Campbell And Bailyn's Boston Office Essay

According to Gibson (2012), Virtual Teams are defined as, “a team that relies on interactive technology to work together when separated by physical distance.” (p. 244) Ironically, I manage a virtual team and I wholeheartedly agree with best practices managing virtual teams. I have team members who support the same business unit, physically sit in an office but in various locations from Michigan to Florida. Most of my team I inherited but have done a decent job of following the best practices discussed by Gibson.

| Employees in geographically dispersed locations can work together in virtual teams using video, e-mail, and the Internet.

Customer Operations Group, C. Greystone expressed frustration with his divisions’ performance—he has also stated, “We’ve been forced”; VP Northeast Region, B. Walker stated, “some branch managers seem to spend most of their time worrying about the new performance measurement system—the skills and attitudes on many levels are mismatched with our current needs”; Branch Manager M. Pauley asks, “Exactly who handles all the pieces of a sale like this”, Sales Team Member 3 stated the situation is getting depressing. The organizational behavior put forth by the CEO and the Research and Advanced Development Group manufactured an internal discontent with divisions and individuals. As a result, the needs of the Manufacturing and Marketing were not considered and retain the support needed to function. The lower level individuals in the these divisions were unfairly treated and disengaged from the goal of the company which lead to ambiguity of company clear and direct goals (accountability and responsibility); flawed construction of Business Units and Sub Units; mass confusion of consolidating; geographic displacement; lack of division communication; lack of training; and most importantly the lack of sharing product

The essence of this article is noting the fact that virtual teams are only going to be effective when technology is involved. When virtual teams first started, there wasn’t much effective meeting technology available, but now there

Last Tuesday in class, Tom James came in to provide insight on Sales Management in their industry. The presentation was unique, because they brought in a Sales Manager and a Sales Professional in Paul and Manny. Their perspectives on how to manage a sales team as well as preform as a sales professional was a perfect balance of knowledge, because it gave a real world example on our sales studies.

It has always been my opinion that I work better in face-to-face encounters. I believed that I interviewed better in person, that my work ethic was stronger alone, and that ultimately groups could accomplish more when in the same physical space. I neglected to consider the benefits of working virtually with a team. In reality, I did not think that virtual teams truly existed – I always thought that members would ultimately have to meet in person at some point. I also thought that presentations must always be done face-to-face and that sensitive issues could never be resolved online. Simply said, I underestimated virtual teams and the benefits of collaborating with others

There was the concept of sales as a hunt, a survival-of-the-fittest contest, pitting tigers against sheep. There was the STP battle cry to raise the quota on how many customers you need to see in a day, “belly to belly,” and there was the emphasis on having as many closing tricks as possible up your sleeve. “Keep beating on your customers until they give in or die,” Robinson

In our current age of technology, societies have been given the opportunity and capability of connecting across distances in ways that were impossible not too long ago. With computer applications such as skype, people can connect from opposite sides of the world. This has created a unique advancement in the way that businesses are run. Handling business with others who are far away is now easier than ever. Curtis (2011) says virtual teams have become so common due to their "potential for flexibility, responsiveness, as well as for cost and production efficiency" (p. 97). Virtual teams are an effective way to bring employees of companies together within the comfort of their own office or home. .

Virtual teams can be described as a group of people with a shared common goal, who strives to achieve these goals with little or no face to face

He spearheaded the initial analysis phase of Customer Support’s Market Sector Specialization (MSS) which is designed to deepen a CSE’s expertise across multiple market sectors. He also partnered with the Customer Administration team which led to deeper business intelligence and significant improvement in time to resolve entitlement queries. The streamlining of the teams under his name coupled with the MSS program and collaboration with different teams with Financial and Risk earned a significant growth in customer satisfaction of the Investors product family by achieving a 17-point improvement.

Globalisation has led to many changes in the international marketing and global advertising industry. Many international companies have projects spanning a variety of nationalities, involving great geographical distances and a range of time zones. In this scenario, companies are forced to make virtual teams - which are comprised of members who are located in more than one physical location (Peters and Manz, 2007). This virtual team trait has fostered extensive use of a variety of forms of computer-mediated communication that enable geographically dispersed members to coordinate their individual effort and inputs (Attaran, 2002). In addition, commitment to a virtual team goal may be further complicated by the single or coherent line of

The influence that management and leadership styles along with communication systems have on the development of leadership, trust, and accountability in a culturally diverse virtual team is unknown. The problem that this study will address is the lack of knowledge concerning management and leadership styles needed to effectively manage a virtual team with multiple cultural backgrounds and the lack of tools to develop each member’s leadership, trust, and accountability skills. A quantitative study will be used to understand the necessary management and leadership styles and communication systems to effectively manage a culturally diverse virtual team.

On the other side, the position of senior market specialists requires identifying industry trends, evaluating new business opportunities, and establishing sales goals. Specialists are team players who develop general market and specific client strategies to help the account executives obtain a sale. Market specialists needs to be strategic in identifying patterns, anticipate problems and provide relevant solutions. They are relator and work as a team to achieve a goal. Their talent of individualization and positive attitude motivates the team to achieve maximized productivity. They are arranger who has to be organized in preparing and executing little possible details by following a standard approach. Illustrating signs of a visionary, Green’s talent of inventive way of working makes him capable to be a successful senior market specialist. However, Green is struggling with his position due to following reasons that he can work on by changing his perspective and managing up:

Hastings, R. (December 3, 2008). Set Ground Rules for Virtual Team Communications. SHRM Online. Retrieved August 8, 2011 from http://www.shrm.org .

The evolution of globalization and the advancement of communication technology have increased the amount of cross cultural, virtual teams in existence in today’s business world. Cross cultural, virtual teams can leverage on the diverse experiences of its members to achieve good results even without the members meeting face to face.