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Five challenges to virtual team success: Lessons from Sabre, Inc.
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2002
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OrganizationsProject ManagementVirtual Team MembersEducationOrganizational BehaviorTeam MembersVirtual Project ManagementManagementTeam IdentityVirtual TeamOrganizational SystemsVirtual WorkVirtual Team SuccessDesignStrategyStrategic ManagementVirtual OrganizationVirtual EnterprisePerformance StudiesOrganizational CommunicationDistributed CollaborationGroup WorkBusinessKnowledge ManagementWork Group DynamicRemote Collaboration
Advances in communications and information technology enable organizations to create and manage virtual teams of geographically dispersed employees who must collaborate to accomplish key tasks. The study examines Sabre's strategies for addressing virtual team challenges to provide guidance for other organizations adopting virtual teams. Through interviews with members, leaders, managers, and executives from 65 Sabre virtual teams, the authors identified five challenges—such as building trust, cohesion, team identity, and reducing isolation—that arise when establishing, maintaining, and supporting virtual teams. Leaders and members encounter specific difficulties in selecting team members with balanced technical and interpersonal skills and in evaluating individual and team performance in virtual settings.
Executive Summary Advances in communications and information technology create new opportunities for organizations to build and manage virtual teams. Such teams are composed of employees with unique skills, located at a distance from each other, who must collaborate to accomplish important organizational tasks. Based on a comprehensive set of interviews with a subset of team members, team leaders, general managers, and executives on 65 virtual teams at Sabre, Inc.—an innovative organization in the travel industry—we identify five challenges that organizations can expect to encounter in establishing, maintaining, and supporting virtual teams, e.g., building trust, cohesion, and team identity, and overcoming isolation among virtual team members. Both leaders and members of virtual teams face particular difficulties in selecting team members who have the balance of technical and interpersonal skills and abilities required to work virtually and in evaluating the performance of individuals and teams working in virtual space. Examination of Sabre's strategies for coping with each challenge should be instructive to other organizations using or considering virtual teams.