Communication without boundaries

The day of the virtual worker for some industries continues to move forward due to technology advances and social changes.

Whether you see it as good or bad, the fact is that people are now becoming used to communicating through a keyboard and screen with friends, family, colleagues and even complete strangers and don’t always seem to need the close presence of other human beings. This was always one of the issues with virtual/home working as there was a view you needed to have access to the ‘water cooler’ or ‘coffee machine’ to catch the gossip so that person didn’t feel isolated, but in some ways this has been replaced by social media tools such as Facebook, where people are more likely to open up than at the water cooler!

Access to the right talent is another factor in the movement towards the virtual workforce. Finding the right person in the right location is difficult and even though people have been prepared to relocate, that trend is changing with people seeking better work/life balance and wanting to work from their chosen location not yours.

Luckily technology has moved on a pace and with things like Unified Communications you can be in ‘the office’ but at home.
Technology now brings us collaboration tools such as Web conferencing where we can share and update documents; carry out polls to get opinions; have chat (IM) sessions either in isolation or running alongside a virtual meeting which allows all members to have a say even if they can’t get a voice due to a more dominant member. Unified communications also allows us to deliver all forms of communication whilst on the move so our voice messages can be delivered through email and we can redirect our voice extension to our smart phone or tablet.

This is also where the Cloud can come in to its own by delivering the platform and tools to the team members. Data security may be a concern but that will be dependent on the type of Cloud (Private or Public) and the sensitivity of the data.

Having the right technology is very important but we still need some structure around virtual teams. The business process needs to be adapted and guidelines set at the beginning of any assignment. A communication plan is required between participants defining how and frequency of communication with some regular mandatory virtual meetings. It is also essential that documents and plans are maintained so that the team has access to the latest position.

Time zones and cultural differences require some different effort from ensuring meetings respect time zones where possible and considering the styles of communication. Electronic communication can come into its own here as it can take out misunderstandings from language translations.

Communicating without boundaries is not only possible but achievable now and enables the best resources to be pulled together regardless of location.

"This post is on behalf of the Enterprise CIO Forum and HP"