This week’s journal articles focus on empowering leadership and effective collaboration in geographically dispersed teams, please answer the following questions:

1. How do geographically dispersed teams collaborate effectively?
2. Please find at least three tools on the market that teams can use to collaborate on a geographically dispersed team.  Please note the pros and cons of each tool. 
3. Based on the research above, note which tool you would select if you were managing the geographically dispersed team and why.

 

Geographically Diverse Teams

Introduction

Diversity is one of the factors attributed to high performance and productivity among many organizations. In enhancing diversity, employees from various backgrounds such as race, gender, different countries globally are recruited and assigned different roles that boost service delivery and productivity. The diversity forces some employees to work virtually from different parts of the world while others operate within the business premises. After the outbreak of the COVID 19 pandemic, many organizations transitioned to working on virtual space to curb the spread of the infection. Such factors have led to the adoption of numerous technological tools available in the market, such as Zoom, Slack, Ryver, or google hangouts, SmartFile, Trello, and ToDolst, to coordinate these geographically dispersed teams. The tools have their advantages and disadvantages depending on their functionalities in relation to the organization's needs. While there are tons of tools, an organization's choice is influenced by the core features and suitability to organizational needs. For effective team collaboration, the organization should implement clear guidelines and plans to manage them and ensure all the members work together for common goals.

Effective Collaborative of Geographically Dispersed Teams

An organization relies on virtual teams to access their expertise from employees in different geographical areas; thus, for effective collaboration of the virtual teams, communication and transformation leadership is the key to effectiveness and success. Enhancing the communication will require selecting and implementing the technical tools that have all the necessary features to meet such communication and reliability (Eisenberg et al., 2019). Choosing the right and reliable tools will enhance the collaboration of dispersed teams as all the members will never be left behind while crucial information on their roles is communicated. Sometimes, these tools may fail, disconnecting members working together. Reliable tools must have backup plans to restore data from the previous session for optimal productivity.

An organization needs a good transformation leader to guide, direct and coordinate the activities of all the virtual team members and ensure they follow the organization's plan and direction (Eisenberg et al., 2019). The leader should also help solve any issue arising from the virtual teams, making collaboration effective as any emerging issues are addressed immediately to guarantee minimal downtime. The leader should motivate the virtual teams' members to work and be disciplined as no one is watching over them while working in the virtual environment (Contreras et al., 2020). This leadership role will help address issues such as cases of absenteeism, which may affect the effectiveness of the collaboration as all the members will not be moving in the same direction. As such, good leadership will help build effective, interdependent, and committed virtual teams who are self-disciplined and cannot take advantage of the virtual environment to engage in their personal business and activities to the disadvantages of the employer.

Geographically dispersed teams collaborate effectively by having clear and detailed deliverables they are supposed to accomplish with a specified period. These deliverables serve as guidance to these virtual teams on what is expected to help the organization achieve its objectives. Besides, it prevents issues such as confusion and duplication of roles among the employees by finding themselves doing the same thing, causing some delay in execution of other functions that are not allocated to some staff (Eisenberg et al., 2019). Also, regular and multiple meetings between the virtual teams and the organization's management make geographically dispersed teams collaborate more effectively as they are given the highlights of their progress and what is expected. During such meetings, members' performance is reviewed, and necessary changes are introduced to facilitate the smooth flow of operations. The scheduled meetings provide an opportunity to address any other issues arising among the teams undermining their productivity, such as ineffective technical tools.

Tools for Collaborating Geographically Dispersed Teams

The first tool is Zoom which provides videotelephony and online chat services through a peer-to-peer software platform. This tool allows people from different geographical areas to engage through video calling. Zoom is also used in teleconferencing, where parties can organize meetings via the platform just as they would attend physically (Gray et al.,.2020). The tool also supports instant screen sharing, cross-platform instant messaging, chat, and webinars. The second tool is Slack, used as messaging app where businesses connect people to different types of information they require. Slack brings together people from different locations into a unified team and discusses various matters they want to deliberate. The third tool, Ryver, is used to communicate and manage tasks (Hurley, 2020). Ryver helps integrate email communication with group messaging in a single app, facilitating effective communication among the team members. The tool supports a connection of up to 12 persons who can manage their tasks, chat, and file sharing.

The next tool is the google hangouts tool which allows voice, video, and chats communication with other team members. Google hangout is a product developed by Google; thus, readily available to those using google apps for business. The next tool is SmartFile which makes it easier to share information in the form of files. SmartFile uses a browser interface to access data on an FTP client (Hurley, 2020). Another tool is Trello used in monitoring virtual team progress, thus, applicable in tracking the status of the project being undertaken by the organization members. Lastly, ToDolst is used in organizing tasks, either individually or through collaboration with members of the team.

Preferred Tool for Managing a Geographically Dispersed Team

From the above list of tools for managing the geographically dispersed team, I would select zoom due to its features and functionalities, making it easier to manage all the team's activities. Zoom is a web-based collaborative video conferencing tool founded in 2011 by Eric Yuan (Serhan, 2020). The tool has the following functionalities: providing quality audio, video, and screen sharing, which support the virtual conference, online meetings, webinars, and many more features, making it ideal for managing virtual teams and engaging them in a range of activities without having them travel to the organizational premises. Zoom's features create an interactive environment where different members can interact (Serhan, 2020). The organization's management will need to share and discuss various issues with the team working virtually. Employing it in the administration will make it easier to have an interactive session as the teams exchange ideas on executing various roles to meet the organization's objectives. 

Sometimes, the organization's management has some urgent information to share with the virtually dispersed teams; Zoom's video conferencing feature allows it to disseminate information in real-time by calling for conferences. Zoom allows for screen sharing, which will make it possible to have interactive sessions such as virtual training to equip the team members with new skills to enhance their productivity. Besides, Zoom improves communication among the team members as they can use the platform to send messages to each other, providing a tool for offering guidance and direction on how to carry out certain things as required by the management (Serhan, 2020). Lastly, it allows for real-time communication, and members can enquire or clarifying any issue during the meetings.

Conclusion

Effective collaboration of geographically dispersed teams can be achieved by taking various measures. These measures include enhancing communication and transformation leadership. The leader will also help solve any issue arising from the virtual teams. Choosing the right and reliable tools and having clear and detailed deliverables is crucial in managing teams.  These will make the activities of the teams smooth thus, effective. Various tools have been developed to help in the management of geographically dispersed teams. The most commonly used tools are Zoom, Slack, Ryver, or google hangouts, SmartFile, Trello, and ToDolst. If I were to manage a dispersed team, I would select Zoom due to the many benefits of its functionalities and features. These benefits include allowing for teleconferencing, where people can organize meetings via the platform and telecommunicating and allows for real-time communication. Besides, Zoom's features make it possible to have an interactive environment and provide quality audio, video, and screen sharing. These advantages will make it possible for team members to carry out vast activities without having to travel.

Introduction

For effective team collaboration, the organization should implement clear guidelines and plans to manage them and ensure all the members work together for common goals.

Paragraph 1

• Diversity is one of the factors attributed to high performance and productivity among many organizations.
• In enhancing diversity, employees from various backgrounds such as race, gender, different countries globally are recruited and assigned different roles that boost service delivery and productivity

Paragraph 2

• • • An organization relies on virtual teams to access their expertise from employees in different geographical areas; thus, for effective collaboration of the virtual teams, communication and transformation leadership is the key to effectiveness and success
    • Enhancing the communication will require selecting and implementing the technical tools that have all the necessary features to meet such communication and reliability (Eisenberg et al., 2019).

Paragraph 3

• An organization needs a good transformation leader to guide, direct and coordinate the activities of all the virtual team members and ensure they follow the organization's plan and direction (Eisenberg et al., 2019).
• The leader should also help solve any issue arising from the virtual teams, making collaboration effective as any emerging issues are addressed immediately to guarantee minimal downtime