Why is it Important?

With the world being forced to transition quickly into a virtual environment, we learned that for employers, having a portion of your employees remain virtual is incredibly beneficial and cost-effective. Due to this, the ability to lead an effective virtual team has been an increasingly important skill for ALL leaders to possess. For some more experienced leaders, a virtual team may appear easier to manage. While this may be true in some areas – you’ll likely experience some difficulties that vary from those of a traditional team.

Companies learned fast that virtual employees are a way to save money, and will certainly be capitalizing on this. Thus, virtual leadership skills are becoming increasingly important. Furthermore, even experienced leaders may experience some difficulties due to the difference in these types of teams

Fortunately for all you experienced team leaders, virtual teams and traditional teams are fundamentally the same, and they should ideally operate in a similar way. The team hasn’t changed: The environment has, and navigating this new environment can be tricky.
The biggest and most prevalent issues virtual teams and leaders run into have to do with communication, work ethic differences, and a lack of personal connection between the team.

While these may seem like big problems to try and tackle, studies show the same things are important to the functionality of a virtual team – right on top of the list: Trust.

If you want to learn more about how to cultivate trust and effectively lead a virtual team, please check out some of our pages using the buttons below, or the navigation above.