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ABSTRACT
Multinational organisations are increasingly adopting information and communications technology (ICT) facilitated
virtual teams for accomplishing projects. This paper explored challenges to effective collaboration in cross-cultural
virtual teams through an interpretive case study of the Ghana subsidiary of a multinational telecommunications company.
It identified three culture-related challenges to the work of virtual teams: cultural and linguistic challenges to effective
communications, cultural differences in work practices, and culture conflict. The paper discusses the implications of the
findings and suggests strategies for effective management of cross-cultural virtual teams.
KEYWORDS
Virtual teams; culture; interpretive research; case study
1. INTRODUCTION
Geographically distributed virtual teams (VTs) have become progressively common across several industry
sectors (Holmstrom, Conchúir, Agerfalk, & Fitzgerald, 2006; Huang & Trauth, 2007; Nicholson & Sahay,
2001; Sarker & Sahay, 2004). As a result, they have generated considerable interest among information
systems (IS) practitioners and researchers in the last few decades. VTs signify groups of geographically
and/or organisationally dispersed co-workers that are assembled using information and communications
technologies (ICTs) to accomplish an organisational task (Townsend, DeMarie, & Hendrickson, 1998, p. 18).
Members of a VT may be present locally within an organization’s physical facilities, dispersed nationally
within a single country or globally dispersed across a number of countries and time zones (Wakefield,
Leidner, & Garrison, 2008).
As organisations seek to exploit the benefits of VTs, they may confront a number of challenges, including
managing cultural diversity among team members (Kayworth & Leidner, 2000; Massey, Hung, Montoya-
Weiss, & Ramesh, 2001). For example, Staples & Zhao 2006, p. 389) note: ‘teams are usually made up of
members from different national backgrounds, meaning the members come from different national cultures,
possibly speak different languages, and were raised in different countries that may have different value
systems’. However, while diversity has a number benefits, there are also challenges, the consequences of
which may range from project failure to delayed delivery of working systems (Shore & Venkatachalam,
1995).
The aim of this paper is to identify challenges to effective collaboration in cross-cultural VTs through
research in the Ghana subsidiary of a multinational telecommunications company that uses geographically
dispersed cross-cultural VTs to execute projects. The rest of the paper is organised as follows: after this
introduction, the literature on the concept of culture and its relevance to IS research are discussed. Then, a
brief review of prior studies on culture and VTs is provided. This is followed by the description of the
research methodology and presentation and discussion of the findings. The paper concludes with an
assessment of the limitations of the research and explores avenues for future research.
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2. LITERATURE REVIEW
This section presents a review of literature in two stages. First, a brief discussion of cross-cultural IS research
is presented. Second, research into cross–cultural VTs is examined.
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3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This research based on an interpretive single case study with the aim to unearth the culture-related challenges
of cross-cultural VTs. Case study is one of a variety of accepted research strategies in IS. A case study
explores a phenomenon in its natural context, using multiple methods of data collection to gather information
from one or a few entities (people, groups, or organizations) (Benbasat, Goldstein, & Mead, 1987). Case
study research is valuable for exploring ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions that the investigator has little or no
control over (Yin, 2011).
Case study research based on the interpretive paradigm has been effectively applied to organisational IS
research and has been adopted for this study to understand the views of the participants on the challenges
cross-cultural VTs within the context of the study organisation. The interpretive IS research perspective
regards knowledge of reality as socially constructed by human actors, therefore, it is important to adopt
research approaches that emphasise human interpretations and meanings (Walsham, 1995). The validity of
interpretive studies rests on the logical reasoning behind the description of the results, the depiction of
inferences, and the reaching conclusions from the results rather than statistical generalisations (Walsham,
1995).
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ISBN: 978-989-8533-33-3 © 2015
corporate culture. Another dimension of the informal culture within the organisation is the option for
employees to work remotely.
Ghana, the local context of the subsidiary the corporate culture is a high power distance West African
culture. The work environment and organisational structure in Ghana is generally characterised by a
recognition and acknowledgement of inequality and institutional hierarchies (Hofstede, 1980). There is also a
high degree of paternalism and submission to authority and power; authority is centralised, and decision-
making styles tend to be autocratic as superiors make decisions without consultation or participation of
subordinates, while subordinates are generally unwilling or afraid to disagree with superiors (Gyekye &
Salminen, 2005; Hofstede, 2001). In contrast, the North European culture of the headquarters setting is
characterised low power distance, with less hierarchy, equal rights, and access to superiors. The management
style is generally informal, communication is direct, and decision-making is consultative (Hofstede, 2001).
4. RESEARCH FINDINGS
The analysis of the data identified four major themes associated with the use of cross-cultural VTs in the
study organisation. The first relates to the nature of the deployment of VTs. However, the remaining themes
relate to three main cultural issues that affect VT effectiveness based on ERSG’s experiences: cultural
barriers to effective communication, the challenges of different work practices, and conflicts arising from
cultural misunderstanding. The next section discusses the findings in detail.
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8th IADIS International Conference Information Systems 2015
My team virtually does all the deployment in sub-Saharan Africa; we are looking at 47 different
countries. There are a number of delivery models I could use. For example, I could use people within Africa,
or teams outside of Africa based on scale, cost, and industrialisation. In terms of industrialisation, I mean
skills that can replicated at a fraction of the cost – Project Manager.
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individuals perceive and interpret information. Because of different interpretations of issues by people from
diverse cultural backgrounds, there is always a potential for conflict. Conflict is disagreement between
members of team that may take the form of task or relationship conflict that may be detrimental to team
performance (Kankanhalli et al., 2006). The interpretation of the data suggests instances of conflict among
VT members based of cultural differences. Issues with cross-cultural understanding, differences in work
practices and effective communications occasionally created frustration and conflict among team members.
Some of the respondents branded some of their colleagues as lazy and laid back and appeared to exhibit
tendencies superiority over others. Other respondents, while not recounting instances of direct conflict talked
about their frustration with some team members and latent conflict.
Figure 1. A Model of Cultural Barriers to Virtual Team Work Emerging from Research
5. DISCUSSION
This paper has explored challenges to effective collaboration in cross-cultural VTs, based on the experiences
of a subsidiary of a multinational organisation based in Ghana. The paper confirms the previous findings of
some previous studies that while VTs presents organisations with some opportunities, they also pose some
challenges. ERSG’s use of VTs to accomplish project tasks across time and space is the part of a growing
trend towards use of remote work teams facilitated by the use of enterprise systems and synchronous and
asynchronous ICT-mediated communications. The use of VTs allows the company has been able to save cost
and time of having to co-locate team members. This is consistent with the findings of previous studies that
report some cost and time savings with the use of VTs. Furthermore, the culturally and functionally diverse
teams working together can improve innovation through the cross-fertilisation of ideas.
However, cultural and linguistic differences are important challenges. Furthermore, the findings indicate
that bringing individuals with disparate cultural values together could adversely affect the work of VTs. An
individual’s cultural background shapes the way their communication preferences, work practices, attitudes
to time and language preferences, which affect how they collaborate in virtual work. The findings support the
conclusions of prior studies that report that cultural diversity creates problems with effective communications
and work practices, which might sometimes lead to misunderstanding and conflict in VTs when compared to
traditional teams (Huang & Trauth, 2007; Kankanhalli et al., 2006; Kayworth & Leidner, 2000; Sarker &
Sahay, 2004).
The implications of the findings for practice are that organisations and managers should appreciate that
cultural diversity has implications for the effective use of VTs. While VTs compress time and space, they
may inhibit the effectiveness of teams. This implies the need for efforts to manage the cultural elements to
reduce conflict and make such teams more effective. This might be accomplished through the development of
strategies to create cultural awareness among team members and the use of team building exercises and
formal training. Kayworth & Leidner (2000) suggest a number of factors that need consideration to help
reduce the negative effects of culture in VT settings. For example, they recommend periodic face-to-face
meetings between team members where possible. This might help create a sense of cultural awareness among
team members. Furthermore, they recommend the setting of clear team goals and promoting continuous
performance feedback and building teams that are more cohesive.
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