An exciting new approach to teamwork has resulted from advances in information technology, shifting employee expectations and the globalisation of business, namely the virtual team. The appeal of forming virtual teams is clear. Employees can manage their work and personal lives more flexibly, and they have the opportunity to interact with colleagues around the world. Companies can use the best and lowest-cost global talent and significantly reduce their real estate costs.

However, virtual teams are hard to get right. In a study of 70 virtual teams Govindarajan and Gupta (2001) found that 82% fell short of their goals and 33% rated themselves as largely unsuccessful. Most people consider virtual communication less productive than face-to-face interaction, and nearly half admit to feeling confused and overwhelmed by collaboration technology (Ferrazzi 2014).

Faced with these statistics your boss, the Marketing Director of Company XYZ, is deciding whether to develop a new virtual marketing team with staff located in Melbourne, Los Angeles, Shanghai and Bangalore or keep things the way they are with separate marketing teams within each country.

What will your advice be to the Marketing Director? Will you argue for or against the creation of the virtual team? Why?

Please note:

The purpose of writing an argument is to seek to persuade other people of your stance (or view) on a subject. There are various possible outlines for an argument. Firstly, you need to be able to present the main argument clearly in the thesis statement of your introduction. Then you synthesize, or combine, supporting arguments at stages within the body paragraphs. These supporting arguments are argued for/against using evidence and explanation. Citation is used to support each argument.

Please follow these guidelines to complete the assessment:

1. Decide on your main argument/stance.

To help reach your own point of view on the facts or ideas:

• read some other points of view on the topic. Who do you feel is the most convincing?
• look for patterns in the data or references. Where is the evidence strongest?
• list several different interpretations. What are the real-life implications of each one? Which ones are likely to be most useful or beneficial? Which ones have some problems?
• discuss the facts and ideas with someone else. Do you agree with their point of view?

2. Make a list of ideas: approaches, supporting arguments, evidence and explanation, and evaluations.

To develop your argument:

• list the different reasons for your point of view.
• think about the different types and sources of evidence which you can use to support your point of view.
• consider different ways that your point of view is similar to, and different from, the points of view of other researchers.
• look for various ways to break your point of view into parts.

3. Decide on a structure for the paragraph.

To present your argument, make sure:

• your text develops a coherent argument where all the individual claims work together to support your overall point of view.
• your reasoning for each claim is clear to the reader.
• your assumptions are valid.
• you have evidence for every claim you make.
• you use evidence that is convincing and directly relevant.

4. Use three to five sources for evidence and evaluation.

5. Submit Assessment 2 via the Blackboard site no later than the due date: Friday 7th December 2018 5.00pm (QLD time).

6. Refer to the Marking Criteria Guide and Marking Rubric located under Assessment Tasks and Submissions.

PRIOS/CDT brief (covered in lecture and tutorials) for Assessment 2:

1. Purpose: The purpose of this document is to present an argument for or against the establishment of a virtual team.
2. Reader: The short report: Your boss (the Marketing Director of XYZ Company)
3. Information: Based on secondary sources.
4. Organisation: Direct order approach (start with you most significant criterion, etc.)
5. Style: Formal. Focus on being clear and concise, not flowery or overly descriptive. Be sure to proofread carefully to ensure that there are no sentence-level errors such as spelling mistakes, wrong word choice, incorrect punctuation, etc.
6. Channel choice: Written document.
7. Document design: Short report using the memo format.
8. Length: 750 words +/-10%.
9. Submission: 7th December 5.00pm QLD time.