Remote working is the new reality, and transactional work provided by freelancers, contract employees or consultants has increased exponentially. It is forecast that as much as half the labor ...force will be working independently and virtually by 2020.Most organizations are still grappling with how to effectively manage their virtual staff and how to effectively support and motivate them an increasingly urgent task as more Millennials join the workforce, bringing changed attitudes to work satisfaction. This book, the fruit of the authors three decades of experience planning and implementing remote working environments, provides expert guidance for anyone planning a shift to remote working, managing teams of teleworkers, or themselves working in a virtual team.Working Virtually is for the executive leading changes in an enterprise that is preparing for virtual work or seeking to improve current performance. It offers tools to assess readiness, advice on creating appropriate reward policies, and strategies to adapt performance management processes to be more team-driven and technology leveraged. Working Virtually is written to and for the virtual leader who wants to establish high performing virtual teams. It provides an understanding of the roles and responsibilities of managing a virtual team, offering a wealth of advice on creating the conditions for collaboration, motivating team members, and identifying and defusing problems.Working Virtually is for the professional who works remotely from home, on the road, or in an office with remote colleagues. It is for anyone who wants to succeed in this new work environment by developing skills and networks to create a sustained and satisfying career path.With this new edition providing a 360° view of the roles and objectives of all stakeholders in the virtual workspace, this book uniquely provides readers with a rounded picture of the policies, processes, work habits, and commitments needed to achieve the shared goal of high performance remote teams.
Remote working is the new reality, and transactional work--provided by freelancers, contract employees or consultants--has increased exponentially. It is forecast that as much as half the labor force ...will be working independently and virtually by 2020. Most organizations are still grappling with how to effectively manage their virtual staff and how to effectively support and motivate them--an increasingly urgent task as more Millennials join the workforce, bringing changed attitudes to work satisfaction. This book, the fruit of the author's three decades of experience planning and implementing remote working environments, provides expert guidance for anyone planning a shift to remote working, managing teams of teleworkers, or themselves working in a virtual team. The author's key message is that, in an environment where there is no face to face and informal contact, virtual working requires the creation of a matrix of distributed teams, and that their success depends on the right preparation, changing corporate culture and rewards, and implementing appropriate strategies at the management level to create team cohesion and motivate team members. "Working Virtually is for the executive" leading changes in an enterprise that is preparing for virtual work or seeking to improve current performance. It offers tools to assess readiness, advice on creating appropriate reward policies, and strategies to adapt performance management processes to be more team-driven and technology leveraged. "Working Virtually is written to and for the virtual leader" who wants to establish high performing virtual teams. It provides an understanding of the roles and responsibilities of managing a virtual team, offering a wealth of advice on creating the conditions for collaboration, motivating team members, and identifying and defusing problems. "Working Virtually is for the professional" who works remotely from home, on the road, or in an office with remote colleagues. It is for anyone who wants to succeed in this new work environment by developing skills and networks to create a sustained and satisfying career path. With this new edition providing a 360 degree view of the roles and objectives of all stakeholders in the virtual workspace, this book uniquely provides readers with a rounded picture of the policies, processes, work habits, and commitments needed to achieve the shared goal of high performance remote teams. An index is included. Foreword by Didier Elzinga.
Learning opportunity is also growing as a desired employee benefit, impacting employee retention and engagement ratings, according to Deloitte's 2016 HR Trends report. Employees want to access online ...learning when they have a need, in addition to having access to professional and leadership development programs. The real purpose of virtual work is to prevent distance from isolating team members and instead create synergy without limitations of time or space. A vital knowledge management process then leverages team learning across the organization. Building cultures that support and reinforce knowledge sharing over hoarding, however, can be done when it's supported and rewarded. Mentoring is a long-standing tradition for sharing knowledge and developing the wisdom of star performers. A collaborative culture encourages relationships at many organizational levels and across teams and boundaries. Leaders held a virtual innovation process to engage all employees through crowdsourcing.
Designing the workplace means to simplify, entering information into context and facilitating conversations with interdependent team members in a way that gets work done. This chapter explores how to ...help an organization develop virtually without sacrificing the culture and team synergy. The business-to-business sales division was unprofitable because its product distributors were often small retail stores in rural areas. Knowledge-based work is still prevalent today, though it's more complex and boundary crossing. Committees, task forces, and project teams often require team members to carry the additional role of "representative" to the organization as members in a network of teams. Teams are part of larger systems, and team members have to be able to manage the pull. Many workers begin as loose-tie contractors who eventually become more strongly tied to an organization. Networks are human systems that rise from the "people parts".
Leading virtually means managing a network of interdependent relationships while keeping the team focused on mission accomplishment. It is active management through relationship, communication, and ...coaching, skills critical to a virtual manager. High-level interaction, interdependence, and performance occur in multiple work environments. The virtual manager launches the team by facilitating its members getting to know each other while clarifying the team charter, team scope, and expected deliverables. Conversation and attention to relationships have to be scheduled into the virtual manager's day. Virtual managers often work in a complex work environment, such as a matrix. A matrix is not an organization structure so much as a set of reporting relationships that tie the organization together laterally. Typically, virtual workers will go through four stages of personal adaptation to the virtual work environment: excitement, disappointment, confusion, and synergy. One of the bigger challenges for the virtual leader is developing team members without the traditional face-to-face interaction and observation.
In a virtually mobile organization with collaborative capabilities, the work space is decided on "best fit" environments. Offices and team spaces are resources, not status symbols. Organizations are ...learning to do the following: Design business operations and work spaces to be more collaborative and responsive to what workers need. Many organizations function in a matrix today, meaning that managing multiple relationships is a core competency for everyone, not just managers or executives. "Best fit" organizations integrate operationally. Enterprise solutions enable people to work together in many ways, such as face-to-face conference rooms that are web enabled. Organizations are made up of networks of teams, and team members are connectors in those networks. Design thinking is evolving as business leaders rethink how to structure the organization into a network of collaborating teams. Time is of the essence to shift organizations toward open collaboration, rewarding team success over individual excellence.
Companies are recruiting differently as a result. On-demand contracts are common and include scientists, project consultants, faculty, marketing experts, programmers, process experts, trainers, ...change managers. HR recruiters use crowdsourcing platforms like Freelancer and Upwork to source talent, as needed, for projects and employment. Recruiting firms help organizations negotiate to their advantage. Companies utilize internships and host innovation hackathons to cull talent and assess whom to hire. Fourth Path professionals are on the leading edge of a bigger trend. Walking the Fourth Path is smart for the career employee and the professional consultant. The biggest responsibility of the Fourth Path is to manage a variety of relationships. The Fourth Path to a successful career in a mobile work world is a winding one.
Engaging and supporting people are the work of the Second Path. Establish communication protocols that help teams relate well and perform at their best. The Second Path of high-performance virtual ...teams is one of team support. Servant leadership tenets reflect the qualities needed in a virtual team leader. Rhythms are the natural connecting and interdependent activities that bring teams together and apart in routines and habits that are easy and repeated. They keep people informed and flowing individually and as a team community. The team must come together in real time to maintain emotional bandwidth. It takes time for the team's culture to form, a curation of experiences and stories, norms, shared rituals, repeated interactions, and fun. The team manager needs to help new team members sort through the history for fast assimilation of knowledge.
