INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT

CHRIST UNIVERSITY
(IMCU)
A REVIEW OF
The Impact of Project Management in Virtual
Environment: A Software Industry Perspective
By
N. B. J. Gamage
https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1601/1601.01220.pdf

International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 8887)

Volume 58 No.8, November 2016
AS PART OF
SOFTWARE PROJECT MANAGEMENT
&
IT OUTSOURCING
CIA I
By
AMAL DEV M
1527505
5MBA L1
Under the guidance of
Prof N Ramakrishnan

ABSTRACT
The main purpose of this article is the analysis of virtual teams in a software project. Virtual
team within an organization could achieve optimized project performance by acquiring
appropriate human resources, coordination, communication and regular performance evaluation.
According to the literature many ICT tools will collaborate to manage virtual teams, but still
most of the projects lead to failure in the software industry. Aim of this research is to discover
the most affected factors for virtual project human resource management.

INTRODUCTION
A virtual team is a group of individuals who work across time, space and organizational
boundaries with links strengthened by communication technology .Virtual team concept is very
common in the software industry. Most of the time clients and software development team in
different locations in the world. Sometimes there are multiple virtual development teams located
in different places. Their subject experts live in different places in the world. So that project
manager needs to hire team from all over the world locations.
Therefore, this research investigates major factors that could influence effective project
management in virtual environment of Sri Lankan Software Industry. The author states that
virtual team human resource management is challengeable task for practicing project manager.
Most of the projects fails because resource inefficiency and late to discover resource skill gap
which hinders gaining maximum output from the project team in a virtual environment and
affects project managers performances as well as the overall success of the project. Furthermore
virtual team human resource management has challengeable issues, so to find solution for these
issues will benefit the project managers and other all stakeholders who handle their projects in
virtual environment.
The objectives of this study are as follows
1. To identify what are practicing project managers facing issues.
2. To identify factors influence project human resource management in Virtual environment.
In addition, the scope of this research encompasses how project managers handle their project
team members in a virtual environment. How do they use agile project management
methodology effectively and efficient way to handle the problems while project running? What
are the major factors affected to the project human resource management in a virtual team?

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Quantitative approach is used because it offers the flexibility to represent the population in
general of users within organizations and also widely penetrated approach in IS. Furthermore,
quantitative research approach can aid to the use of tables and charts to visualize the data, use

appropriate means to describe it, and chose some methods to examine trend relationship within it
using statistical techniques like hypothesis testing.
The idea of a survey is used to obtain same sorts of data from a large group of people in a
standard and systematic way .On the other hand, it may not consume respondents time
unnecessarily. Perhaps the greatest benefits offered by a survey study from respondents
viewpoint would be the freedom to choose their best opinion from a given set of options, which
is also more easy process for them instead of having an interview Furthermore, overall survey
study could help respondents to get an idea of the research field.
Thus a Likert scale questionnaire was used to conduct the survey for the research.
Population
Project managers and Team Leads of Software development companies who manage virtual
teams in the Sri Lanka.
Sample
The research was conducted with 10 software development virtual teams with 7-10 members,
who work different locations in the world (N=10).

RESULTS
Most of virtual teams are ineffective as a percentage 25%, lack of team performance as a
percentage 27%. Another issue is individual performance lower of team members as a percentage
17%. But another study prove that 18% virtual teams are success in action.
The three main reasons affecting virtual team in trouble were
1. Lack of face-to-face contact with team members (46% of responses),
2. Lack of Resources (37%) and
3. Time zone differences hindering the ability to collaborate (29%).

CRITICISM
1. The sample size considered for the study was very small (N=10).
2. The population should have been software engineers from IT hotspots of the world like
India or US as the software industry in Sri Lanka is still developing.
3. Research methodology used i.e. survey method or questionnaire may be subjected to the
mood and perception of the interviewee rather than experience.
4. Two areas of critique for the literature review involve the lack of critical analysis and an
ineffective discussion of how the current research will add to or enhance the existing
body of knowledge.

CONCLUSION

Virtual project teams are being used by organizations primarily for cost reasons.
In most of the selected organizations, the techniques for managing virtual project
teams do not differ significantly between virtual project teams and traditional project
teams.
Technology is an enabler of virtual project teams. It is not the solution to virtual
project teams.
Virtual project team managers need to take a different approach to managing their
teams less management, more leadership.