This year I'm inspired to talk about UX and virtual teams. Why?
- How many of your team members work from home? Or from an office location in another city? State? Country?
- How often are you on conference calls for work?
- How often are you sharing your screen with a team online?
We don't even realize that we are actively working in virtual environments. It's almost a treat to be in a meeting with teammates in the room and collaborate together.
We talk about the value and importance of collaboration in Agile, but are we really collaborating in these virtual teams?
Working with a virtual team comes with some benefits - we all get a lot more work done at home or in our offices away from the team because it's quiet and there are few interruptions. Interactions are scheduled so we can plan our work day - when we meet vs when we do our work.
But the effectiveness from being virtual comes with a huge price tag - mainly, communication.
We like to think that we are all great communicators and use language well to express our thoughts.
Even the best of us can fail at this in a virtual environment. Most communication is non-verbal. That's just a fact. To top it off, most of communication is about listening. And this is where communication fails. Listening is hard. It's harder when the person you are talking to is not in front of you.
Notice what happens when you get on a phone call next time. Do you attempt to "multi-task" and:
- Read emails?
- Answer emails?
- Work on another project?
- Prep for another call?
- Surf the Web?
- Attend to social media? (Check Facebook, Twitter, read an article, etc.)
- Or just other things than be present on the call?
Sure, video calls can help maintain focus because people are looking at each other, but it's still the same instinct to multi-task. And it's natural to do. If your phone is around, email and social media is just at your fingertips to "keep connected." It's hard to stay focused.
It takes time (an average of 15 minutes) to re-orient to a primary task after a distraction such as an email. Efficiency can drop by as much as 40%. Long-term memory suffers and creativity — a skill associated with keeping in mind multiple, less common, associations — is reduced.--Paul Atchley, You Can’t Multitask, So Stop Trying, Harvard Business Review
15 minutes - that could be up to a third of a conference all.
And what about those impromptu discussions or meetings that happen throughout the day? We typically find those to be distractions, but are they really distractions? Or are they really discussions for clarifications to get work done? Or a way to bond with teammates, understand them better, and work better with them in the future?
Ideas get lost in virtual communication. People may not be listening. Or read the attachments. Or be open to change or new ideas. It's not anyone's fault, really. It's part of being in a virtual world and adjusting to new ways to communicate with one another.
Advertising and entertainment has uncovered effective ways to communicate to groups of people who aren't present in person - and much of this is centered around the more emotional side of communication.
This has influenced 6 strategies to communicate with teams:
- Meeting in person isn't the only way - Use your communication tools wisely
- Makin' friends - Build relationships online
- Broadcast - Work live and in real-time
- Nobody reads - Be sure people read your work
- Make it real - Share your work
- Call a member of the audience - Keep people involved
Building trust is key to communication, and typically that happens in person. However, it can happen virtually through the 6 strategies listed. I have found that in startups, building trust occurs differently than in larger companies, where institutional knowledge may be more valued - and trusted. That's not a bad thing - just a different perspective. In some ways, it's easier to get that knowledge and be trusted, almost like you know the game's rules.
Generally, change inspires suspicion. And all projects are about change in some way. That's why it's important to meet in person or communicate in ways that builds trust.
It is possible to build trust with a virtual team and inspire them to contribute to conversations, even feel like they are all sitting near each other.
I have a number of stories and examples of how this works. I've been working with virtual teams for a long, long time and have experienced team environments where we are such a tight knit team, when we finally meet in person, we act as a team that has worked together live in a workroom.
I share my insights, thoughts and experience about UX and virtual teams at Agile 2015 on Thursday, August 6 at 2:00pm - UX practitioner? In an Agile virtual team? 6 ways to bridge the distance. Hope to see you there!!
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