Working efficiently and profitably in virtual teams spread around the globe requires more than the usual competencies and organisational processes. Siemens’ Monika Altmaier investigates what is involved in transforming global, virtual business and what the role of HR should be
Working efficiently and profitably in virtual teams spread around the globe requires more than the usual competencies and organisational processes. Siemens’ Monika Altmaier investigates what is involved in transforming global, virtual business and what the role of HR should be
Employees in Melbourne and Perth, customers in Madrid, suppliers in Dubai, partners in Bangalore, London and Shanghai, the HR department in Brisbane. Nowadays, relationships like these tend to be the rule rather than the exception. It is increasingly common for working groups and project teams to be spread across different locations and time zones. Tough global forces, such as international competitiveness, cost pressure, tighter deadlines, customer focus, fast product cycles, innovation demands and increasing globalisation, are driving companies to do business in project-based trans-national virtual teams. Global business time is 24 hours a day, 365 days per year. That is why companies such as IBM, EADS and Siemens have made virtual team skills one of the core competencies for their managers and employees running their global business.
Global transformation in Siemens
Like any global company, Siemens, which has 450,000 employees in 190 countries, needs to respond to these new forces in business. We also recognised new business models for outsourcing, insourcing, off-shoring, cost-cutting, sales initiatives, the diminishing availability of resources and the global acceleration of commercial activity.
We realised that we needed to find new ways of working, learning and sharing to improve our position as a global player, with local roots but responsibility for playing a global game. In terms of our values, we wanted to strike a balance between change and stability in order to integrate human rhythms with natural cycles and the demands of global business. We wanted to ensure local identity in the global frame with a view to making better use of local knowledge, creativity and innovations, while creating understanding, meaning and sustained value for everyone involved.
We saw that one crucial means of making these transformations was through virtual teaming. We needed to create the environment and processes so that our people could work together closely across geographic and organisational boundaries, communicating electronically rather than travelling.
According to IT and telecommunications research group Gartner, “by 2006, in 75 per cent of enterprises, project teams will have virtual membership; in more than half of these enterprises, some project team members will be non-employees”. In five years time, we anticipate that employees will do 50 per cent of their work virtually. That’s why it was so important for us to get started as soon as possible.
That is why we set about the creation and implementation of a technology-independent standard for distributed collaboration (or ‘e-collaboration’). This is based on a fixed company-wide standard together with flexible elements, which can be fitted to individual needs, policies and culture.
Challenges and barriers encountered and how Siemens responded
In making the transformation to virtual teaming, we needed to be aware of common problems faced in adopting this new way of working. Many of these are ‘people factors’that HR can tackle. Often employees are not skilled enough to work virtually. Their leaders are not skilled enough to lead people from a remote location, resulting in a lack of coordination and motivation. Other issues are that business processes fail because they are transferred from the traditional workplace without suitable adaptation. The table below illustrates other challenges.
HR as a driving force for global success through virtual teaming
Who else, if not HR professionals, should drive organisation-wide, systemic transformational initiatives? Here is how Siemens’ HR organisational departments were involved.
Our success would not have been possible without the involvement of top management –group executive management was a sponsor – ensuring immediate and high-level leadership communication between headquarters and the relevant countries and also ensuring the concept was endorsed locally.
The support of the HR department enabled us to ensure that project staffing efforts were no longer limited by geographical constraints and that the best brains could be used regardless of location.
New incentive and reward systems, new career paths and new promotion criteria were defined together with HR so that virtual managers did not feel they were losing promotion opportunities because they were not as visible as other managers.
We saw that constant accessibility, even on the road and during leisure time, makes it possible to delocalise the workplace: people can work and network from anywhere in the world. This has a significant social impact for the people involved and HR supported the change towards more remote ways of working by offering flexible working times, agreements and contracts.
We enhanced innovation and creativity by ensuring team diversity and by empowering the team members with the help of change agents. Resistance to change was overcome by communicating frequently, honestly, consistently and continuously. In order to dispel fear, we built up confidence right from the beginning and created new perspectives through involvement, motivation and incentives. As we changed the way people work together, new ways of thinking were implemented to create value.
Systematic hands-on training with a focus on basic and advanced training in methodologies, processes, teaming and cultural awareness was provided through the Siemens Management Learning Programme.
HR helped us with the analysis and design of organisational and virtual team components, and defined virtual team values and boundaries. They supported us in developing the profiles of employees likely to be successful virtual team managers and members and coordinated their selection.
In kick-off face-to-face workshops with newly-forming virtual teams we defined a clear vision, binding mission and shared purpose. The responsibilities, roles and accountabilities were clearly fixed and recorded in a charter. Building trust-based personal relationships was crucial at this stage and that is why we started with face-to-face workshops.
Personal lessons learned
I have described how HR helped us in Siemens’global business transformation. Additionally I would advise any organisation embarking on virtual teaming as a systemic initiative to put the following into practice: First, set up virtual teams as a company-wide project hand-in-hand with business transformation while standardising virtual teaming process across the organisation. Second, establish the right balance between rules and freedom to encourage creativity and innovation (the global/local dimension). Third, expand virtual teaming competencies in the organisation by letting inexperienced people work together with experienced people.
Organisational benefits achieved through ‘going virtual’
At Siemens we are increasing productivity, cost-effectiveness and efficiency through virtual teaming.
We find that ‘going virtual’ shortens product development cycles by up to 50 per cent. We are able to reduce travel expenses and make better use of time by minimising the cost of arranging and supporting face-to-face meetings. We are improving coordination and streamlining complex work processes. We are experiencing lower transaction costs, speedier e-business and knowledge-based work and greater flexibility and mobility.
Achieving these benefits requires significant and systemic change to organisation-wide practices and policies, and the HR function is invaluable in helping to make that transformation.
Five key points
1 Tough global forces, such as international competitiveness, are driving companies to do business in trans-national virtual project teams.
2 Some companies anticipate that in five years time, employees will do 50 per cent of their work virtually.
3 Working virtually can, in some cases, shorten product development cycles by up to 50 per cent.
4 The challenges posed by working in global, virtual teams include not just technological issues but also business process, management and cultural issues.
5 Remote working has a social impact – for example, on leisure time – but HR can support employees by offering flexible working times and contracts.
Monika Altmaier is Project Leader, Internationalisation at Siemens Business Services, Germany. This article is adapted from her keynote address to the Going Virtual conference in Brisbane in September 2005.
