...d Nowadays international teams are very popular in all over the world. There are many reasons what make them happen. Managing these teams is not an easy task because managers need to know how to deal with cultural differences. Cultural differences can help team to work more effectively but also can start interpersonal conflicts. ′As organizations grow in size and become structurally more complex, groups of people are needed to work together in co-ordinated way to achieve objectives and contribute to overall aims, effectiveness and competitiveness of organizations.′ (David A. Buchanan and Andrzej A. Huczynski, 2010, p386). This means that nowadays teams are very important and needed for organizations. Companies believe that teams are an effective way of identifying and solving work-related problems, reducing production costs, speeding up innovations, improving product quality, increasing work flexibility and employee participation, achieving better industrial relations, meeting the challenge of global competition (David A. Buchnan and Andrzej A. Huczynski, 2010). Team working is stated as a solution to all organizational problems. According to Katzenbach and Smith (1993) ′A real team is a small number of people with complementary skills, who are committed to a common purpose and an approach...
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...The Management of teams within organizations is vital in assuring that all required tasks are completed to a satisfactory level. A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who hold themselves mutually accountable for pursuing a common purpose; achieving performance goals and improving interdependent work processes. Teams within companies are often used for a number of reasons; regularly when there is a clear purpose or job that needs attending to, which requires more than one individual to complete the task at hand. The size of the task, time given to reach a goal or even the overall difficulty of the job, are all examples as to why teams may be assembled to assure all standards are met. Although it seams that the use of teams is beneficial to the organization, this isn’t always the case. If a team is assigned to smaller tasks, which can be completed by an individual, this takes employees away from their other jobs ultimately resulting in a loss of productivity. Nor should a team be used if there are scarce resources as this has the probable outcome of conflict over who gets to use what, which again leads to low productivity. Using teams in various ways proves to have many advantages to an organization if these teams jell together with little to no conflict. Increasing customer satisfaction, improvement in product and service quality, increasing speed and efficiency in product development and an increase in job satisfaction to employees are just...
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...Managing Multicultural Teams If everyone on the team are exactly the same, this is not a good thing for a team.Today the trend of globalization is increasingly evident.A multicultural team, able to provide more innovative suggestions for the enterprise. However,The challenge in managing multicultural teams effectively is to recognize underlying cultural causes of conflict. In the article ,the Examples have the same problem. Multicultural team managers will often in a dilemma. If the managers intervene with an improper way, will affect both members of the cultural conflicts generated negative emotions, and ultimately harm the team‘s performance.The writer summarized four categories which can create barriers to a team’s ultimate success. There categories are direct versus indirect communication; trouble with accents and fluency; differing attitudes toward hierarchy and authority; and conflicting norms for decision making.No matter which categories become a barrier for teams.It will be a huge challenge for the manager. As a qualified leader, they need to have a keen insight. While serious in their own right when they have a negative effect on team functioning, cultural challenges may also unmask fundamental managerial problems. If a leader only intervene until the team has reached a stalemate, even if this time enables the team to continue,the passive management will also continue to accumulate contradictions. In my opinion, a multicultural team‘s leaders...
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...CHALLENGES OF MANAGING VIRTUALIZED TEAMS Table of Contents I. Introduction 3 II. Why Virtual Teams? 3 III. Are Virtual Teams For Me? 4 IV. Virtual Team Challenges and Best Practices 4 1. Communication Challenges 5 A. Cultural and Global Communication Challenges 6 2. Management and Leadership Challenges 7 V. On The Flip Side: Virtualized Project Managers 9 VI. Conclusion 9 Appendix 1: Source: Solomon, 2010, p. 10 11 Appendix 2: Source: Solomon, 2010, p. 12 12 I. Introduction As globalization becomes more prevalent in organizations and telecommunications infrastructure improves, virtual teams are becoming more and more of a reality. Collaboration of work and sharing of knowledge is becoming increasingly important as businesses promote more agile and just-in-time production. Many businesses realize that virtual teams can provide them with these competitive advantages. However, as virtual teams grow in popularity (Cascio et al., 2000), the challenges that come with managing these teams become more apparent. This is due to problems that naturally come from a virtual environment, such as communication deficiency, lack of motivation, and non-transparent management. This report is intended to inform project managers and IT professionals about the challenges of virtual team management and provide best practices for handling these challenges. In this paper, we will be looking at managing three different configurations for virtual teams: virtualized...
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...0 Managing transnational teams Cultural heterogeneity within a team: A value or burden? Bachelor Thesis Organization & Strategy, 2009-2010 Name : Grace Bronmans Anr : 588850 Supervisor : Miranda Stienstra E-mail : gracebronmans@gmail.com Date : 11-06-2010 Nr. of words : 7967 Management summary Globalization has become an important aspect in business the last decennia. Companies’ competitive position is challenged by a globalizing market, and globalization is a natural development for growing companies to sustain their competitive position. When a firm enters the global market, management faces the challenge to work with transnational teams. International project teams are where most of the boundary spanning works in international enterprise goes on, making them a key factor in organizational success and an important catalyst for individual and organizational development. However, little is known about the management strategies on motivation of diversity, and existing information is scattered. Motivation is a key driver of performance, therefore it is important for management to know how they can influence motivation of transnational teams. This thesis will provide an overview of the effect of culture on the motivational strategy of management on transnational team motivation. This will be guided by the following research questions: RQ 1: How is management...
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...been to form global teams in order to provide excellent and prompt support to its client at any hour of the day. Greg James is the global manager of SUN located in Santa Clara, USA. H e leads a global team of 45 people composed of members in France, India, the UAE and the US. James ’ team serves Sun’ s enterprise customers in Asia and Europe. 1. Situational Analysis James’ s team faced a big challenge where one of their account, HS Holding has a problem of their entire system went down for two hours. It was a disaster for their online banking business. H S Holding support team had contracted SUN for support but nobody engaged their needs . They were dissatisfied with their customer services and expected prompt response from SUN. H ence, they are seeking a $300K service contract money return to them and threatening a lawsuit because SUN violated their service contract. Through this incident, James realized there are many issues existed among his global teams. 2. Organization and HRM challenges Being a multinational enterprise (MNE) has to face many challenges, just like James ’ team at SUN, they are now facing a challenge in people management . Managing a global team, they need to have a good system or procedures to guide the ir teams in different countries with upda te information. 2.1 Key Issues in existing teams 2.1.1 India James conduct ed weekly conference calls with his entire team of 45 which beg in at 08:00 Pacific Standard Time. Problems arise for teams in India. Refer to...
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...Managing and Leading Teams in Offender Services a Reflective Paper Introduction As part of the foundation degree in offender management a team project was participated in by the author of this paper titled Managing & Leading Teams in Offender Services aimed at giving a 20 minute presentation on the title as a team. There was a requirement then to produce a reflective paper on the part played by the author showing an understanding of managing teams, identifying key factors in team building, and discussing potential for conflict in a team and strategies to resolve them. How the author currently employs an approach to leadership in the work environment It is the author’s belief that at present he employs a rather rigid military style leadership model in his working environment, consisting of dictatorial decision making but showing some flexibility by allowing his team to take some responsibilities and decisions under close guidance from himself. This is in part due to a military background and a lack of any other real training in the past, on how to be a team leader and how to manage a team outside a military environment. Incompetence is not tolerated and all the team under the author’s supervision are expected to show they are able confident and reach the standard he requires, any short falls are dealt with swiftly. Outside agencies or departments are expected to comply with the goal of the author and anyone failing to meet that requirement is excluded from the team and...
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...Creating and Managing Effective Teams Axia College of University of Phoenix MGT 245 Organizational Behavior June 8, 2008 Organizations today have to be more productive and in order for that management has been dedicated in achieving this goal. Different strategies can be used, however for us, it was decided that selecting different employees with different qualifications would to form a team, would be the best route. We want to engage our employees in the everyday decision making and change to drive performance. Our team had to be formed by five staff members, and their responsibilities would be determined by the role in that team. The team consists of: Assessor + Adviser (offers insightful analysis of options and encourages the search for more information), Creator (Initiates creative ideas),, Controller + Organizer (examines details and enforces rules and provides structure), Promoter + Maintainer (Champions ideas after they are initiated and fights external battles), and Linker + Producer (Coordinates and integrates, provides direction and follow-through). Having to choose the best fit for each role was not an easy task. The decision was based on personalities and previous job experiences. Marcell was the best fit for the A+A role he had been a project manager for Ford’s Jaguar finance dept. and even thou he does not have the knowledge yet on auto design however he has excellent project management skill, and comments from his coworkers saying that...
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...Intro Virtual teams are a group of individuals working together across geographies and time to complete a common goal. Though they are not an entirely new concept, there is still much to learn about virtual employees and how they differ from their physical counterparts. Over the next few paragaphs we will look at the different types of teams as well as the positive and negative impacts virtual teams place on managers and business employing this model. Different types of Teams Virtual teams have evolved over time, specifically around the types of teams we see being used. Executive or Management Virtual teams are typically made up of managers, each with specific responsibilities over a region or division. The management team I serve on covers 11 states. We each are assigned a multi-state region with virtual employees scattered throughout. My team all live outside of Oklahoma which means 95% of our interactions take place electronically. Virtual Project Teams are created to accomplish a specific task. These teams typically disperse once the project has been completed. Our company utilizes this approach for projects so as to get the most qualified resources aligned. Work teams are made up of groups on individuals accomplishing similar types of functions and have clearly defined membership. My work team are engineers that are tasked with enabling companies to sell and install the products we make. Though each engineer has different skills, they are each responsible...
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...MANAGING VIRTUAL PROJECT TEAMS A research project submitted to the faculty of San Francisco State University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Master of Business Administration by Bryan Rolf Trautsch San Francisco, California December 11, 2003 Copyright (c) 2003 by Bryan Trautsch. CERTIFICATION OF APPROVAL I certify that I have read VIRTUAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT by Bryan Rolf Trautsch, and that in my opinion this work meets the criteria for approving a research project submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for the Master of Business Administration degree at San Francisco State University. ________________________________________ Dr. Robert C. Nickerson Professor of Information Systems ________________________________________ Dr. Sam S. Gill Professor of Information Systems ABSTRACT MANAGING VIRTUAL PROJECT TEAMS Bryan Rolf Trautsch San Francisco State University Fall 2003 The purpose of the project is to explore the communications and collaborations issues associated with managing virtual project teams. In order to establish a better understanding of the problem, the paper evaluates virtual teams against more traditional collocated teams to provide some background and depth to the research. The method used in the research was in the format of a questionnaire consisting of six questions. The questionnaire was delivered via e-mail to various project managers with virtual project team experience...
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...Virtual Teams and Managing Conflict. Name of the Author: Name of the Professor: Name of the Institution: Date of Submission: According to Duarte and Snyder (1999) “virtual teams operate without the physical limitations of distance, time, and organizational boundaries. They use electronic collaborations technologies and other techniques to lower travel and facility costs, reduce project schedules, and improve decision making time and communication (p.4)“. Virtual teams mean people who are geographically separated, and work together across borders. They are connected by modern technologies of computers. Internet has transformed most economies and workplaces into modern economies and workplaces. Many organizations are abandoning conventional face to face working teams for virtual teams. Most organizations are embracing technological revolutions. This enhances them to be more dynamic and adopt innovative approaches in their procedures. The ability of the work team to incorporate technology has led to success in most organizations. Well known international companies such as, IBM, Whirlpool, Hewlett-Packard, Ford Motor, Johnson and Johnson and Verifone have successfully implemented virtual teams. (Kiser, 1999; Stough, 2000). The rapid worldwide growth of virtual teams has been attributed by increased inter organizational co-operation, rapid pace of globalization and other benefits associated with its implementation. This includes the ability of the employees to work for...
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...Management of Cross Cultural Teams- Problems and Effective Management of Cross- Cultural Teams VAIBHAV MISRA Management Consultant and Ex- Lecturer Bora Institute of Management Sciences Lucknow INDIA vaibhav.misra@aol.in ABSTRACT As the world economy is globalized the companies are expanding their businesses in international markets for business profitability. The teams are recruited by these companies in the international market for the business tasks to be performed. These teams belong to different cultural background and have different values. The author will discuss about the problems faced by these cross- cultural teams. The author had also focused on the strategies to cope up with these problems of cross- cultural teams. The author will act as researcher and will use exploratory research design, i.e. the study will be based on secondary data taken from magazines, journals, internet and reports. These tools will help author to conclude the objectives of the study. The author found that there are problems among the cross-cultural teams regarding their cultural background. The different ways are also suggested to cope up with the problems faced by crosscultural teams. The author had also focused on how to create effective management of multicultural teams. RESEARCH VALUE The research may be valuable for the companies who are looking for expanding the business and also for those companies who are facing the cross- cultural team issue. workplace leads to heightened tensions...
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...MANAGING CHANGE WITH AN INTERCULTURAL TEAM Master’s (one year) thesis in Informatics (15 credits) Lee Wennerström 2012MAGI11 I Title: Managing change with an intercultural team Publishing year: 2013 Author: Lee Wennerström Supervisor: Anders Hjalmarsson Abstract: The study explores the subjects of organizational change and management of intercultural teams. The goal of the study is to spread knowledge about how an intercultural team should be managed in order to assure the best possible success of an organizational change initiative. It has long been recognized that organizations constantly need to change in order to stay competitive. At the same time it has also been recognized that organizations today operate on the global arena with operations spread to many different parts of the world. It is thus important to understand how an intercultural team should be managed in order to assure the success of an organizational change initiative. The aim of this study has been to provide information and guidelines that may be used by academia as well as professionals to better understand how to manage an intercultural team that conducts an organizational change. A total of six different guidelines have been presented in this research - each one important in assuring an effective teamwork and a successful organizational change. The study has been conducted using a qualitative research approach and the method used for gathering data has been interviews as well as literature studies...
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...Managing New Product Development Teams Topic: Managing New Product Development Teams CASE STUDY W/QUESTIONS (MUST ANSWER ALL DISCUSSION QUESTIONS) Skullcandy: Developing Extreme Headphones1 In 2001, Rick Alden was riding up a ski lift and listening to music on an MP3 player when he heard his phone ringing, muffled in the pocket of his ski jacket. He fumbled around with his gloved hands, trying to get to the phone before it stopped ringing, and at that moment he thought “ why not have headphones that connect to both a cell phone and an MP3 player?” 2 In January of 2002 he had his first prototype built by a Chinese manufacturer, and by January of 2003 he launched his company, Skullcandy. 3 Building an Action Sports Brand Alden had an extensive background in the snowboarding industry, having previ-ously founded National Snowboard Incorporated ( one of the first companies to promote snowboarding) and having developed and marketed his own line of snowboard bindings. His father, Paul Alden, had played many roles in the indus-try, including serving as the president of the North American Snowboard Association, which helped open up ski resorts to snowboarders. His brother, David Alden, had been a professional snowboarder for Burton, and a sales repre-sentative for several snowboard lines. Thus when Alden began creating an image and brand for the headphones, it only made sense to create a brand that would have the kind of dynamic edginess that would attract snowboarders and skate-boarders...
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...Proposal Template 1. Title “A situational analysis of shared leadership in a self-managing team” 2. Background Team leadership merits continued attention because leaders have an impact on how the team develops and performs. Team processes are explored within self-managed teams that develop different leadership styles. In particular, two leadership styles are compared: shared leadership and single leadership. The results of the study suggest that teams with shared leadership have motivational and cognitive advantages over teams that took the traditional approach of relying on a single leader. The two main concepts in organisational studies can be search in this leadership and teams. Moreover, this represents the analysis of leadership styles and team processes within self-managed teams. Self-managed teams have the autonomy to make important decisions concerning their team processes. A key team process is leadership and without leadership, team members are unlikely to identify with team objectives. The self-managed teams need more leadership than conventional teams around both task related issues and team development issues. As far as I concerned, I believe in team and teamwork. Furthermore, the business can only be successful only when the decisions are team leaders with their excellent leadership skills. The teams with shared leadership have motivational and cognitive advantages over teams that took the traditional approach of relying on a single leader. 3. Research...
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