We are two-thirds of the way through 2021 and we have already seen the benefits of virtual teams or a Flexible Workforce. Employees have the freedom and flexibility to work from anywhere and create their schedules. Organizations can save on infrastructural expenses, improve productivity and have access to a global talent pool barring any geographical limitations. Nevertheless, we have also experienced numerous challenges on our way to leveraging the various benefits of Virtual Teams. Nevertheless, we must navigate these challenges efficiently, or else we will be faced with disjointed teams with individual productivity. This will not have any meaningful consequence.

Some Challenges of a Virtual Collaboration

Time Zone Differences

This is an obvious issue faced by teams that are spread over different countries and continents. Simply put, scheduling a group meeting can become a nightmare as the availabilities of different team members may not match. Additionally, it becomes difficult to accommodate urgent requests.

In such situations, it is best to first monitor everyone’s work schedules and look for overlapping schedules where everyone or at least most of your colleagues are available. Send out your communications 12-24 hours ahead of deadlines so that you have a lead time.

Distracting Communications

This may not be an obvious one at first, but let us take a good look at it. When you are physically present at the office, you just have to wave at a colleague or walk up to their desk to get their attention. However, you cannot do the same when you are telecommuting or virtually connected. You have either to get on the phone with them or send them a message over the virtual connectivity tool you are using. Nevertheless, this can potentially disrupt their concentration or flow of work. Furthermore, when you are at the office, you can always know when the person does not want to be disturbed. When working in a virtual team this is not necessarily the case.

The easiest way to deal with this is to keep communication asynchronous and make it a point that nobody expects the other person to respond immediately. People need to be respected enough to be given their space to work. If not, this can eventually lead to severe productivity and efficiency issues. You can also block time for deep work and inform the other team members when you do not want to be disturbed.

Isolation

Working remotely can feel disconnected and lead to loneliness and it does not matter how big of a team it is. Matters become worse when your teammates are nothing more than pictures on your screen, i.e. if they are not encouraged to turn on their videos.

An easy fix to this problem is to encourage your colleagues to switch on their videos while in a team meeting. In addition, more importantly, organize regular team-building activities; either online or offline. This can help improve team bonding and ease the flow of collaboration. Furthermore, we have seen how “Zoom Fatigue” has become all too common now. Increased feelings of anxiety, tiredness, or even loneliness after a video call. Hence, while it is a positive step forward to encourage video calls, do not enforce them for every other call.

Problems in Building Trust

A 2017 Harvard Business Review (HBR) study found that in any given Hybrid or Flexible team, at least 52% of members feel left out or shunned by the rest of their counterparts who are physically in the office. Trust issues may arise in a Hybrid team for obvious reasons mainly because nobody sees what each of their teammates is up to. Furthermore, in some cases, teams have never met each other in person, and this can subconsciously affect how much trust can be built between them.

To remedy this, encourage open communication, promote transparency, and avoid micromanagement. Moreover, organize routine seminars, team retreats, or face-to-face meetings so that employees can come together and socialize.