Building the Dispersed Team

1
Building the Dispersed Team

• Building the Dispersed Team Through Trust,
  Communication, and Personal Bridges
• Building relationship means face to face, shaking
  hands, working shoulder by shoulder, sharing a
  drink, building trust.
• Personal face to face relationship are formed in
  kick-off, milestones, and celebratory meetings
• Can collaborative technologies alone built a true
  team?

2
Building the Dispersed Team

• Building Trust
• Trust means placing confidence in anothers
  character, ability, strength, and reliability.
• Trust is essential if people are to depend upon
  each other to meet commitments
• Trust is a complex thing to develop
• It take time to develop
• While co-located team members can built trust
  through formal and informal face to face
  interactions distance is an impediment to
  building trusting relationships.
• Importantly, different culture develop trust at
  different rates
• Low context vs. high context cultures
• Tuckman Model of forming-storming-norming-performi
  ng

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Building the Dispersed Team
Forming The team gets together and gets to know each other. It clarifies roles, figures out the tasks and the objectives
Storming Conflicts breaks out over roles, objectives, and task allocations. Different leaders, official or otherwise, are pursuing different goals
Norming The team begins to form norms, roles, and protocols for working together. Some team cohesion may begin.
Performing The team begins to perform well, working together towards a common goal. Conflicts are handled constructively.
Tuckman Model
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Building the Dispersed Team

• Theory of Swift Trust
• Swift trust occur when team members assume that,
  like themselves, the other team members have been
  filtered for reliability and competence.
• E.g. Temporary teams such as in film crews, etc.
• Members set aside their suspicions and swiftly
  get into trusting role and addressing the task at
  hand.
• Global IT managers engage in team members role
  legitimization by highlighting the reputation and
  professional qualifications at the other sites
  as units and as individuals.
• What university he attended, what company she
  worked for, and what product he developed
• Cultural issues with swift trust

5
Building the Dispersed Team

• Kick-off and other milestone meetings
• The idea is to get as many members of the team
  together for several intensive days of working
  and socializing at the beginning of the
  development cycle.
• The kick-off meeting build trust, team spirit,
  addresses some of the cultural differences, also
  accelerates communication at the outset.
• In a multinational team, there is little in
  common to begin a relationship, and thus personal
  relationships will take long time to build or not
  develop at all.

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Building the Dispersed Team
Vision Elaborate on the overall project vision and how each site fits into that vision
The methodological framework Introduce and motivate the software development framework (process model/ methodology). Explain the quality standard
Communication ground rules Explain how team members should communicate and include tips and rules about phone, e-mail, video-conferencing, and etc.
Cultural training Hire a professional training to address specific cultural differences and how these differences can be overcome.
Social functions Arrange for social activities.
Key component of kick-off meeting
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Building the Dispersed Team
Change in level of trust between sites
Milestone meeting
Kick-off meeting
Trust
Sufficient level to work together effectively
Time
8
Building the Dispersed Team

• Lateral Communication
• Distance causes coordination and control
  mechanisms to break down
• Informal
• Formal

PM
Team Lead country A
Team Lead country B
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Building the Dispersed Team

• 360 view
• Team communication protocol
• English Language training
• Building personal bridge between site
• Cultural liaison
• Constant travel
• Expatriates
• Create a common team culture
• Training

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Building the Dispersed Team
The Five Stages of the People Capability Maturity Model The Five Stages of the People Capability Maturity Model
Level 1 Initial These are ad hoc, inconsistently performed practices
Level 2 Repeatable Instill basic disciplines into the team activities, including training, communication, and complementation.
Level 3 Defined Identify the primary competencies and align the activities around them, including creating a participatory culture
Level 4 Managed Begin to manage quantitatively and engage in team building
Level 5 Optimizing Continuously improve methods for personal and team competence
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Conclusion
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Globalization and Information Systems

• Why are companies globalizing there is functions
• The forces driving globalization includes
• Demand for new global consumer
• New global business consumer
• Global sourcing
• Global product RD

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Globalization and Information Systems

• Implication
• IS organization itself is taking on a new form
• IS organization is an Integrated Network in which
  global systems and global development efforts are
  increasingly shared across borders
• Units CGA are assigned short and long time
  responsibilities for systems deemed global.

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Globalization and Information Systems
Centralized, Decentralized, Coordinated and
Integrated
Corporate Systems IS
Structure Development
Centralized databases and processes driven by
headquarters
Headquarters centralized development and decision
making
Centralized
Standalone, largely independent
Independent at each subsidiary
Decentralized (Multidomestic)
Coordinated
Linked databases with some application sharing
Some joint development formalization and
standards established.
Integrated Network (Transnational)
Integrated architecture shared databases and
shared global processes
Centers for global applications
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Globalization and Information Systems

• Characteristics of Integrated Network IS
  Organization
• Common global Architecture
• Powerful telecommunication backbone
• Uniform global system with flexible modules
  tailored to address local requirements
• Centers for global application development with
  responsibilities for systems worldwide
• A culture of shared management
• A culture of shared application development
• A culture of shared innovation

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Globalization of Software Development
50 nations now exporting software products or
services
Source Erran Carmel
17
Microsoft
RD centers
Cambridge
Redmond
Beijing
Haifa, Israel
Silicon Valley
Bangalore, India
Source Erran Carmel
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Xerox -- Global Service Organization
England
Ireland
HQ USA
China
India
Singapore
Brazil