Virtual teams and well-being A fascinating project launched in June 2020
Research context
Virtual teams have been an area of cross-disciplinary importance for over two decades. Despite the richness of the virtual team literature, important knowledge gaps still exist. In particular, how virtual teamwork impacts well-being is under-explored, and needs addressing. Using the job demands-resources (JDR) framework, we examine the specific demands that are presented when working in both newly formed and established virtual teams, and the resources that people need to mitigate these demands, in order to work well and effectively.
Research question
How do workers in VTs (a) experience work demands, and what do they report these to be, and (b) utilise job resources, and what do they report these to be? How do VT workers’ job demands and resources dynamically interact to influence their subjective experience of well-being?
Methodology and milestones
A three-phase study
Research team
- Almudena Cañibano (ESCP, Madrid campus)
- Petros Chamakiotis (ESCP, Madrid campus)
- Emma Russell (University of Sussex)
Research keytake aways (to be explored further in phase 3)
Virtual teamworking has specific demands (e.g. more meetings, new work processes and reporting mechanisms, learning new tools, etc.) that are added to the existing demands of the job.
Virtual team members experience a decrease in their resources (particularly interpersonal ones).
The combination of increased demands and reduced resources puts virtual team members’ well-being at risk.
The increase in demands is more salient for the teams that had to transform into virtual overnight because of Covid-19 and for members of globally dispersed virtual teams.
Daily sensory contact has been found to be a resource that can help virtual team members manage the demands of virtual teamworking.
12 Research projects from the Reinventing Work Chair
By bringing together academics and professionals, the Chair facilitates renewed theoretical and practical views of the following other key topics:
- Reshaping the work experience
- The role of agility to organise and change work
- Measuring the paradox of flexible working
- Psychological contract and new work relationships
- HR & digitalisation
- Talent sharing as a new development tool
- Technology-enabled interviews
- Shifts in expertise in the data science era
- Managing in geographically dispersed virtual organisations
- Virtual teams and well-being
- Meaning of work and self-organisation
- New contact centres & hybrid work (coming soon)
Key outcomes
External ecosystem
Shared research outputs / Awards and articles
ESCP Impact Paper:
“Virtual teamwork and employee well-being: The Covid-19 effects.” ESCP Impact Papers, 2020-25-EN [link ]
Book chapter:
“Understanding Well-being in Virtual Teams: A Comparative Case Study.” In: Themistocleous, M., Papadaki, M. (eds) Information Systems. EMCIS 2021. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol 437. Springer, Cham.[link]
Conference papers:
“Employee experiences and well-being in rapidly transformed virtual teams.” Accepted at the 82nd Academy of Management (AoM) Annual Meeting, August 5–9 2022, Seattle, WA, USA
“Exploring Well-being in Virtual Teams: Emerging Demands and Daily Sensory Contact.” Submitted to the 43rd International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS), December 9–14 2022, Copenhagen, Denmark
Campuses