The iRise Blog

Cynthia Froggatt, author of “Work Naked: Eight Essential Principles for Peak Performance in the Virtual World,” was another keynote speaker on Day One at the World Congress for Business Analysts (WCBA) conference today at Disneyland. 

First, Cynthia wanted to make sure that everyone understood that the title of her book was to be taken methaphorically and not literally.

In a world where more and more people are working on or with virtual teams, Cynthia’s talk was very timely and pertinent.

When talking about distributed teams, Cynthia pointed out that it is important to focus on a sequence of WANTS:

• leaders want the best people on their team (without regard for where they are located)
• people want to be on the team (even though they won’t see their teammates every day)
• teams want to be successful (even though they will have to work in different ways)
• teams want to understand why and what’s expected of them (AND how to use geographic distribution to their advantage)

While at Cisco, Cynthia managed a distributed team in the U.S., Asia and Europe.  She shared some of the issues with a globally dispersed team, such as time zones, travel burnout, cultural differences, difficulty with verbal and nonverbal communications.

Some of the other hurdles that need to be overcome are:

• a predisposition to see teammates everyday
• a belief that co-located teams are more effective
• try to get as close to co-location as possible instead of exploiting geographic advantages
• that blame every problem on distance
• have a bad experience
• give low priority projects to distributed teams

How do you have to work differently with distributed teams?  You have to:

• want to work time zones to your advantage
• want to use latest technology in sophisticated ways, but also know how to use basic tools when technology fails
• want to gather for face-to-face interaction in collaborative places, but don’t want to own workplaces they don’t use very often

Cynthia also shared an excellent tip from her experience.  She made sure that everybody participating in group conference calls had to be on a headset, so no one is at a ‘locational’ disadvantage.  This approach leveled the playing field for all participants and forced everyone to focus more on the discussion.

So, why bother with distributed teams?  Cynthia’s answer is that distributed teams:

1. use people’s time and talents wisely
2. use financial resources effectively
3. use natural resources responsibly (and can reduce your company’s carbon footprint)

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