It has been a while since I last blogged. The main reason is that I have been working on the development of a cheminformatics strategy for a client and that has been a fascinating but time-consuming project. It has enabled me to combine my background as a chemist with my experience as an information scientist. In the course of it I went back to my university at Southampton for the first time in over 40 years! One of the features of the way that science is conducted is that the research teams can be spread around the world in both academic and industrial laboratories. In the case of science at least there is a widespread use of English and science itself uses terms that are universally understood around the world.
In other cases virtual team management can be a significant challenge. Even if the meetings go well there is the problem of ensuring that the team delivers between meetings, especially if team members report into managers who may well have different priorities than those of the team manager perhaps thousands of miles away in a different section of the organisation. Most of my projects involve virtual meetings, even if they are based in the UK. I have just published a revised version of my Research Note on Managing Virtual Teams. Over the last couple of years I have developed a one day training course on virtual team management which is set out in Appendix B of the Research Note. In this new version some additional topics have been covered and the list of books and other resources has been expanded.
I will be giving a 90 minute version of this course at the IntraTeam Event in Copenhagen on 25 February which will focus on the practical aspects of making virtual teams successful, including stories of good and horrendous team meetings that will help you in enhancing your own approach to virtual team management. The course will run at 10.45 and 13.15.
Martin White