Communication strategies for successful virtual team projects in IT sector

Abstract

The main objective of this research is to understand the impact of communication technologies on the success of IT virtual team projects. Communication technology has consequences for every virtual team project and its legacy will be measured by future generations. Much debate has ensured the perceived necessity of communication technologies in virtual team projects yet no study has ultimately proven the fact that whether advancement in communication technologies will create massive impact in virtual team's performance and ensure success. The aims of this research are to establish understanding of virtual teams and its communication technologies in IT organizations, how communication technologies are used to improve virtual team performance, do current communication technologies fully satisfy the key needs of virtual team projects and whether future communication technologies can be used among the virtual teams to facilitate an increase in the productivity of the resources. The research uses in-depth semi-structured interview, which is a qualitative method. Interviews involved project managers and software engineers from different IT organizations. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and analysed according to the thematic analysis. This research establishes that advancement in current communication technologies lead virtual teams in IT sector to ensure successful delivery of projects rather than to implement future communication technologies, which experiences unsustainable level of barriers both politically and technologically. The researcher through secondary research, which is supported through primary research, acknowledges the need of two important theories that should be acknowledged by virtual team projects i.e. media richness theory and adaptive structuration theory. Advancement in the present communication technologies such as video conferencing and web-ex has a more profound positive effect in the success and development of virtual team projects. In the conclusion, the researcher recognizes the advancement in current communication technologies. On that node video conferencing provides a strategic response to complex and unpredictable challenges faced by IT organizations. The research also founds that video-conferencing satisfies the key needs of the virtual team project and helps to reduce technological barriers such as miscommunication and information overload. Author keywords: Virtual teams, communication technologies, video-conferencing, virtual team performance