Working in a variety of locations or collaborating with multiple team members across borders can introduce some extra challenges to team and project management.

A recent article from Web Worker Daily entitled “Web Working in a Borderless World” points out some of the challenges international team members face:

  • Working styles differ across cultures – I definitely agree with this one and the importance of having a clear communications structure is essential to make sure all team members understand their project/job responsibilities and have a well-defined mechanism to highlight problems before they become disasters. In working with people in Russia, the Middle East and South America, it is quite true that there are different work styles but the one consistent factor is that people seem to value being given the facts and knowing what people expect of them. Knowing how to best structure your multi-cultural communications is important as well.
  • Geography becomes less of a factor in business – Depending on the product or project you are involved in, geography may become a competitive advantage. Suppose you are looking for first-hand knowledge about a city or region. It would definitely improve the value of your information to have someone who actually lives there as part of your team. I think the challenge becomes finding a common language to leverage any advantages that geography might offer. In an increasingly connected world (and employment market) developing language skills (or the skills to use tools for effective communication in multiple languages) is a very important aspect of taking advantage of geography.
  • Timezones – These make doing business and communicating a new and exciting experience – especially with the near-real time options of email and VoIP telephony. I happen to favor the use of asynchronous communications tools such as 37Signals’ Campfire tool. Team members can log in according to their business “day” and then post updates and messages without trying to manage oddly-timed emails.

The opportunities for working globally as a “web worker” are expanding, despite the current financial crisis conditions. Being aware of the challenges mentioned in the Web Worker Daily’s article is a good first step to equipping yourself to handle them. I happen to disagree with the statement at the end of the article:

“As technology improves and as the global community gets more comfortable to international web work, these challenges will hopefully become non-existent.”

International business and cross-border communication has been around for quite a while and the challenges of cross-cultural communication, multi-cultural team management and communications logistics are not going to be diminished by new technological tools. However, it would be a welcome evolution to see improved cultural awareness and a willingness by international web workers to look for the benefits of cross-border cooperation rather than seeing only increased competition for jobs.

I think it is a good sign that more graduate business programs and undergraduate programs are including “international business” as part of their core curricula.