Is There Anybody Out There?? ... Technology And The Dysfunctional Team

      
     Have you ever gone through the ping pong game of emailing someone back and forth until you can’t figure out where it started?  Death by email we have all seen it.  After several pings and a couple more pongs it loses translation.  Something we forget that there is another human being on the other end of the email.  Connecting just by picking up the phone and talking to someone is so important to solve the issue or just connect in a personal sense. 

      When working with a team just seeing a face once in a while or hearing a voice can do so much.  Inflection and non-verbal cures are a part of communication that the written word just can't replace. There are great ways to do this now that we have technology that puts a face on the screen. Sometimes I wonder if everyone looks like a powerpoint presentation that works remote or in another location. I have even seen team members that are two desks down write an email instead of taking the time to connect by talking.  Technology is great but we need to remember that humans bond through direct interaction.  We are connected to our family, our community, our organization through the emotional bonds we feel for them.  A team is not a thing but is made up of people and people need to bond to feel a part of something.

        Creating a productive team dynamic can be an issue in today’s world of technology.  More and more teams are relying on email, task initiators, shared data files and web chats as their primary communication.  The days of picking up the phone and asking the other person how they are and what’s been going on in their life has been replaced by task and a couple of quick sentences or words on a computer  We are taking the human out of human contact and with this can bring an impersonal disconnection of the team. 

       “New technologies help companies extend participation on a project to an ever greater number of people, allowing firms to tap into a wide body of knowledge and expertise. A decade or so ago, the common view was that true teams rarely had more than 20 members. Today, according to our research, many complex tasks involve teams of 100 or more. However, as the size of a team increases beyond 20 members, the tendency to collaborate naturally decreases, we have found.”  Research has shown that teams that are above 13 members tend to be more dissatisfied with the team.  This is due, to the most part, to lack of human connection.  The human factor is crucial to the success of the team.“

      Loyalty is built through the feeling of being a part of a group or team.  When leaders are managing teams it is important to remember that the team's interaction is as important as completing the tasks.  If  leaders create an environment that encourages human connection many of the issues and time drains can be eliminated.  Team connection creates motivation and breaks down the communication barriers.    

     Virtual teams can create more of this disconnection, that is why we need to remember that the human factor is critical in bonding a team.  “Working together virtually has a similar impact on teams. The majority of those we studied had members spread among multiple locations—in several cases, in as many as 13 sites around the globe. But as teams became more virtual, we saw, cooperation also declined, unless the company had taken measures to establish a collaborative culture.” With the technology today we should be connecting face to face with our virtual team members regularly and create a bond. 

     While I would agree that technology has taken business into an entirely different dimension, the need to connect is still a significant part of creating strong bonds.  Creating a collaborative culture is critical to the success of a team and individuals within the team.  If we remember to disconnect sometimes from technology and create human bonds we can move past many of the misunderstanding and become more productive. So get up from your desk and ask a question or pick up the phone and connect.  It is surprising what a little human interaction can do for productivity and teamwork.

Gratton, L., & Erickson, T. (2007). Eight ways to build collaborative teams. Harvard Business Review, 85(11), 100-109. (Business Source Complete Accession Number:
         AN 27040494)