Digital Transformation in Business

Background of the study

The internet and digitisation have drastically transformed business models and processes and has helped blur geographical boundaries. The world has become a global village and today organisational productivity is dependent on how the organisation applies new technologies in the business process (El-Sofany et al., 2014). Business organisations no longer operate as stand-alone entities but they create networks of suppliers, customers, and partners, which is enabled by communication and information technologies (Mukherjee and Natrajan, 2019). Economic development, such as deregulation of many service and product industries, has resulted in reformation of organisations (Gupta and Pathak, 2018). The rising popularity of inter-organisational alliances and the shift from production to service-related business have changed the ways to organise and manage work (Mukherjee and Natrajan, 2017). These changes among others have been majorly influenced by communication and information technologies that enhance knowledge management as well as increased dissemination of information at the global level thus creating new working methods for organisations.

In consequence, the exponential rise in communication technologies has led to greater frequency in daily interactions between people who could be dispersed in different units within an organisation, in diversified geographic locations both nationally and internationally, and in different time zones across the world (Mukherjee and Natrajan, 2017). As a result, leadership and organisational work have become increasingly global given the spanned organisational boundaries and the web-like working environments arising from use of communication and information technologies. Organisations have set up arrangements that allow work to be done through cyberspace with increasing level of virtuality. Today, virtualisation of digital infrastructure is among the most important strategic moves companies are adopting in order to combat crunch of resources while enhancing productivity (Mukherjee and Natrajan, 2019). Additionally, organisations have increasingly turned to virtual teams as a way of connecting and engaging with geographically dispersed workers, lowering the cost of global collaboration, and enabling greater speed and adaptability (Zuofa and Ochieng, 2017). Virtual teams have become essentially important as they have the ability to gather the best people for a given task regardless their geographical location (El-Sofany et al., 2014).

Despite the increased popularity and adoption of virtual teams by organisations, Batarseh et al. (2017) argue that virtual teams are more difficult to manage as compared to traditional face-to-face teams. Given the inherently dispersed nature of virtual teams, the deployment of virtual teams brings with it a set of challenges (Shaik and Makhecha, 2019). In the same vein, Gupta and Pathak (2018) argue that virtual teams encounter challenges in their methods and processed of collaboration. Analogously, Mukherjee and Natrajan (2017) write that virtual teams across international borders perform poorly than traditional face-to-face teams. Further, Dulebohn and Hoch (2017) note that without face-to-face communication, it is very challenging to manage employees and therefore it requires lots of energy to maintain high-team spirit and trust in virtual teams. In agreement, Serrat (2017) writes that there is very less face-to-face communication, miscommunication, lack of clarity regarding roles of the team members, lack of trust and coordination, and improper understanding of the organisation’s larger goal, which hamper team performance. While most literature on virtual teams focuses on the benefits of deploying virtual teams, there is scant literature that considers the challenges faced virtual teams and how these challenges can be overcome (Mukherjee and Natrajan, 2017). It is within this background that this study is conducted.

Problem statement

The problem that prompts this study is poor performance among virtual teams as compared to the performance of traditional face-to-face teams. A study conducted by Gupta and Pathak (2018) explored the performance of virtual teams and the results reveal that virtual teams are unavoidable in the current business environment but their nature and characteristics bring management challenges, which can be associated to poor performance. Another study conducted by Zuofa and Ochieng (2017) notes that having mutual trust among member from diverse space, time, and culture is difficult, which inhibits performance in virtual teams. Further, Batarseh et al. (2017) write that team members have difficulties interacting with leaders while working in virtual projects which negatively affect the outcome. Insufficient leadership skills are also associated with poor performance in virtual teams. Challenges related to technology, cross-cultural composition, trust, project structure, ability of the team leaders, and the relationship among the team members and the team leader are also identified as barriers to the success of virtual teams (Mukherjee and Natrajan, 2019). Informed by such literature, the current study will explore how these factors affect the performance of Two Men and a Moving Van LLC while identifying more challenges that virtual teams in the selected company face and how they affect performance. In addition, the study will investigate how virtual teams can overcome these challenges for optimal performance.

Aim and objectives

The ultimate aim of this study is to explore the HR management challenges faced by virtual teams with a focus on Two Men and a Moving Van LLC. In order to attain this aim, the study is guided by the following objectives:

a. To identify the challenges that HR managers face in managing virtual teams in Two Men and a Moving Van LLC

b. To explore how HR management challenges affect the performance of virtual teams

c. To find out how HR managers can overcome virtual team challenges for optimal performance

Research justification

This study makes three contributions to existing literature: first, it identifies the challenges encountered by HM managers in managing virtual teams; second, it explores how these challenges affect the performance of virtual teams; and third, it investigates the ways through which HR managers can overcome the challenges they face in managing virtual teams. To practitioners, this study sheds light on the measures that HR managers can adopt in order to effectively manage virtual teams for optimal performance.

Methodology overview

The study will adopt a positivism research philosophy. The study will adopt the deductive research approach as it is qualitative in nature. The survey research strategy will be adopted and data collected from a sample of 5 which will be selected using purposive sampling. The prioritised sample is persons working at the management level in Two Men and a Moving Van LLC. A semi-structured interview will be used as the data collection instrument. Thematic analysis will be used for analysing the collected data.

Structure of the dissertation

This dissertation has five chapters namely introduction, literature review, methodology, findings and discussion, and conclusion and recommendations. The introduction chapter provides a general overview of the dissertation by providing the background of the study, identifying the aim and objectives, and showing the relevance of the study. The literature review analyses existing literature on the topic to identify a research gap and give the study a sharper focus. The methodology chapter contains the methods adopted in the study including what information will be collected, how it will be collected, from whom, when, and how it will be analysed. The findings and discussion chapter presents the findings and analyses them in relation to the reviewed literature. The conclusion and recommendation chapter sums up the main findings of the dissertation and provides insights to future researchers and business practitioners based on the findings.

References

Batarseh, F. S., Usher, J. M., & Daspit, J. J. (2017). Collaboration capability in virtual teams: examining the influence on diversity and innovation. International Journal of Innovation Management, 21(04), 1750034.Dulebohn, J.H. and Hoch, J.E., 2017. Virtual teams in organizations.

El-Sofany, H. F., Alwadani, H. M., & Alwadani, A. (2014). Managing virtual team work in IT projects: Survey. International Journal of Advanced Corporate Learning (iJAC), 7(4), 28-33.

Gupta, S., & Pathak, G. S. (2018). Virtual team experiences in an emerging economy: a qualitative study. Journal of Organizational Change Management.

Mukherjee, D. & Natrajan, N.S., (2017). Comparative analysis of social media tool used in software projects deploying virtual teams. Vision, 21(4), pp.397-409.

Mukherjee, D. & Natrajan, N.S., (2019). Managing Virtual Teams in Software Projects through Social Media: A Multi-case Approach. South Asian Journal of Management, 26(1).

Serrat, O. (2017). Managing virtual teams. In Knowledge Solutions (pp. 619-625). Springer, Singapore.

Shaik, F.F. & Makhecha, U.P., (2019). Drivers of employee engagement in global virtual teams. Australasian Journal of Information Systems, 23.

Zuofa, T. & Ochieng, E.G., (2017). Working separately but together: appraising virtual project team challenges. Team Performance Management: An International Journal.