Multicultural Virtual Team Performance: The Impact of Media Choice and Language Diversity

Julia Eisenberg, Ella Glikson, Alon Lisak

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

5 Scopus citations

Abstract

Globally distributed multinational virtual teams (MNVTs) are increasingly prevalent. To better understand communication in MNVTs, we explored the effects of using verbal and written synchronous communication media under different levels of English Language Proficiency (ELP) diversity. The results of data collected from 45 MNVTs, composed of MBA students who worked on a joint project, revealed that while verbal communication leads to higher perceived proximity within low ELP diversity teams, written communication contributes to perceived proximity when ELP diversity is high. Perceived proximity in turn, positively influences MNVT performance. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings for MNVTs.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)507-534
Number of pages28
JournalSmall Group Research
Volume52
Issue number5
DOIs
StatePublished - Oct 2021

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The authors would like to thank our anonymous reviewers for their detailed and constructive comments on earlier versions of this article. All authors contributed equally. The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2021.

Keywords

  • computer-mediated communication
  • group process
  • performance
  • teamwork
  • virtual groups

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Multicultural Virtual Team Performance: The Impact of Media Choice and Language Diversity'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this