Working with People You Can't Be With

A-Z of Virtual Teams: R is Responsiveness

The heart of effective collaboration both in-person and when mitigated by technology is responsiveness, as measured in (a) time and (b) engagement.

In terms of time, a face-to-face conversation "works" when the people in the meeting answer the questions they have been asked during the meeting, or take a next action to respond at a later time. Meetings where one person talks, and everyone else is an unreadable object -- not engaging in the conversation and not giving any feedback -- are really difficult meetings for the people who are asking questions. "That meeting was a waste of time" is a good summary -- the others didn't embrace the opportunity afforded by in-person time to converse in rapid / interactive time.

The same applies to conversations run through technology. Regardless of the technology being used, a timely response is a great facilitator of collaboration. In some cases, email can be a very effective collaboration tool where two people are having a conversation by email, and where each person takes the responsibility to reply in short order. Conversations left hanging for days and weeks -- where someone ignores the request for conversation with another as embodied in an email -- are hung / dead conversations. The other will have to move on, will have to find another way of making it happen.

In terms of engagement, responsiveness can be measured. You send out an invitation for collaboration, and the others come back quickly but with only a brief "okay" or "looks good" ... They have been responsive in time but not in terms of engagement. What does "okay" really mean? Is that all they can say to your masterpiece, or is the "okay" a signal of indifference, a sign that they really don't care.

On the other hand, a detailed response that shows care and thought in understanding what you were saying, and in giving concrete ideas on how to improve it ... well, it's more messy, but it's an invitation for collaboration. You will have to re-evaluate your positions, and re-evaluate how you will proceed with the project or the idea, but that's the point.

So the R is ... responsiveness, as measured both in time and in engagement.

What Do I Need To Do?

How are you going with being responsive in your virtual team work? Are others waiting (... and waiting ... and waiting ... and waiting) for you to come back? Do others describe you as "responsive", or do they frequently say "Oh you are still alive" when they happen to bump into you virtually or in-person? (If yes, that's *really* bad).

What do you need to do differently, to be more responsive?

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: T is for Trust

When you are with other people and can observe them over time, you build up a picture of their trustworthiness. If Sam says he'll do something, do you believe him? The words are the same whether he does or doesn't, but your perception of whether he really will or not is informed by how he has done in similar situations in previous encounters. I call this "informed trust".

It's a bit harder to develop informed trust of others in a virtual team setting, where you can't see them and where you can't therefore observe what they do over time. So you need a new strategy: the academics call it "swift trust", but I prefer the term "assumed trust". Assume the other people will be trustworthy, believe that they will do what they say they will do, and then see how it goes. But also, and this is the critical point, don't put all of your faith or hope in them actually doing the thing, so build in preliminary assessments of whether your assumed trust has some basis in reality, or not.

Over time, as you work with others more and more, your assumed trust will give way to "informed trust", as the actions of the person demonstrate their real trustworthiness.

What Do I Need To Do?
Firstly, you have to be trustworthy ... Worthy of the trust of others. If you say you will do something, do it. If you realize all of a sudden that you can't do it ... renegotiate; don't spring a lack of delivery upon others as a surprise. You can't see all of the implications of your delivery to time or not on the behalf of the others, but you'd better believe that they exist.

Secondly, too, is the need to be clear about what you are trusting the others to do and be. In terms of doing, ensure that you really know what the others are saying that they will do. It is no use having a different definition of "doing" if you can overcome the issue through some persistent questioning. In terms of being, that's much more about character, and what the others are really like. You only get to know that through repeated observations or interactions.

And thirdly, either don't hold the promises of others to tightly, or build in some leeway in case things don't go as they were supposed to go. Perhaps they really did try, but things went bad at the end. So build in interim deadlines so you aren't caught in too hard a situation.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: V is Visiting Team Members

Go and visit your team members, even if they live on the other side of the world (actually, that's all the more reason to do so). If you are working with others for a long period of time, say over 6 months, and the work is intensive (you are putting in at least 50% of your time on the project), make it a business priority to go and be part of their work and life for a week or so. See what the world is like for them. Eg, what's it like to travel to the office where they live? What's it like working in their office?

It's not always practical, and for some projects the duration of your work is too short to make it work, but if you can, go and visit your team members at their place of work.

This is not a mandate, but it's an idea to help you work more effectively with the people that you are working with. Once, I worked with another person for almost 5 years with never meeting them during that time. And the one time that I was in his city, he was in London. Nonetheless, I went to his office, looked around, saw what it was like, looked out his window, and even called him in London from his office phone (we had arranged all of this). His office wasn't quite what I expected, but it gave me a visual reference point of what his work life was like when we talked from that point on.

What Do I Need To Do?

Put it in your budget - both financial and year planning - to go and visit the people that you are working with.

If you can't visit with them, maybe because there is no funds to do it, or because you are only working with them for a short time, say weeks or months, one thing you can do is to arrange a video tour of their office, and then give them one of yours. Set up a 30-minute meeting with them, and ask them to show you around their work space with the video camera on their computer, giving you the verbal tour at what you are seeing. And then you do the same.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: H is for Handling Disagreements

Disagreements among people are a good thing — really, they are — because they show that people are actually invested and interested. "Whatever" is the absolutely worst statement you want to hear during a discussion / debate, because it signals that the person speaking has decided to exit the conversation and feels unheard and not listened to. Again, that's a bad outcome.

But just as disagreements are a good thing, keeping them festering and unresolved for too long can cause great damage to the forward progress of the team, and the relationships among team members.

Two key things are needed:
1. An agreement upfront that disagreements are valid and to-be-expected, and that people should stay in the argument and not prematurely exit; and
2. That disagreements won't be swept under the proverbial carpet, but will be argued out until everyone understands what the other parties are saying, and either that there is a clear way forward, or someone — a manager or leader on the team or that the team reports to — hears the two sides and makes a binding decision.

It's unlikely that two people on a team will ever perfectly agree, but they should have total permission to argue a position or idea.

What Do I Need To Do?
Stay attentive to how disagreements are handled within your team. If you sense that others are not being listened to, even if you don't agree with their position, speak up for their right to speak.

Debate the idea; don't destroy the person. A vital outcome of a healthy team is the willingness to work together again on another project.

Listen for the cues that others are giving up because people with bigger mouths and better words are steamrolling what they are saying. Suggest a switch to a written mode if one person has vastly superior verbal skills and the other person is a better writer. Get both parties to document their arguments.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: Q is Questions

Questions asked of others are great … although you can control a conversation by asking a whole list of questions (and if you're not careful, you can get a bad reputation for being so controlling), you also can learn a lot by doing the same. Bring the latter intention to your work on virtual teams, and ask questions of others. It's generally the case that you will be working with other people that have different backgrounds, expectations and training to you … so you need to take responsibility for creating understanding.

Ask questions to understand the context … why do they think something is as important as they are saying it is?

Ask questions to comprehend the details … draw others out so they will give you the complete picture.

Ask questions to help the other people explain themselves in ways that you can understand.

You don't have to agree with all of what other people say … this isn't a directive to be a door mat on the virtual team … but it is a directive to be open to deeper meanings that aren't apparent on first blush.

What Do I Need To Do?

If you think you understand what someone else is saying to you, ask a question to clarify that you really have understood. "Here's my understanding … What haven't I got right?"

If you don't understand what someone else has said, try the Brian Tracy question … "How do you mean?" Don't be backwards about asking for more insight, more information, more context, more clarity.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: W is Willingness

Working in virtual teams removes almost all of the social cues that we rely on when interacting with others. We can't see them. We can't hear what they're up to unless we explicitly call or reach out. We don't know whether they are being silent because of travel, holidays or … frustration with the project. And sometimes it seems too hard to cope with, too hard to bear. To top it off, even if we had the funds and permission to travel to talk it all out, it's often not possible or practical.

It also puts us in the direct line of having to use communication, collaboration and coordination tools that can be a pain to use, that fail (there is a system outages, for example), or that get in the way of communicating with others. With cross-border virtual team work, we work with people from different cultures — they speak differently to us (so we have to strain to hear and understand), they have different ways of working to us (so things that we take for granted they find objectionable), etc. And vice versa.

So we need to bring willingness to the table … a willingness to try again, a willingness to be (extra) patient with people and systems, a willingness to listen deeply (and then listen some more, so we can truly understand and comprehend what others are saying).

"Where there's a will, there's a way".

What Do I Need To Do?

Stay willing. Do, on a regular basis, those things that create the passion and power for your work … those things that keep you willing to communicate, help you to keep reaching out, enable you to answer in a tone and with words that encourages others to talk rather than shutting them down through cynicism or critique. Take care of yourself, so that you can interact and work effectively with others.

Maybe your thing is to swim, cycle or run. Do it.

Maybe your thing is to paint. Do it.

Maybe your thing is to climb mountains. Do it.

Maybe your thing is to have coffee with a friend. Do it.

Whatever it is that keeps you engaged and re-creates the passion and power to work effectively … to re-empower the willingness to be deeply involved in virtual team work — do it. You owe it to yourself, because you owe it to your fellow team members.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: U is Universal Time Zone

When people are involved in a team from many different places and thus different time zones, you have two choices. Either everyone has to state any meeting times in their own time zone and then rely on everyone else to do the conversion to their time zone (which in my opinion, is pretty hard to get right all the time); or everyone agrees to use one time zone as the "universal time zone". In the latter, everyone only has to remember one time zone conversion; from their time zone to the universal one.

What Do I Need To Do?
Encourage the adoption of a universal time zone within your project team. Either go for one where most of the people are based (West Coast USA, East Coast USA, London time, etc.), or go for a "major time zone" that is commonly known or can be easily seen on a Web site, eg, a news web site.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: S is for Silence

Silence can mean many things, and that's a problem in virtual teams. When you can see someone, you can go over and ask why they're being silent. When you work with others that you can't easily see or visit, it's much harder to know what's going on.

Are they being silent because they are traveling and out-of-the-loop?

Are they being silent because it is a public holiday where they are, and are thus not in the office (and they forgot to tell you and the others, thinking that you would "just know")?

Are they being silent because they are offended and don't want to talk to you or anyone else?

Are they being silent because they think that the work of the team is going in the wrong direction, and are feeling really annoyed at the lack of progress.

What Do I Need To Do?
Don't stop talking about what you are doing, what's coming up for you, when you are going to be out of the office, when you will be out-of-touch, how you are finding the work of the team, what you find difficult about the team work, and the ideas that you have for improving what's being done. Be transparent yourself, and thus model for others how they can act within the team.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: K is Keep the Sponsors Informed

Teams working on a task outcome are embedded in a social and business environment; they have their own work to complete, and in addition they have others to keep informed about how things are going. Perhaps it's the manager of a division, and he or she has sponsored the work, and as such, needs to be kept up with the progress that is being made, as well as technical, business and political interference that has to be run. Or maybe it's the senior management team, and they need regular / frequent updates on what's going on.

There's a third group too, and that's everyone else in the organization who may have a direct or indirect interest in the work of the team. There should be some way of keeping them informed at a high-level about how things are going, and when the work is intended to be completed.

These three constituencies can be thought of as three concentric circles, with the virtual team members in the center, the sponsors in the next circle, and everyone else in the final circle. Starting from the center and moving out, the level of detail about what's happening starts extremely dense and becomes less and less dense. The project team needs to know everything on a day-to-day basis, the sponsors receive less day-to-day data but more summarized information, and everyone else should have access to the statement of work, the names of the people involved, some key dates, and the name of someone to contact for more work.

What Do I Need To Do?
Determine who the sponsors are of the work, and ask them the kinds of information they want to hear on the progress of the team, and the frequency with which they want to receive it. The interactions with this group should be planned and intentional; merely giving them access to the collaborative workspace of the team is generally the wrong way to go about doing things.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

Update (April 19)
Gavin has posted some thoughts on this one, and suggests that the better term is "stakeholders" rather than "sponsors".

A-Z of Virtual Teams: F is Facilitation

With virtual teams spread across the world, different backgrounds, cultures, work styles, approaches to formality, and methods of communication makes effective team work more difficult. Sometimes it is really helpful to have an external facilitator join a conference call or video conference to help with the process of interaction, forming a work style, and smoothing over unintentional cultural missteps. Such a facilitator has no task-related responsibilities, but rather process related ones. Are the Americans talking too informally for those from Europe? Are the Asians saying what they really think, or is the brashness of others shutting them down from contributing?

The facilitator is trained to notice these things, and is responsible for highlighting them to the people involved as a new common form of interaction comes into being. They should be external to the team, impartial to the task outcome, and independent of any of those involved.

What Do I Need To Do?
Think about a virtual team that you are involved with. If there are communication difficulties, not just in the asynchronous emails but also in the synchronous conference calls, look into bringing in an external and independent facilitator.

Guided Insights offers facilitation support services, if you need outside expertise.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: E is Execute on Expectations

When work is undertaken in virtual teams, you often can't see the other people that you're working with (they are invisible to you) and your communication is mediated by technology (email, IM, the phone, a shared workspace, Twitter, etc.). If others choose not to respond to email or IM (for valid or invalid reasons), nor to answer their phone (ditto), they are also inaudible to you. You can't see them, you can't hear them … what binds you together?

The D … the desired outcome … and the A … the agreement on work practices. The D is the thing that you have jointly agreed to pursue; the A is the way that you have jointly agreed to work.

So the best way to be viewed in the minds of others (they hold a mental picture of you) as a contributing member of the team, is to execute on the expectations that others have about your work. Once you have all agreed that something will be done by a certain time, get your bits done. If you can't, renegotiate ASAP. Keeping your commitments provides a firm foundation of trustful co-work, and smoothes over the times when you can't interact in real-time, you can't get to the bottom of your email, or you are so schedule-slammed that you just don't have time for the conversations that others want to have with you.

And another thing. Most team members are involved in multiple projects, in multiple teams. They will have looked at what you agreed to do, and will have arranged certain things with respect to this project and others in the expectation that you will meet your deliverables in the expected time. If you do so, work is smooth for them. If you don't, chaos ensues and the downstream effects are huge.

What Do I Need To Do?
If you say you will do something by a certain time, do it. Execute on the expectations that others have of you, based on your explicit agreement to perform.

If you realize that you can't, let the others on the team know ASAP.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: D is Desired Outcome

Every team needs to have a driving reason for being, for existing, for working as a team ("being a team" isn't good enough). It's the thing that pulls people together, that enables them to see beyond the major conflicts, the petty disagreements, the slog and the hard times … and to envision a better future. It's the desired outcome, shared between all of those that are involved.

There are a couple of ideals with creating such a shared desired outcome. First up, it should be stated in terms of a performance outcome to be achieved, not merely an activity to complete. "Secure increased awareness of our new product offering in the media to drive increased sales by 10%" is good, "Write a press release to announce our new product" isn't as good.

Second, at least part of the desired outcome is imposed by the powers that be, but if it isn't meaningful to the individual, their heart won't be in it. Take what's given, but re-state it into terms that are meaningful. Consider adding, "And as a result of achieving the performance outcome, then … " Then what? Then you will get a promotion? Then you will take that 2 week vacation? Then you will … go to the movies with your sweetheart? Whatever … but it has to cut the mustard for you and get you enthused about keeping on keeping on.

What Do I Need To Do?
Define what the achieving the desired outcome of the team means for you, and write it down where you can see it whenever you are working on the project. If you are using a shared workspace that permits you to make private notes to yourself, write it there.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: C is Coordinate the Work

When you work with others, there is all of the task work that has to get done, and that takes time and effort … and there is also the coordination of the task work, and that takes time and effort as well. For novice teams—those that haven't worked together before—more time will be needed to spent on the coordination of the work, because people are not in a groove of working with the others. For established teams, the time on coordination will be less and less over time, because people know what to expect from the others. They have a history of working together, and can intuit what others will do or won't do without having to articulate that.

What Do I Need To Do?
If you are working on a new team, be aware that the total time involved in the project will be greater than if you were working with an established team. The coordination time will be much greater, even if the task time is pretty much the same. You'll have to talk it out, and you'll need to do a lot of talking and sharing. This need to coordinate the work will also apply with an established team that is working on a task variant that is different for the team.

If you are working on an established team, where the task is one that the team members have collectively done before, it is fair to expect that the coordination time will be minimal.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: B is Backgrounds

The different people on your virtual team are likely to come from different cultural backgrounds, have different tastes, be sensitive to different things, and have different goals from their involvement in the project. In the same way, when members of a virtual team are composed of people from different functional units and specialties, they bring differing technical perspectives, values and frameworks to the table. Everyone is not like you … and if everyone was, a team would not be necessary, and indeed, would be quite boring in approach and conservative in outcomes.

While these differences can be meshed together to become a driver of innovation and breakthrough thinking when harnessed in the right way, they can also derail a project when they are ignored or belittled.

What Do I Need To Do?
For yourself, you need to be upfront with the other people about the frameworks and expectations in your cultural or technical background that dictate the way you see the world and the things that you expect from the project.

For yourself in relation to the other people on the team, you need to listen deeply to what they say, how they address you, and what their values appear to be … in other words, you need to try to figure out how they think, where the areas of similarity are between you and them, and where the areas of difference are. You will then know what common ground you have to call on when the going gets tough, and also where you will need to be careful as a result of your differences.

Addendum: Another thought. The nature of the team's task and the duration of their work will have a moderating effect on how much you need to get into this. If the task is fairly straight forward and will only take a couple of days, the need to go deep into this vanishes. It would be fair to expect each person to come with their mind set on the task, and to work together effectively towards a quick outcome. On the other hand, if the task is complex, and you'll be working with the team for some months or a year, the need to explore background and cultivate common ground becomes much more vital to the ongoing effectiveness of the virtual team.

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.

A-Z of Virtual Teams: A is Agreement on Work Practices

Virtual team members need to agree how they are going to work toward the shared outcome that they have identified, particularly if they are going to be intensely collaborating on shared artifacts. Because everyone not in the same room is invisible, a shared mental picture / shared cognitive visualization is needed by everyone to know what has been planned to happen. "How does what I am working on by myself here relate to what Sue is doing in Australia and Ivan is working on in England?"

Talk it out during a conference call. Thrash it out using email. Think it out on a wiki.

Many can only act as one when the many have become cognitively one.

(So this is the first of an upcoming 26 posts on the A-Z of Virtual Teams ... and a mighty big hat tip to Nicholas Bate for the inspiration)

See A-Z of Virtual Teams: Summary for the complete list.