Microsoft Word - Assessment 3 Case Study.docx
©MNG81001 Assessment 3 Session XXXXXXXXXX
Assessment 3
The virtual team: creating and managing
communication across the globe
Jane Wilson has recently been appointed the Marketing Director of Sunshine 100, a
Brisbane-based company specialising in responsible foods with R & D offices in New
York, Shanghai and Mumbai, and sales offices in Melbourne, London, Cape Town,
Dubai and Sao Paulo. When she was given the opportunity to manage a team of
eight spread across six continents, Jane was confident that, with a little planning, she
could manage perfectly and deliver on time as she had always done.
Project and Team Background
Jane’s work at Sunshine 100 was originally in the role of Director of Social Media.
Now she had been promoted to Marketing Director. The company has expanded to
China with the launch of the company’s new line of wholesome baby foods. The
professional nutritionists and dieticians led by Dr Jeremy Jones have asked Jane to
start working on a world-wide marketing campaign to promote ‘KidsEats’ a recently
launched initiative with a focus on working directly with schools as well as children’s
organisations to educate primary aged school children about healthy foods and
healthy eating.
International virtual teams are a relatively new form of working at Sunshine 100 and
one the CEO is keen to develop further. Following Jane’s appointment the CEO, Paul
Morgan, made it clear to her this was a very appealing form of work especially as
there was greater opportunity to interact with colleagues around the world, use the
est and lowest-cost global talent and significantly reduce travel costs thus
offsetting the company’s flight ca
on footprint.
From past experience Jane also knew that virtual teams can be hard to get right. In
her previous role as Director of Social Media nearly half her staff working remotely
admitted to feeling confused and overwhelmed by collaboration technology. She
also discovered that most people she spoke to considered virtual communication
less productive than face-to-face interaction.
Jane started reading literature about what makes an effective virtual team and
discovered that successful virtual team players all have a few things in common:
good communication skills, high emotional intelligence, an ability to work
independently, and the resilience to recover from the hitches and delays that
inevitably arise (Fe
azi 2014). She was particularly interested to learn that
awareness of and sensitivity to other cultures is also important in global groups and
it is the quality of cross-cultural communication at the team level that determines
the effectiveness of the multicultural team (Matveev & Nelson 2004).
©MNG81001 Assessment 3 Session XXXXXXXXXX
Moreover, she also learned from her readings that teams incorporating diverse
nationalities can experience problems later on when the pressures of work kicks in.
Problems such as defining trust and how trust is earned, prefe
ed language for
usiness meetings, protocols for feedback, and even rules for addressing people and
inte
uptions.
Next steps
This morning, Jane received an email from Paul with a list of people who had been
chosen for the new team (Exhibit 1). These people had already been notified of the
‘KidsEats’ project and were waiting for Jane to initiate the discussion and get the first
virtual meet under way. Jane was impressed by the expertise of the team Paul had
assembled. She was confident that with the help of all these people, ‘KidsEats’ would
ecome a world-wide phenomenon promoting the fundamental value of Sunshine
100: ‘Together, may we create a healthier life by starting with the food we eat’.
However, her three immediate concerns were:
1. How to manage all the differences in communications styles, world views,
customs, rules and roles that each team member would
ing to the table;
2. Specific cross-cultural competencies needed for an effective global team; and
3. Key task and process issues to be addressed in the new team to minimise
future problems and conflict.
For the first time in her career, Jane had to think about time differences to schedule
a meeting. How would the communication between the team work? What to write
in her first email?
The first thing Jane did was place her new team on the world map and also put the
appropriate cu
ent time next to each (Exhibit 2). She thought it would be a good
idea if each team member assessed their own personal communication style (Exhibit
3) and shared style and communication preferences in the first meeting. In addition,
Jane felt it would be useful if each team member considered the context of their
espective national culture in terms of the styles in which different countries
communicate. How many ‘high-context’ and ‘low context’ cultures do we have, she
wondered? ‘I’m sure this will be useful when it comes to avoiding miscommunication
and misinterpretation between all the different national cultures of our teams
members’ mulled Jane to herself. To help her new team understand the challenges
of communicating cross-culturally Jane started to map out a framework relating
national culture orientations, cross-cultural communication competence and
multicultural team performance (Exhibit 4).
Finally, Jane sat back in her chair and began to ponder what should be in her first
email, the specific cross-cultural competencies that could be applied to both the
individual and also to the teams interactions, as well as the key task and process
issues to be addressed to minimise future problems and conflict.
©MNG81001 Assessment 3 Session XXXXXXXXXX
Exercise
1. Week 6 tutorial: the class will be divided into groups of eight with each student
given a role to play on this newly created virtual team. Please get into character of
that team member as you decide the impact of your assigned national culture on
communication and team performance (for example, negotiation, relationship
management, role of language, social power and conflict resolution).
2. Complete the Communication Styles: A Self-Assessment Exercise (Exhibit 3) and
consider the key contextual features of your assigned national culture. Bring the
esults of both to the Week 9 tutorial.
3. Week 9 tutorial class: the first telephone conference call role-play. Allocated time
per team 10 minutes. After the role-play, the class should discuss what went well
during the conference call and what the problems were. Discuss initial concerns,
strategies and expectations for the call.
4. Answer the following four (4) questions associated with the case. This forms the
1,000 word written part of the assessment task. Use seven (7) sources to support
your claims and build your argument.
i. Prepare a common email for Jane to send to all the team announcing the first
telephone conference call. Identify the agenda for the meeting. What key
messages should Jane include in her first email? Use the memo format for
the email.
ii. Discus how best Jane can manage all the differences in communication styles,
world views, customs, rules and roles that each team member will
ing to
the table.
iii. Identify the specific cross-cultural communication competencies that can be
applied both to individual as well as to team interactions.
iv. Evaluate the key task and process issues to be addressed in the new team to
minimise future problems and conflict.
5. Refer to the Assessment 3 Marking Criteria Guide and Marking Ru
ic located on
the Blackboard under Assessment Tasks and Submissions.
6. Submit Assessment 3 to Turnitin via the Blackboard site no later than the due
date: Monday 9th September 9.00am (QLD time).