Online Seminar – Putting the “teams” back into virtual teams

Professor Lucy Gilson, University of Connecticut

Digital technology is evolving at high speed, influencing how we live, interact with others, and work. From innovative tools to different communication methods, digital technology has become prevalent in almost every job, organisation and industry. Technological changes or disruptions affect how teams work, communicate, coordinate, solve complex problems, and even how members form interpersonal relationships. Research on team effectiveness has recognised this via the growing literature on “virtual teams” (VT) and by acknowledging that all teams are now, to some extent, virtual.

Using a qualitative, exploratory approach, we employ inductive analysis to examine VT research findings’ plausibility being unique. Using inductive and abductive reasoning processes based on the extant literature, we seek to understand if there is anything truly unique about VTs and if so, what that is. Taken together, we see this as an important step to disentangling some of the complexities brought forward by technological advances and a means to facilitate adjustments in furthering our understanding of team effectiveness in the digital era.

This presentation is designed to be informal and interactive and will focus on an early-stage paper on which we are looking for feedback.

Speaker bio

Lucy Gilson (PhD Georgia Tech) is a Professor and the Associate Dean for Faculty & Outreach at the University of Connecticut. She is also the Academic Director of the Geno Auriemma UConn Leadership Conference, and a Research Fellow at the Universidade Catolica in Lisbon Portugal. In 2019, the Web of Science named her of the world’s most highly-cited researchers.

Her research examines teams in different organisational settings performing a diverse range of jobs to understand how creativity, empowerment, leadership, and virtual communication influence effectiveness. She has also done work on Mentoring and Leadership – in particular the mentoring of women and minorities. Her work has been published in the Academy of Management Journal, Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Management, Leadership Quarterly, Group & Organization Management, Journal of Organizational Behavior, as well as many other academic journals and edited books.

Lucy has served on the Executive Committee of the Organisational Behaviour Division of the Academy of Management, and the Southern Management Association where she was inducted as a Fellow in 2019. She is the Senior Associate Editor of Group and Organization Management, where she also serves as Editor of the Annual Conceptual Issue, and is on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Management. Lucy teaches Managing Organisational Change and Leadership and has been recognised as the teacher of the year on several occasions. She consults with many multinational companies and has worked with several state and national agencies including the Army Research Institute and the Army War College.

To join the seminar, join the Zoom meeting.

Meeting ID: 965 7202 4477
Password: 888496

The webinars may be recorded and shared on Cambridge Judge Business School’s websites, social media and other channels.

For more information, please contact Luke Slater.