"Modern organizations face many significant challenges because of turbulent environments and a competitive global economy. Among these challenges are the use of information and communication technology (ICT), a multicultural workforce, and organizational designs that involve global virtual teams. Ad hoc teams create both opportunities and challenges for organizations and many organizations are trying to understand how the virtual environment affects team effectiveness. This study focused on the effects of cultural diversity and ICT on team effectiveness. Interviews with 41 team members from nine countries employed by a Fortune 500 corporation were analyzed. Results suggested that cultural diversity had a positive influence on decision-making and a negative influence on communication. ICT mitigated the negative impact on intercultural communication and supported the positive impact on decision making. Effective technologies for intercultural communication included e-mail, teleconferencing combined with e-Meetings, and team rooms. Cultural diversity influenced selection of the communication media." [article abstract]
Pnina Shachaf, SLIS faculty member, gave insights on her recently published article:
Shachaf, P. (2008). Cultural diversity and information and communication technology impacts on global virtual teams: An exploratory study. Information and Management, 45 (2), 131-142.
"This article reports on my research about global virtual teams. In particular it focuses on the impact of various communication technologies on the effectiveness of culturally diverse global teams. This article joins a series of three other articles that emerged from the same research project on global virtual teams and that have been published during the last couple of years:
- Shachaf, P. (2005). Bridging cultural diversity through email. Journal of Global Information Technology Management, 8(2), 46-60.
- Shachaf, P., & Hara, N. (2007). Behavioural complexity theory of media selection: A proposed theory for global virtual teams. Journal of Information Science, 33(1), 63-74.
- Shachaf, P., & Hara, N. (2005). Team effectiveness in virtual environments: An ecological approach. In: Ferris, P. and Godar, S. (Eds.) Teaching and Learning with Virtual Teams. Idea Group Publishing: Hershey, PA. pp. 83-108."
See Related SLIS News Story:
Global Virtual Teams
Posted March 19, 2008