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Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning

This paper presents a preliminary understanding of cross-cultural challenges and synergistic experiences of multicultural students engaged in global virtual teams (GVTs).In this case study, we introduced the GVT structure as a novel learning platform which utilized computer mediated communication...

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Main Author: Zakaria, Norhayati
Format: Conference or Workshop Item
Language:English
Published: 2014
Subjects:
HD28 Management. Industrial Management
Online Access:http://repo.uum.edu.my/16991/1/16.pdf
http://repo.uum.edu.my/16991/
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spelling my.uum.repo.169912016-04-18T08:39:55Z http://repo.uum.edu.my/16991/ Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning Zakaria, Norhayati HD28 Management. Industrial Management This paper presents a preliminary understanding of cross-cultural challenges and synergistic experiences of multicultural students engaged in global virtual teams (GVTs).In this case study, we introduced the GVT structure as a novel learning platform which utilized computer mediated communication (CMC) tools as part of its virtual-based learning. We administered the case study with thirty students (n=30) in the United of Emirates (UAE) who engaged in GVTs across the globe-encompassing 26 universities and 22 countries.Qualitative data was collected in the form of documents - reflective reports of the students' experiential learning over a ten-week period.We content analyzed the reports based on the thematic analysis with two distinctive categories--cultural challenges and cultural synergies based on the first seven (7)-weeks of the experiential learning process.In this study we found that students experienced challenges such as managing technical difficulty, language barriers, deteriorating motivations, geographical distance, time differences, noncommitted and unresponsive attitude. On the other hand, students also experienced synergies from the GVTs such as strong relationships and continued friendships, formation of emergent leadership, learned diverse managerial styles and competencies skills, varied use of varied CMC tools, and international exposure to diverse cultures without the need to travel abroad. 2014-06-12 Conference or Workshop Item PeerReviewed application/pdf en http://repo.uum.edu.my/16991/1/16.pdf Zakaria, Norhayati (2014) Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning. In: The Asian Conference on the Social Science, 12-15 June 2014, Osaka, Japan.
institution Universiti Utara Malaysia
building UUM Library
collection Institutional Repository
continent Asia
country Malaysia
content_provider Universiti Utara Malaysia
content_source UUM Institutionali Repository
url_provider http://repo.uum.edu.my/
language English
topic HD28 Management. Industrial Management
spellingShingle HD28 Management. Industrial Management
Zakaria, Norhayati
Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning
description This paper presents a preliminary understanding of cross-cultural challenges and synergistic experiences of multicultural students engaged in global virtual teams (GVTs).In this case study, we introduced the GVT structure as a novel learning platform which utilized computer mediated communication (CMC) tools as part of its virtual-based learning. We administered the case study with thirty students (n=30) in the United of Emirates (UAE) who engaged in GVTs across the globe-encompassing 26 universities and 22 countries.Qualitative data was collected in the form of documents - reflective reports of the students' experiential learning over a ten-week period.We content analyzed the reports based on the thematic analysis with two distinctive categories--cultural challenges and cultural synergies based on the first seven (7)-weeks of the experiential learning process.In this study we found that students experienced challenges such as managing technical difficulty, language barriers, deteriorating motivations, geographical distance, time differences, noncommitted and unresponsive attitude. On the other hand, students also experienced synergies from the GVTs such as strong relationships and continued friendships, formation of emergent leadership, learned diverse managerial styles and competencies skills, varied use of varied CMC tools, and international exposure to diverse cultures without the need to travel abroad.
format Conference or Workshop Item
author Zakaria, Norhayati
author_facet Zakaria, Norhayati
author_sort Zakaria, Norhayati
title Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning
title_short Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning
title_full Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning
title_fullStr Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning
title_full_unstemmed Building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: Challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning
title_sort building cultural competencies through global virtual teams: challenges, opportunities, and best practices of pragmatic learning
publishDate 2014
url http://repo.uum.edu.my/16991/1/16.pdf
http://repo.uum.edu.my/16991/
_version_ 1644282109780557824
score 13.211869

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