Team Building and Virtual Teams

During the fourteen and fifteen class of Intercultural Management, the professor Heiko Schmidt explained the concept of how to build a team and virtual teams. First, I am going to explain how to build teams, then I will continue with the advantages and disadvantages of virtual teams and finally I will answer my research question, what are the principles of virtual teams?

Team Building 

In order to build a team, it is important to first identify the issues and the goals. This will guide to get in a more efficient way to the expected results. However, when dealing with teams works gets complicated because different factors such as division, not knowing the other person, communication, resistance to change, morale (related with ethics), team work and the most important of all Trust appears (Schmidt, 2015 ). Here in Colombia we try to do everything in teams because it gets easier and you always work with friends that you know they work and make suggestions. Nevertheless, when you do not know your teammates it gets complicated because as a Colombian I would say we do not trust in others, this is mainly for cultural and historical factors.

With the stated above we can say that in order to have a good team is important to maintain your mind open, communicate effectively and be prepare to deal with others opinions and suggestion, that is what a good leader should do to make other comfortable with the team.

Virtual teams

According to professor Heiko Schmidt we can define virtual teams as “Virtual teams are teams geographically disperse that works through communication technologies (Skype, WhatsApp, Facebook, Google Hangouts, Viber and others) in which communication face to face is limited” (Schmidt, 2015 ). Virtual teams are used to increase the respond to the changes of the market, in addition, helps the company to gain more knowledge about specific problems and solve through the interaction of different people from different backgrounds (Virtual teams are similar to multicultural teams).

Some of the advantages of virtual teams are (Managing Virtual Teams, n.f.):

1-      Time is flexible

2-      Money: you save money because there is no need to have a physical location.

3-      Comfort: you have the possibility to work at home and set you own schedule.

Disadvantages (Managing Virtual Teams, n.f.)

1-  The communication is made through devises, which affects the understanding of not verbal communication

2-     Multicultural teams: they are composed by different people with different backgrounds, beliefs and values which complicates the work

3-   Time: even though we have our own schedule, we have to plan meetings at night or early in the morning.

What are the principles of virtual teams?

According to the Harvard Business Review in order to have an effective virtual team is important to take into account the following advises (Michael Watkins, 2013):

1-      Get the team together physically early-on. It may seem paradoxical to say in a post on virtual teams, but face-to-face communication is still better than virtual when it comes to building relationships and fostering trust, an essential foundation for effective team work.

2-      Clarify tasks and processes, not just goals and roles. All new leaders need to align their team on goals, roles and responsibilities

3-      Commit to a communication charter. Communication on virtual teams is often less frequent, and always is less rich than face-to-face interaction, which provides more contextual cues and information about emotional states — such as engagement or lack thereof.

4-      Leverage the best communication technologies. Developments in collaborative technologies — ranging from shared workspaces to multi-point video conferencing — unquestionably are making virtual teaming easier.

5-      Build a team with rhythm. When some or all the members of a team are working separately, it’s all-too-easy to get disconnected from the normal rhythms of work life. 

6-      Foster shared leadership. Defining deliverables and tracking commitments provides “push” to keep team members focused and productive; shared leadership provides crucial “pull.”

7-      Don’t forget the 1:1s. Leaders’ one-to-one performance management and coaching interactions with their team members are a fundamental part of making any team work. 

Bibliografía

Managing Virtual Teams. (n.f.). Obtenido de http://managing-virtual-teams.com/en/virtual-teams-articles/project-management/advantages-and-challenges-of-virtual-work-teams.html

Michael Watkins. (Junio de 27 de 2013). Obtenido de https://hbr.org/2013/06/making-virtual-teams-work-ten/

Schmidt, H. (2015 ). Virtual teams.

The Intercultural Conflict Style and Multicultural Teams

During the thirteen class of Intercultural Management, the professor Heiko Schmidt explained the Intercultural Conflict Style of Mitchell Hammer and finally multicultural teams. First, I am going to introduce the Intercultural Conflict Style of Hammer, then I will continue with the definition, advantages and disadvantages of Multicultural teams, finally I will answer my question Does culture really matters?    

Intercultural Conflict Style:

The Intercultural conflict style is a tool developed by Mitchell Hammer in 2002. It is used to resolve problems between different cultural backgrounds or ethnic differences. According to the Intercultural Conflict Style webpage, the tool “is composed by 18 items and is a self-scoring, easy to use, cross-culturally valid and statistically reliable instrument that can be used for individual, group, and organizational level assessments” (Hammer, 2002).

(Taken from the presentation of Intercultural Conflict Style Model, Heiko Schmidt)

Two dimensions according to the components of the conflict compose the conflicts styles. Substantive dimension (Indirect and Direct approaches to communication) and the emotional dimension (Expressive or Restrained). In addition, both dimensions are combined to identify the type of conflict style. For example, direct discussion and emotionally expressive engagement. These terms means that the person confronts directly arguments and problems in a calm atmosphere and tends to be more frank with emotions (Schmidt, 2015).    

By the other hand, we have the accommodation and dynamic person; these means that the person is aware of other opinions and cares about the relationship, with dynamic the person feels comfortable with the help of others and emotions (Schmidt, 2015).    

With stated above we can know how to deal with these kind people when having problems. This is very common when dealing with persons of different countries (High and low context cultures) because as seem throughout the curse misunderstanding can arise depending of the communication with others.

Multicultural teams  

Let us begin with the definition of multicultural teams, according to Small Business Multicultural teams can be defined as “is one in which a wide range of cultural differences exist among the team” (Kokemuller, n.f.) 

Benefits of a multicultural team

• ·      When having multicultural teams is easy to do brainstorming due to fact that we are different and have ideas and solutions that do not might seem conventional.
• ·         Ability to adapt to different circumstances  
• ·         Understanding of social, political, economic issues in different markets
• Creativity exploits 

Disadvantages of multicultural team

• ·         Different perspectives
• ·         Cultural barriers
• ·         Communication barriers
• ·         Misunderstanding may arise

In conclusion, having a multicultural team is a good idea when organizations want to enter to other markets in which the culture is unknown. However, it is important to know that differences and conflict may arise when having these teams because as been said throughout the curse we are different, I do not think the same as my German colleague even I do not think and have the same values as my Colombian partner.  

Does culture matter?

According to Abdullahi A An-Naim “Culture matters to globalization, to economic and social rights, and to civil and political rights because the very idea of rights is a cultural construct” (AN-NAÍM, 1998)in other words, being a globalized world requires the attention of those small parts that we do not consider important. The best example is when doing business in Asia; during the last two decades, Asia has become an important player in the international economy that is why companies look at Asia as a potential market. However, in order to enter in those markets is important to know about their culture (Guanxi, Mianzi, business presentations and others) if you do not take into account those “irrelevant” factor you will not be able to do business there.   

Bibliography

AN-NAÍM, A. A. (1998). Obtenido de http://www.carnegiecouncil.org/publications/archive/dialogue/1_11/requisites_for_shared/598.html

Hammer, M. (2002). Intercultural Conflict Style . Obtenido de http://www.icsinventory.com/ics_inv.php

Kokemuller, N. (n.f.). Small Business . Obtenido de http://smallbusiness.chron.com/definition-multicultural-workplace-15469.html

Schmidt, H. (2015). The Four Intercultural Conflict styles presentation.

The Sub-Saharan Africa, Middle East, Latin America and Latin Europe Cluster

During the eleventh class of Intercultural Management, we had the presentation of the Sub-Saharan Africa and Middle East Cluster. In addition, during the twelfth class we had the presentation of the Latin America and Latin Europe cluster. First, I am going to explain both cluster with some examples used by classmates, and then I will finish with my research question, Is Islam related with male chauvinism in the Middle East?

The Sub-Saharan cluster

The Sub-Saharan cluster is composed by Nigeria, Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and South Africa. The cluster shares the similarity that was British colony in the 19 and 20 century and these countries had high scores on humane orientation and had average scores on most other dimensions (Ortony, n.f). Something that I found interesting with the presentation was the question asked by my classmates; could a high power distance be the heritage from being mostly a colony continent? I would say yes (personal opinion), the relation master-slave have continued since the decolonization process. Europeans and North Americans are still seem as the master of the continent; that are involved in all the economic sectors of the region and are the ones that generate jobs. Still we see how white descendants in South Africa gets better jobs and salaries than others natives and the ones that gets into college or have the money to pay for it are white people. In addition, most of the government of these nations are full of corruption that plays against the development of the nations; even we can classify the governors as individualistic because they are looking for their benefits nor the benefit to the society.

Metaphor: 

Sub-Saharan bush taxi

The Bush taxi represents the African Time orientation in which time is take in a more relaxed way, where there is not thoroughness towards scheduling or be on time for meetings or reunions. Also, it represents the sense of communalism and community sharing in which every time you have the possibility to share (have a conversation) with someone in the taxi is exploited, something curious is that anyone is left behind even though they do not have money to pay the taxi fare (Team, 2015).

Middle East Cluster:

The Middle East cluster is composed by Qatar, Morocco, Egypt, Kuwait, and Turkey. I would say that is the cluster more stereotype in the world, even though they do not have direct problems of security with IS (Islamic State, Al Qaeda and others). They have been classified as a dangerous region, this is mainly because the news that remark the difficult situation in other countries such as Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and are been group in a single region call the Middle East.   The Middle East Cluster scores high for in-group collectivism and low scores on gender egalitarianism, future orientation, and uncertainty avoidance/acceptance of risk (Ortony, n.f). 

Metaphor: 

Turkish coffee houses:

Coffee houses in Turkey were used to the social life contribution, in which people seat together and have a conversation with their friends of different topics. In addition, the coffee houses were used as recreational locals where people can see different performs of artists, theatre and taste different coffees. With the expansion of the Ottoman Empire, the Coffee houses did it as well. Now coffee houses are representatives of the Turkey culture around the world.

Latin America cluster:

The Latin America cluster is composed by Ecuador, El Salvador, Colombia, Bolivia, Brazil, Guatemala, Argentina, Costa Rica, Venezuela, and Mexico. The  cluster share the similarity that were part of the Spanish and Portuguese Empire (In the case of Brazil) the region speaks a common language (Spanish) and is intelligible with Portuguese. Even though we are not a single entity, we share similar customs and traditions. In addition, from other people eyes we are seem as friendly, kind, “rumberos” and that we want to dance every time. In my opinion, I consider these stereotypes as good because is not the rule but in Latin America we try to be always happy.  According to the Hofstede study, the countries of the clusters are predictably scored high on in-group collectivism and low on performance orientation, future orientation, and uncertainty avoidance/risk acceptance.

Latin Europe Cluster

The Latin Europe Cluster is composed by France, Portugal, Spain, French-speaking Switzerland, Italy, and Israel. Something that gained my attention of this cluster is Israel; I do understand why the other countries belong to the cluster. However, Israel do not share the same background as France or Italy, for example the romance languages (in which is included Spanish, French, Italian and Portuguese) I would say that Israel have more in common with the Middle East Cluster even though they been fighting for more than 50 years. Hebraic for example was born in the Middle East, the nation is located in the Middle East and unbelievably Arab is part of Israeli society.   The cluster had fewer high scores on any of the cultural dimensions and the scores were quite moderate, but the cluster scored low on humane orientation and institutional collectivism

Is Islam related with male chauvinism in the Middle East?

According to As`ad AbuKhalil “Although there is no gender equality in the Middle East (including in Israel), the phenomena of sexism and misogyny are global—not peculiar to Islam, or to the Middle East” (AbuKhalil, n.f). We as western people, always look at Middle East countries as sexism countries, in which women do not have rights, where male controls all the spheres of the society and where women are look as weak and passive. This is mainly because the stereotypes we have of the Arab society. Yes, there are countries such as Saudi Arabia where women are not eve allow to drive a car. However, there are other countries such as Tunisia in which abortion is legal, Egypt in which women are allow to vote, Syria, Jordanian, and Turkey in which women occupied ministries and are allow to vote.

In conclusion, even though there are countries such as Saudi Arabia in which women rights are inexistent, there are other countries that recognizes the importance of women and that they should have all the rights that were granted to men years ago. In relation whit Islam, even Christianity and other religions considered women as not part of the political society until the last century in which were granted fundamental rights in almost all the countries in the world (in 1920, the right to vote was granted for women in the USA) . This means that Islam is not the cause of sexism in Arab countries is something cultural that comes from our ancestors and was replied in all the religions around the world.      

Bibliography

AbuKhalil, A. (n.f). Islamic Research Foundation International. Obtenido de http://www.irfi.org/articles/articles_401_450/women_in_the_middle_east.htm

Ortony, A. (n.f). sagepub. Obtenido de http://www.sagepub.com/upm-data/30903_Chapter1.pdf

Team, S.-S. A. (2015). Sub-Saharan Africa and Middle East Cluster.