Poor management, communications breakdowns, unsuitable or badly integrated team members, ill-equipped staff, personality clashes — there are many reasons why a virtual team can fail. What can you do to ensure that your team succeeds? Here are five common failings of virtual teams, and ways to avoid them. Beyond personality types, not everyone has the ability to set up an environment away from the office that is conducive to work. MORE >>

Binfire offers distributed teams a free solution for online collaboration that makes it simple to stay on track. On top of these helpful features, here are a few of the other things you can do with Binfire: Communicate with Your Team. The interactive whiteboard provides a direct way to brainstorm with your team in real time, including the ability to write, draw, import pictures, and open PDF documents directly within the whiteboard. MORE >>

But what’s an internationally dispersed team to do in the meantime? Meyer cites a recent survey by CultureWizard , an intercultural training consultancy, that found that 63 percent of respondents working for multinational companies said that nearly half of their teams were located outside their country to illustrate the urgency of the issue. This way, participants can confront each idea during the meeting — without confronting the person associated with it. MORE >>

We all know that we can achieve more in a good team than we can alone. But in many teams, that idea is misappropriated to mean that teams should necessarily move more quickly than individuals can. Using a team, rather than an individual, isn’t just a way to get things done faster, it’s also a way to do things better, and do better things. When viewed in this context, the shorter timeframes implied by the increased capacity in a team must necessarily expand. MORE >>

Let’s consider the social team one that works closely together, regardless of distance, hierarchy, timezones, or, within certain boundaries, degree of project involvement. A social team is one that’s able to make the most of possible offerings or contributions from within or beyond the team efficiently and productively. And it’s a team that finds those engagements rich, satisfying and fun. A Social Team Is Supportive and Responsive. MORE >>