Management 3.0: Virtual Teams

In today's increasingly interconnected world, an ever-growing number of businesses around the globe work on complex, cross-border projects. Their success depends on the efficiency of mostly heterogeneous teams whose members collaborate across time zones, continents and cultures. Such settings, known as virtual teams, require special skills that can be developed and also need to be refined. The Global Team Project prepares managers for the challenge of bringing cross-border projects to fruition, which is becoming more and more of a success factor for both executives and businesses.

How practical Global Team Projects can be is illustrated by two Global Executive MBA alumni who have successfully turned their projects into reality:

• Harald Trautsch and his start-up "iVoting"

• Norbert Wirth and the BPL "GREENoneTEC enters the US market" market-entry study

The Global Team Project (GTP) has been an integral part of the Global Executive MBA for years, making the WU Executive Academy one of only a few executive-education providers to use this innovative teaching method. 120 MBA students from three leading universities from Europe, Asia and the USA work on complex projects in 21 teams. In an effort to foster joined-up thinking and working at the global level, the WU Executive Academy's partner institutions - the Carlson School of Management in Minnesota and the Lingnan College of Sun Yat-Sen University in Guangzhou - have also firmly established the GTP in their curricula. The GTP is a six-month endeavor. At the end of the program, all teams meet in the USA, where they present the results of their work to a jury of experts.

"The GTP provides executives who have no prior experience of working outside national or European contexts with a wonderful opportunity to experience for themselves how 'tricky' global business can be and to see how the complexity of projects increases exponentially when you take them to the international level - mind you, I am referring only to organizational aspects, and projects involve much more than organization. Nonetheless, state-of-the-art communication tools (Skype, Connect, telepresence, etc.) enable you to carry out projects successfully without ever meeting your teammates in person," says Norbert Wirth, Global Executive MBA alumnus. His team created the BPL "GREENoneTEC enters the US market" market-entry study.

When putting teams together, the GTP designers put a particular emphasis on maximizing not only the mix of industries and sectors but also the wealth of perspectives and experience. Throughout the project, students use a state-of-the-art online platform that promotes efficient and interactive working - with experts and professors coaching them along the way.

Experience shows that teams who follow the rules of modern project management function best. Time is crucially important in this context: it has become clear in recent years that those teams who draw up - and stick to - a schedule and a list of responsibilities enjoy the actual project work more and are able to derive lasting benefits from the experience. Given that the MBA is a demanding 16-month program, time is definitely a premium.

Some projects are particularly outstanding in terms of quality and creativity and impress the program's professors and corporate managers alike. It is not uncommon for businesses to use GTPs as a starting point for projects that are not only elaborated in theory but also implemented in practice:

"Working on a topic for six months is a challenge - and it is even more of a challenge when your teammates are located in China and the USA. Back then, we decided that we wanted to create something of lasting value, which is why we developed not only the business plan but also the product itself. The biggest learning has been how much time you can save by simply building prototypes and interacting with clients, rather than getting lost in theory and Excel projections. Also, it is much more appealing if you can prove your business figures based on real-world experience. Sharing a common goal and working towards something "tangible" was a powerful motivator for the entire team. We knew what we were aiming at and how to go about it, so we did not have to discuss opinions; instead, we were all interested in obtaining real data," says Harald Trautsch.

About the product:

Life is too short for bad presentations: gone are the days when boring lectures and presentations made you fall asleep! Thanks to iVoting, lecturers are now able to interact with their audiences. It gives them the opportunity to ask participants questions that they can answer in real time via their smartphones, tablets or laptops. iVoting is fun and easy to use - and it is free. Voting results are available immediately and inserted directly into the presentation. In the past, remote controls and receivers had to be rented or bought, which required considerable logistic and financial resources. Now, by contrast, everyone can take advantage of iVoting.

About the custom study:

"GREENoneTEC", one of Europe's largest manufacturers of solar thermal panels, was interested in an in-depth evaluation of the US market, which was to include a business plan for market entry - a goal that the Austrian-based business intended to reach within two years. For our project, we initiated a custom study (BPL "GREENoneTEC enters the US market"). Some two years later, "GREENoneTEC" managed to reach this vitally important milestone by implementing our recommendations. By now, they have even set up a production facility in Mexico, which we had suggested as an alternative in order to boost local value creation and ensure competitive pricing of products.

For more infromation about the Global Team Project and the Global Executive MBA.

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