What: Wall Street Journal article “Managers Learn to Bond with Remote Workers.”
Posts to which it is related: Virtual Teams – Beneficial or Detrimental, Manipulate Perceptions to Improve Virtual Team Performance, Implicit Communication and Culture: What it Means for Leading Virtual Teams, Building Trust in Virtual Team
Bottom Line: Article indicates that it is becoming more critical for managers to understand how to oversee remote employees. One of the ways in which managing remote employees can be made easier is to hire or recruit people who are ready to work in a virtual environment. Our take on this suggestion is that this is easier said than done. This suggestion also goes against why you set up virtual teams – very often, your aim is to find individuals who have the domain knowledge that you need for your project and these individuals may not have the experience of working virtually. Other suggestions offered by this article include the following: (1) Go and meet the remote members of your team to open up communication channels and to build relationships and trust; (2) Communicate each person’s role and business objectives regularly and set up agreed-upon ways to resolve conflicts and solve problems early on; (3) Train the remote employees in technology if needed; (4) Put yourself in the shoes of the remote workers you are working with; (5) Learn as much as possible about the remote workers (e.g., check for personal web sites and profiles on the corporate intranet or on Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.); (6) Use clear language in your communication.

What: CIO Australia article “Running an Effective Teleconference or Virtual Meeting.”
Posts to which it is related: Improving Virtual Team Leadership Using Technology, Building Trust in Virtual Team
Bottom Line: Article provides various tips for running an effective teleconference. These are: (1) While typical ground rules for ordinary meetings (e.g., sending information in advance of the meeting) apply here as well, there are additional rules that you need to keep in mind (e.g., stay out of your email); (2) Be the eyes for other participants; (3) Encourage participation; (4) Consider using the mute button to cut down on background noise; (5) Stay conscious of time zones; (6) Technology can help but use it for good, not evil.

What: Wall Street Journal article “‘Telepresence’ is Taking Hold.”
Posts to which it is related: Improving Virtual Team Leadership Using Technology, Building Trust in Virtual Team
Bottom Line: Improvements in technology and higher gas prices are making ‘telepresence’ technology more attractive for virtual team meetings. A telepresence system is a high-definition videoconferencing system with smooth video and high quality audio. Document sharing is possible and people in more than two locations can participate in the same meeting. Though most telepresence systems are costly (they range from $200,000 to $500,000 per room), their acceptance is increasing rapidly (1,000 telepresence systems were sold in 2007 compared to 200 in 2006). Hotels, which stand to lose from reduced business travel, are installing telepresence systems and making them available to business travelers. These systems have become easier to use and demand among users in organizations that have installed such systems is very high.