3D Virtual Team Environments

This activity is important because as a manager, you are likely to lead or work on virtual teams. Virtual teams have members who are geographically dispersed, with interdependent activity through electronic communication such as web conferencing and email. You should know that virtual teams have challenges in lacking face-to-face discussion, but have the benefit that members in different time zones can hand off work to each other with a stream of activity over the 24-hour day.

The goal of this exercise is to demonstrate your understanding of virtual teams by reading a case study and answering questions.

Read the following case about 3D virtual team environments and answer the questions that follow.

Three-dimensional environments (3DVEs) are not new in the gaming world. But did you know that 3DVE technology is now used in organizational teamwork?

Organizational teams in todays global business environment must collaborate virtually, so information technology experts investigate methods for more effectiveness. 3D virtual team technology offers an avatar-based environment in which people can communicate in real time through chat or audio, but the magic is in the virtual actions. In the virtual environment, team members can share applications like Excel. Individuals are in the same room and can jointly work as they use audio and/or video interfaces.

Researchers have studied the effectiveness of 3DVEs with some surprising results. Team members develop a better shared understanding of the work and use better decision making processes. Social presence also may increase, meaning how aware members are of each others presence in the meeting increases. For some tasks, a higher presence is needed to allow for maximum collaboration.

Organizations can also use 3DVEs for knowledge sharing and learning. In the virtual environment, role-playing and demonstration are possible for training. At the highest level of shared space, virtual worlds can be created for dispersed teams. Architecture and engineering design teams would benefit most from the ability to create together, but most of all, to manipulate and explore their models as avatars.

1- Some may consider virtual teams to be less productive than in-person teams, but companies have found a strategic benefit in that

Multiple Choice

• the manager can check on the team by secretly logging into the virtual space.

• those who want overseas assignments can have them to increase in-person teamwork.

• less overlap in time zones means fewer conflicts between locations.

• team members in different time zones can make progress throughout the 24-hour period.

• travel costs have decreased so more in-person trips are possible.