Anywhere, Anytime, and with Anyone—Virtual Workplace
In a virtual workspace, people still need to make decisions as efficiently as usual, despite the geographical distance. Most of the time, teams are challenged with a different working time zone. It can range from as minimal as an hour (Malaysia versus Japan) to an extreme of 12 hours apart (Malaysia versus United States). Communication is thus heavily reliant on technology to speed up decisions. Additionally, team members are culturally divergent in their working practices, values, and attitudes. Thus, the key question is, when working together, how can team members collaborate effectively when they are faced with different cultural values, time zones, and remote geographical locations? Rapid globalization and the advancement of information communication technology (ICT) have resulted in a new, effective, and efficient workplace phenomenon. With the proliferate use of ICT, the virtual workplace has totally changed the normal work orientation and space in multinational corporations (Gibson et al. 2014; Gilson et al. 2014). As such, the mark of the 21st century has made it possible for people to fully seize the advantage of this new form of global collaboration as it provides opportunities for people to work with anyone, anywhere, and any time.
ICT entails greater efforts to manage globally distributed collaboration across the world. Globally distributed collaboration often takes place through computer-mediated communication (CMC) technologies, many of which rely heavily on the Internet and complex information systems. Globally distributed collaboration also demands managing intercultural communication, defined as interaction between people of diverse cultural backgrounds with distinct communication patterns, preferences, and styles. On the one hand, CMC allows people to communicate and collaborate unrestricted by barriers of time and space. On the other hand, cultural barriers stemming from different managerial aspects and communication styles may adversely affect various elements of collaboration such as negotiations, deliberation of ideas, self-disclosure, conflict resolution, coordination, and so on (Rusman et al. 2010; Paul et al. 2004). Potential culture-related management problem areas include overcoming high anxiety and the uncertainty of feelings (Germain & McGuire 2014; Hertel et al. 2005), managing conflicting and frustrating situations (Dickinson 2013; Holt & DeVore 2005), saving face in confrontational situations (Ting-Toomey 1997), making effective group decisions (Oetzel 2005), diverse leadership style (Hill et al. 2014; Huang et al. 2010), using language and nonverbal communication (Lockwood 2015; Lee 2009; Shachaf 2008), and adjusting to and acculturating in a new environment (Lu et al. 2011; Smith & Khawaja 2011; Haslberger 2010).
The use of CMC among people with different cultural values can either facilitate or impede collaboration and communication (Hill et al. 2014; Shen et al. 2014). Early scholars of CMC suggested that it is ineffective in several areas (e.g., establishing online relationships, producing effective communication, and expressing oneself or receiving feedback) due to the absence of contextual, visual, and aural cues (Magnusson et al. 2014; Gu et al. 2011; Ramirez, Jr. et al. 2002; Wachter 1999; Daft & Lengel 1984). For example, electronic mail (email) is referred to as a lean media because it relies purely on textual elements. For people whose intercultural communication styles rely heavily on nonverbal or paralinguistic cues (tone of voice, facial expressions, body movements, and gestures) to interpret the information they receive, lean media was believed to pose a significant barrier to effective communication. With the range of cultural values, managing this new form of collaboration and communication in a distributed environment using CMC becomes more challenging and intense. Essentially, the challenges arise because, as Hall (1976) asserted, high-context culture prefers nonverbal cues, whereas email lacks such key characteristic.
The unresolved question, therefore, is, how does culture impact participation in the distributed environment, particularly the decision-making process, when people use CMC technologies to participate and collaborate? The significance of this book lies in its exploration and description of the cultural factors that influenced the participation of global virtual teams collaborating via email, and in its investigation into whether different cultural orientations gave rise to different communicative behaviors, thus impacting the way or manner individuals contributed to the decision-making processes. In this regard, the book will describe cultural variations such as intercultural communication styles, individualism versus collectivism, and task versus relationship orientation during the decision-making process. From Hall’s theoretical lens and literature support, people who employ high-context cultural communication styles have different ways of making proposals, deliberating on ideas, making choices, and coming up with solutions from people who employ low-context cultural communication styles.
Case 1: Cultural Vignette
Working at a Distance, Working with Culture
Adam Resnick, the regional manager at the headquarters of South Western Inc. in Utah, sat in his office contemplating one crucial question: how will he lead a negotiation and collaboration effort involving team members in three different parts of the world? Over the course of a ten-week project, a team of Indian engineers needs to collaborate with Swedish engineers to develop microcomputer products and then communicate with a Malaysian marketing manager on the exporting of the products to Southeast Asia. Adam is perplexed. “How is this possible when they will have no opportunities to meet and have no history of working together?,” he wonders.
As an American, Adam’s usual way of working is to develop plans, coordinate, and implement tasks based on structured milestones and datelines. The moment he learned he would need to complete the task within ten weeks, he was full of plans and ideas on how to coordinate the tasks according to weekly goals and develop a strategy to execute it. With all his planning documents ready, he is ready to make the team effort a success, so he sends out an introductory email to his colleagues in India, Sweden, and Malaysia. In the message, he introduces himself, informs them about the task at hand, and elaborates on his plans to carry out the project successfully. At the end of the email, he says, “I will oversee the project and ensure that all the tasks will be carried out efficiently and as planned.”
Prakash and Ainuddin, the Indian engineers on the team, are taken by surprise when they receive the long email full of instructions and guidelines from their project manager. They had not expected to need to get to work immediately, considering that they still have two months to go in the project. Although both of them are well aware that they have a short time to complete the task, which is quite demanding, they were expecting Adam to call or send a short, friendly email to get the project rolling. They were hoping that the email would give them information about him, his position, and his role in the project. As Ainuddin comments to his colleague, “I got an email that tells me to stay focused—it is almost like the task is already being executed, and no joke!” On the other hand, Carlsten, the Swedish architect, is extremely happy to see such careful plans laid out. He is motivated to give his best efforts to get the project completed on time.
As the project moves into its third week, confusion arises, and there are many instances of miscommunication. Ainuddin is frustrated because he does not understand what is going on, but he is hesitant to ask questions because he does not want to expose his lack of knowledge. At the same time, Adam is annoyed that Prakash is relenting over the impressive developments, but he does not see any tasks being completed as expected. All the deadlines he has set have been missed. Although he sent out many reminders and was adamant about getting everyone on the same page, he received no replies. After a couple of days, Ainuddin might briefly mention his progress (and Prakash’s responses were always positive), but nothing has been delivered. And yet Carlsten seems to have no trouble adhering to the deadlines. As the end of the project approaches, Adam starts to wonder, “Which is the real challenge in managing global virtual teams? Working at a distance? Or working with their cultural differences?”
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