Search results

This paper aims to determine the impact of perceived virtuality on team dynamics and outcomes by adopting the Input-Mediators-Outcome (IMO) framework. Further, it also investigates the mediating role of team processes and emergent states.

The authors collected survey data from 315 individuals working in virtual teams (VTs) in the information technology sector in India using both offline and online questionnaires. They performed the analysis using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM).

The authors investigated two sets of hypotheses – both direct and indirect (or mediation interactions). Results show that psychological empowerment and conflict management are significant in managing VTs. Also, perceived virtuality impacts team outcomes, i.e. perceived team performance, team satisfaction and subjective well-being.

The interplay between the behavioural team process (conflict management) and the emergent state (psychological empowerment) was examined. The study also helps broaden our understanding of the various psychological variables associated with teamwork in the context of VTs.

Findings from this study will aid in assessing the consequences of virtual teamwork at both individual and organisational levels, such as guiding the design and sustainability of VT arrangements, achieving higher productivity in VTs, and designing effective and interactive solutions in the virtual space.

The study examined the interplay between behavioural team processes (such as conflict management) and emergent states (such as psychological empowerment). The study also theorises and empirically tests the relationships between perceived virtuality and team outcomes (i.e. both affective and effectiveness). It may serve as a guide to understanding team dynamics in VTs better.

This exploratory study attempts to enhance the current understanding of the research and practice of VTs within a developing economy.

The research focused on the question how the authors could assess the impact of organizational virtuality on financial efficiency using primary data from company accounting records. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The implemented model was based on the assumption that the authors could define virtuality with the joint effects of outsourcing and IT utilization. The authors also assumed that they could define virtuality with available financial indicators. The authors tested the model on a sample of tourist organizations in Slovenia. The main methodological challenges were hidden by diverse methods in calculating and keeping financial records in individual organizations. In some cases, the authors had to recalculate and adjust individual indicators in the particular company to make them methodologically comparable with others. As the modeling and testing tool the authors used structural equation modeling with two latent variables: organization virtuality and financial effectiveness.

The authors confirmed the basic research hypothesis that higher organizational virtuality leads to higher financial effectiveness in studied organizations. The authors also confirmed that they could develop a functional model of organizational virtuality on financial data only. However, the authors concluded that accuracy of the model could be improved if the authors would include also nonfinancial data that would provide a more holistic model of virtual organization.

The authors recognized that general concepts of organizational virtuality were often too academic and unpractical for managers in the real business. Therefore, the authors argued that financial indicators would provide managers with more convenient and management-like tools for assessing the level and the impact of virtuality.

Modeling organizational virtuality with financial indicators only extended the perception of virtuality and provided some original research and practical guidelines.

This paper aims to test if team reflexivity is a countermeasure to the detrimental effect of team virtuality on team performance improvement, in decision-making teams.

Study 1 regarded 210 individuals (N = 44 teams) executing five decision-making tasks. Study 2 regarded 60 individuals (N = 20 teams) executing four decision-making tasks. Study 1 was longitudinal, with no experimental manipulation. Study 2 had an experimental longitudinal design comprising two between-team manipulations: medium of communication and team reflexivity; the outcome was team performance improvement.

Study 1’s results show that team reflexivity positively moderates the effect of virtuality on team performance improvement over time. Study 2’s results shows that a reflexivity manipulation benefits face-to-face teams more so than virtual teams, probably because team reflexivity is more effective when media richness is high.

The implications of reflexivity’s lack of effect in low virtuality (Study 1) and high virtuality (Study 2) teams are discussed. This study contributes to the team learning and virtual teams’ literatures by expanding current knowledge on how team reflexivity can facilitate team learning under face-to-face versus virtual communication conditions.

This paper aims to examine the influence of the level of team virtuality on the effects of intra‐team conflicts on team performance, which have hardly been investigated.

A framework is proposed based on the extent to which team members use communication media to coordinate their actions and execute their tasks, taking into account the extent to which the communication media are synchronous and the extent to which the communication media convey para‐verbal and nonverbal aspects of communication. Data of 49 teams with 172 team members were analyzed using stepwise multiple regression analysis.

The level of team virtuality influences the relation between intra‐team conflict and perceived team performance. The higher the level of team virtuality, the greater the positive impact of task conflict on perceived team performance. In teams with a low level of virtuality task conflict has a negative impact on perceived team performance, and in high virtual teams task conflict has a positive impact. In addition, process conflict has a negative impact on perceived team performance.

The present study provides a framework for the effects of the level of team virtuality that can be used in further research and has implications for practice.

The study shows the effects of the level of team virtuality on team performance, which is important considering the emerging use of virtual communication tools in organizations.

Deploying hybrid construction project teams (HCPTs) in which the common pattern of interactions is a blend of face-to-face and virtual communications has been increasingly gaining momentum in the construction context. Evidence has demonstrated that effectiveness of HCPTs is affected by a perceived level of virtuality, i.e. the perception of distance and boundaries between members where teams shift towards working virtually as opposed to purely collocated teams. This study aims to provide an integrated model of the factors affecting perceived virtuality in HCPTs, to address the conspicuous absence of studies on virtuality in the construction context.

An a priori list of factors extracted from existing literature on virtuality was subjected to the scrutiny of 17 experts with experiences of working in HCPTs through semi-structured interviews. Nvivo 10 was deployed for analysing the interview transcripts.

The findings outline the factors affecting virtuality in HCPTs and map the patterns of their associations as an integrated model. This leads to discovering a number of novel factors, which exert moderating impacts upon perceived virtuality in HCPTs.

The findings assist managers and practitioners dealing with any form of HCPTs (including building information modelling-based networks and distributed design teams) in identifying the variables manipulating the effectiveness of their teams. This enables them of designing more effective team arrangements.

As the first empirical study on virtuality in the construction context, this paper contributes to the sphere by conceptualising and contextualising the concept of virtuality in the construction industry. The study presents a new typology for the factors affecting perceived virtuality by categorising them into predictors and moderators.

The virtual organization is emerging as a much‐researched phenomenon in the context of inter‐organizational relationships as well as intra‐organizational issues. However, the existing literature on the subject provides multifarious views of virtual organizations, making it difficult to compare findings in research and derive actionable inputs for practice. This paper proposes a multi‐dimensional model with nine possible variants that serves to accommodate and understand virtuality in its various forms, giving greater conceptual clarity on how virtuality can be measured and interpreted in an organizational context.

A review of the literature shows that most discussions on virtuality have not made a clear delineation of its facets.

This paper first identifies the granularity and directionality of virtuality in order to understand virtuality in its different contexts. It then suggests that virtuality should be examined in terms of factors that influence it, the degree of virtuality, and the outcomes of virtuality.

Given the breadth of coverage required to present a model in an area that is as large and complex as virtual organizations, a detailed discussion of the operationalization of the constructs has not been possible.

From a researcher's perspective, this model should aid a better understanding of virtuality whilst providing a framework within which existing and future contributions in this area can be studied. From a managerial perspective, this can be used by organizations to assess whether virtuality is indeed leveraged as a strategic tool or is largely a mere technological phenomenon.

The “virtuality” of a team collaborative interaction is the extent to which it is accomplished in the same place, in fully distributed virtual teams, or in a hybrid combination of the two. However, existence, strength and process of potential association between virtuality and effectiveness in construction project teams have remained elusive. This paper aims to address this gap in the literature.

In this study, a conceptual model demonstrating the association between virtuality and effectiveness of teams was developed through integrating the input-process-output (IPO) model and the “Big Five” theory. This conceptual model was contextualised for the construction industry drawing upon conducting 17 semi-structured interviews with hybrid team experts.

The findings provide the first model mapping the associations between virtuality and dimensions of team effectiveness for the construction context.

The discovered patterns of associations between virtuality and dimensions of effectiveness for hybrid construction project teams (HCPTs) will assist managers in designing and running more effective teams. In addition, the findings help construction practitioners better understand how virtuality influence the performance and satisfaction of team members in HCPTs. The present study concludes with outlining a set of recommendations based on the findings of the study.

As the first study in its kind, the present study offers a new insight into the concept and impacts of virtuality for construction teams and provides instructions and guidelines for designing and maintaining the effectiveness of such teams on construction projects.

Technology and globalization of services have facilitated the digitalization of many processes at work. However, their impact on social capital is unknown. The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships between virtuality in the workplace and social capital.

Using an online survey, the authors recruited 152 female student workers using an opportunity sampling approach.

Participants who used social media at work (n=112) reported higher social capital overall than participants who did not use any social media to communicate with colleagues at work (n=40). This difference also presented itself in terms of the social capital subscales (network ties, shared vision and trust). Mediation analysis conducted with users of social media at work revealed that social media use was a significant mediator in the relationship between virtuality at work and social capital overall (partial mediation). Subsequent analyses with the subscales for virtuality and social capital suggested full mediation of the relationship in most instances (with the exception of work practices).

This is the first study to examine the relationship between virtuality, social media and social capital at work. The result of this study suggests that social media use at work between colleagues can play a significant role in promoting social capital in workplaces that are heavily reliant on technological application to support interactions at work and feature geographical and temporal dispersion.

The paper discusses the measurement of manufacturing virtuality and, in doing so, contributes to knowledge in the fields of operations strategy, operations management and accounting. Initially, the use of a virtual manufacturing operations strategy within the contemporary business environment is considered. Thereafter, a conceptual scale by which the extent of the virtuality of a manufacturing organisation can be measured is presented. A preliminary version of the scale is described together with its application to three companies manufacturing in the global electronic and electrical industrial sector. These companies, each having adopted different operations strategies, potentially represent the two extremes and a mid‐point on the virtuality scale. The empirical component of the work includes presentation of case study descriptions of the companies and the results of the application of the scale. These are shown to provide evidence of its validity. The final section of the paper analyses the current form of the model and describes how its performance might be informed by the incorporation of concepts from accounting that embrace the financial measurement of intangible company assets. It is a further demonstration of the limitations of conventional financial reporting in dealing with contemporary issues in management and business. The paper concludes by discussing the generic significance of the work and by presenting future directions for the research.

The aim of this article is to explore the rise of firms making a strategic virtue of virtuality. This trend underlines the increased diversity of internationalisation trajectories within the modern international economy where multinational companies (MNCs) use third parties in a “strategic” manner to support a stated value proposition. To highlight this diversity, the article identifies a particular strategic type: virtual global strategy.

The article uses configural analysis to identify the particular strategic type of virtual global strategy. Based on the identification of this type, the article offers evidence from the corporate telecommunications market where this strategy has emerged.

The evidence offered suggests there are limits to the strategic value of a virtual global strategy. Not only are the conditions for its existence rare, but also even in those sectors where it is feasible many firms will seek a degree of hybridity as there is still value in some degree of physical presence either at the regional or local level.

The emergence of these innovative strategies challenges the understanding of the form and nature of internationalisation. Not only does it highlight that there is value in virtuality, but also challenges conventional understanding of the nature of commitment within host markets.

The value of the article lies in understanding the increasingly diverse set of trajectories linked to internationalisation and the ability of firms to make a strategic virtue of virtuality within international markets.