Working in a Virtual World - Essay Example

Working in a Virtual World and Section # of Working in a Virtual World Introduction Virtual organizations are organizations which exist in a virtual world and thus have no physical existence. When it comes to the workings of a virtual organization, there is no need to have all the labor or even any labor at one place at a single point in time. Rather, it exists virtually and collaborates on a network. There is no office or physical presence of the organization, yet the organization exists in its full form and function. There are many attributes that combine and form a virtual organization. The first one is that it is a network of various skills, abilities, talents and capabilities, which is vast yet dispersed on a geographical area. This brings in the best of the talent present in the multiple locations in which the virtual world exists. Moreover, the virtual world brings forth the use of many technologies, which makes it even more interesting, as communication and collaboration becomes easier and working on any project becomes a dream-come-true even if each member of the project is kilometers away from each other. The barriers that would have been present in any virtual organizations - that of time and distance - have been conveniently removed by the technologies that are used, essentially that of telecommunications and computing. Furthermore, the virtual organization is flexible, because it is the management of an organization over a virtual set up. This also makes the virtual organization dynamic and ever-changing; it is restless in nature and dares to experiment with new ideas and creative techniques of operation. And lastly, the most important attribute which gives virtual organizations a unique touch is the integration that results and which enhances and brings out the best in all individuals to level out complete synergy and work in favor of the organization. The Disadvantages - Employee and Employer Virtual organizations have their own set of disadvantages that are: There is always a limit as to the efficient performance of the communications network that has been set up. As will be mentioned in the next few pages, handling and managing communication with remote workers will be one of the biggest challenges for the organization. For example, there will be a potential limit as to how much of transmission can the bandwidth set up do. Therefore, the moment that limit is crossed, the speed of communication gets slowed down and thus collaboration gets difficult. (Gareth, 1998) A very big disadvantage for virtual organizations lies in the fact that there may be hardware and software compatibility issues with the remote workers. The hardware that the remote worker uses will most probably be personal and would not be a specialized computer, rather just a simple one to keep at a house. The software that the management expects the remote worker to use would be specialized and would not be that efficient on an old, slow or mediocre computer. Thus, this mismatch is likely to result in low productivity and frustration of the employee to get things done the way management wants him to do. Computer security is an issue for the virtual organizations because they exist on around a million personal computers of all their remote workers. Leakage of information is highly likely. Technology that is being used in managing a virtual organization is most likely to evolve over time. Updating it in the many computers of the many remote workers would be difficult. The Advantages - Employee and Employer The virtual organization has many advantages for the employee: Often organizations experience an increase in production, but there is no as such acceleration in productivity, as should be the case. Therefore, implementing a virtual organization helps increase productivity and the number of output per worker, thus improving quality and not just the quantity of work that is being produced. Moreover, the employee is always at a pressure from all the stakeholders as to fulfill their various demands and to just the stockholders to make sure that the profits outdo that of the competitors. In such a case, it is always beneficial to go for quality than just quantity, and this can be achieved by virtual organization implementation. (Ilze, 2001) It not just helps the company in gaining a competitive advantage over its competitors, rather it helps the company in identifying areas where its core competencies can lie and can work on them. Moreover, it also helps the company in achieving them. If in a network of virtual organizations, many businesses exist, then they can share core competencies and result in a better position than before. Globalization is being thoroughly exploited through the usage of virtual organizations as the organization is tapping into the resources of the whole world, be it be the skills, technology or the infrastructure. Companies can better manage the many workers who are already working on a mobile basis in the physical environment only. These people can be the auditors, the sales people etc. (Gareth, 1999) The company is better able to reduce the costs that it has in operating in a physical environment. This is achieved through economies of scale, eliminating the cost of a physical office etc. For the employees, these are the following advantages of working in a virtual organization: Employees get to totally integrate their personal values with that of their work values. This is because by working at a remote distance, they can balance their family life and work life, have autonomy in decision making, be their own boss, prioritize tasks etc. Employees will considerably save a lot of money and time in the travelling that they would have had to do in a virtual organization. They also save the hassle and the physical stress. Issues of Managing Remote Workers The numbers of people who are working from a remote distance in a virtual organization are very high. They have to be well managed and their issues have to be regularly addressed so that the administration does not lose control of its employees. Firstly, the standards have to be set for all the remote workers, so that performance can ultimately be measured on some scale. When employees are working together in a physical location, standards are easy to set because many a times, they can be assumed and taken from the implied meaning, but when the company is operating virtually, it is important to define standards and let every worker know so that there are no feelings of resentment and that no employee can later complain of not being well informed. Secondly, the parameters and deadlines have to be told in advance as to how work has to be done in such an environment. For instance, it should be informed before hand that what days they are expected to work or take off, are their timings fixed or they can work whenever they want, how quickly are they expected to respond to all sort of correspondence sent their way. Thirdly, it is important to bring the trust element in the relationship between an employer and a remote worker. It is not possible to keep a check and balance on every other remote worker, because of their number and because of the energy that will be involved of any individual to do so. What the employees can do to make accountability for each employee easy is the setting of easy and well defined goals, through which the employees can be held accountable. (Cary, 1999) And lastly, the greatest challenge that exists when it comes to managing remote workers is that of maintaining and keeping that flow of communication going between them. it is often noted in such relationships that there are no informal conversations, which often result between the employee and employer in lunch breaks in a physical environment. Such absence of informal conversation can damage the relationship, but can be effectively managed by the employee even in remote distances. Moreover, managers should encourage the remote worker to visit the physical location, if any, of the office, on a regular basis. Challenges of Working at a Distance Nowadays, more and more people prefer that they telecommute and work at a distance, but it should be noted that working at a distance is not all about convenience. Rather, it is about facing multiple challenges at the same time. It is atypical form of doing a job and thus the rarity brings forth many new challenges for the employee. When a person gets to set his own working hours, he needs to be alert enough to be careful in working in those specific hours and then meeting the deadlines that have been given. Often people tend to put off a task for the next day if there are no set deadlines and thus telecommuting would not suit them if they have such a personality. Telecommuting is for those who would like to adopt an isolated profession, that is they would not mind not being part of a social circle and a proper physical work environment. People often like to chat around with their colleagues, gossip about the office grapevine and interact with various people to expand their social circle. All this is not possible when you work at a distance. (Martin, 2005) Moreover, when a person works at a distance, he usually works at his home only. And thus, he is physically present at his home but he has to give all his mental capacity to his office work. This becomes a challenge as now he has to balance both his work and family life effectively, so that none is tampered with. How Technology Has Changed the Virtual Opportunities Virtual opportunities, a virtual world, a virtual business, a virtual existence, a virtual enterprise - all these have been made possible solely by technology only, in the first place. Technology tends to be so dynamic that they keep on getting better and revolutionizing themselves. The basic technology that is needed for any virtual organization is that of the Internet, the World Wide Web, the convenient e-mail system, software like groupware, video and audio conferencing and telecommunications that is communicating over a distance using a suitable medium of communication. (Ulrich, 2002) Moreover, there are advanced technologies which help in the successful management and operations of virtual organizations and even support the function of knowledge management that takes place. These are the collaborative technologies, which fall into two categories of synchronous and asynchronous, various portals for proper and instant flow of communication, virtual reality systems to make the workers experience what it is like in some scenarios, wireless technologies like Bluetooth, infrared, satellite, radio and microwaves, the usage of personal devices like Blackberry for communication and instant connectivity, the set up of an intranet and an extranet by the administration and management for proper provision of a common set up and place for communication and meeting of all remote workers. The Future of Virtual Employment The virtual employment in a virtual organization is a new concept in the corporate world. The acceptability of this concept is arising with time but is not at its maximum height. Moreover, it's success and future also depends on how much the people (the employees), the organizations (the employers) and the systems are ready to embrace the concept and integrate within themselves ways and methods which suit the working of a virtual organization. Moreover, getting employed in a virtual organization means deviation from the traditional office environment, with colleagues working around and a bossy boss standing in authority till the work gets done. Thus, employees should be ready to take a different environment, where isolation is the call of the day and where time and decision making management is solely dependent on self. (Ilze, 2001) Moreover, the various trends that it has brought to the workplace will decide on its future popularity. It has brought trends in the technological, organizational and people components present in any network in a business. Technological changes is the move towards more wireless set ups and the need to upgrade hardware for compatibility with the advance groupware software that are being introduced. People changes are the increased amount of flexibility and autonomy available to the employee force. Organizational trends are the need to outsource tasks and activities as well as believe in strategic and partnership alliances with various businesses to succeed in a virtual network. References Cary, C. (1999) The Virtual Organization. Wiley & Sons Gareth, M. (1998) Images of Organization: The Executive Edition. Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Ilze, Z. (2001) Our Virtual World: The Transformation of Work, Play and Life Via Technology. Idea Group Inc (IGI) Martin, O. (2005) Virtual Organizations: Systems and Practices. Springer Ulrich, F. (2002) Managing Virtual Web Organizations in the 21st century: Issues and Challenges Read More