any time that is convenient for
everyone, but the “least worst “time should be established.
This agreement is not intended to be restrictive, rather to manage expectations of management
and staff, and ensure everyone knows what is expected of them, when and how. This should have
the effect of avoiding misunderstandings, enabling effective team communications and ensuring
people are comfortable with boundaries.

7. This will depend on the function of the team. If
everyone is doing the same work in the same time
zone, covering different regions, that is one issue, but
if the team is cross functional, perhaps seconded to a
joint venture or project, this can bring additional
problems of time zone, first language, culture,
expressions, practices, and local and national
holidays.
In this case it may be necessary to establish core
working hours so that there is some overlap of work
time.

8. ThankYou