Going from the time of long letters about anything — business, government or friendship — to using the internet as a conduit for linking an enterprise and its teams without regard for borders or time zones appears farfetched to some. But it is it really so very different?
It is not as though the broadly based work team is new. After all, when what we now call snail mail was the only game in town, people collaborated through long letters and rarely, if ever, met. The ability to think things through was affected positively by the distance between team members because everyone had a chance to reflect and to develop ideas, concepts and solutions for business issues.
Mail traveled within a country or beyond its borders. Decision making was spread among people residing in vastly different areas — distance was a valued aspect of the process. Indeed, excluding far-flung team members or populations had serious consequences — the British lost 13 colonies for precisely that reason.
The telegraph and the telephone made it easier to communicate more quickly. But the railroad, the car and the airplane changed the way business was and is done. Actual physical presence became required. If a team was not in the same office and supervised in the same place, a cohesive approach was thought to be questionable at best.
The internet has the capacity to create as big a change in the way business is done as the railroad, car and airplane But that change is a modification of a proven approach. The internet and its tools — the video camera, e-mail, i-phone — make team cohesion possible regardless of physical location. Actual physical presence need no longer be required — the team will function and develop regardless of where its members actually are. Cohesion will occur and be maintained for exactly the same reasons as it did when long, detailed letters were the sole means of communication — and it will produce the same excellent results
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
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