Abstract
Geographically distributed virtual teams are increasingly prevalent in global organizations. Despite the growing attention to virtual teams, there is limited understanding of how cross-cultural collaboration and electronic dependence in communication affect virtual workers’ psychological reactions and well-being. This qualitative multi-case study aims at understanding the different causes of stress in cross-cultural collaboration. An overarching analysis across seven case studies revealed that globally distributed team members experienced job stressors such as language challenges in English, or lingua franca, misunderstandings, and conflicts due to different mindsets, communication and behavior styles, and work-leisure orientations. Without adequate skills in lingua franca, or proper cultural and local awareness of distant team sites, coping was not successful, thereby stressors lead to distress.
Chapter PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Ancona, Caldwell: Bridging the boundary: external activity in performance in organizational teams. Administrative Science Quarterly 37, 634–665 (1992)
Armstrong, D.J., Cole, P.: Managing distances and differences in geographically distributed work groups. In: Hinds, P.J., Kiesler, S. (eds.) Distributed Work, pp. 167–190. MIT Press, Cambridge (2001)
Bell, B.S., Kozlowski, S.W.J.: A typology of virtual teams. Implications for effective leadership. Group and Organization Management 27(1), 14–49 (2002)
Beyene, T.: Fluency as stigma: implications of a language mandate in global work. Stanford University (2007)
Carcia, M.C., Canado, M.L.P.: Language and power: raising awareness of the role of language in multicultural teams. Language and intercultural communication 5(1), 86–104 (2005)
Cramton, C.D.: The mutual knowledge problem and its consequences for dispersed collaboration. Organization Science 12(3), 346–371 (2001)
Eisenhardt, K.M.: Building theories from case study research. Academy of Management Review 14(4), 532–550 (1989)
EUTC, UNICE, UEAPME, CEEP, Framework agreement on work-related stress (2004), http://ec.europa.eu/employment_social/news/2004/oct/stress_agreement_en.pdf
Hakanen, J.J., Bakker, A., Demerouti, E.: How Dentists Cope with Their Job Demands and stay Engaged: The Moderating Role of Job Resources. European Journal of Oral Sciences 113, 479–487 (2005)
Hakanen, J.J., Bakker, A., Schaufeli, W.: Burnout and engagement among teachers. Journal of School Psychology 43, 495–513 (2006)
Hinds, P.J., Bailey, D.E.: Out of sight, out of synch: Understanding conflict in distributed teams. Organization Science 14, 615–632 (2003)
Hinds, P., Kiesler, S.: Communication across Boundaries: Work, Structure and Use of Communication Technologies in a Large Organization. Organization Science 6(4), 373–393 (1995)
Knapp, K.: Approaching Lingua Franca communication. In: Knapp, K., Meierkord, C. (eds.) Lingua Franca Communication, Frankfurt Lang M.A, pp. 217–245 (2003)
Mannix, E.A., Griffith, T.L., Neale, M.A.: The phenomenology of conflict in virtual work teams. In: Hinds, P.J., Kiesler, S. (eds.) Distributed Work. MIT Press, Cambridge (2002)
Meierkord, D., Knapp, K.: Approaching Lingua Franca communication. In: Knapp, K., Meierkord, C. (eds.) Lingua Franca Communication, Frankfurt Lang M.A., pp. 2–28 (2003)
Miles, M.B., Huberman, A.M.: Qualitative data analysis: A sourcebook of new methods. Sage, Beverly Hills (1984)
Nurmi, N.: Coping Stress in Global and Finnish Virtual Teams. In: Proceedings of Global HRM Conference, Turku, Finland, August 27-29(2008)
Jarvenpaa, S.L., Leidner, D.E.: Communication and trust in global virtual teams. Organization Science 10, 791–815 (1999)
Kokko, N., Vartiainen, M., Hakonen, M.: Collective competencies in virtual organizations. In: Luczak, H., Zink, K.J. (eds.) Human factors in organizational design and management – VII. Re-designing work and macroergonomics – future perspectives and challenges, Proceedings of the Seventh International Symposium on Human Factors in Organizational Design and Management held in Aachen, Germany, October 2003, pp. 403–408 (2003)
Kokko, N., Vartiainen, M., Lönnblad, J.: Individual and Collective Competencies in Virtual Project Organizations. eJOV 8, 28–52 (2006)
Parasuraman, S., Alutto, J.A.: An Examination of the Organizational Antecedents of Sressors at Work. Academy of Management Journal 24(1), 48–67 (1981)
Powell, A., Piccoli, G., Ives, B.: Virtual teams: a review of current literature and directions for future research. The Data Base for Advances in Information Systems 35(1), 6–36 (2004)
Richter, P., Meyer, J., Sommer, F.: Well-being and stress in mobile and virtual work. In: Andriessen, J.H.E., Vartiainen, M. (eds.) Mobile virtual work. A new paradigm?, pp. 231–252. Springer, Heidelberg (2006)
Williams, K.Y., O’Reilly, C.A.I.: Demography and diversity in organizations: A review of 40 years of research. In: Staw, B.M., Cummings, L.L. (eds.) Research in Organizational Behavior, vol. 20, pp. 77–140. JAI Press, Greenwich (1998)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Nurmi, N. (2009). Unique Stressors of Cross-Cultural Collaboration through ICTs in Virtual Teams. In: Karsh, BT. (eds) Ergonomics and Health Aspects of Work with Computers. EHAWC 2009. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 5624. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-02731-4_10
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-02731-4_10
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-02730-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-02731-4
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)