LEADING VIRTURAL TEAMS DURING COVID-19

The context given by the COVID-19 pandemic has led to the implementation of the mandatory work from home (MWFH), a concept well known nowadays. The teams had to adapt and to become 100% virtual in a really short period of time in order to ensure the continuity of the activities for the businesses. Team leaders suddenly became team leaders of virtual teams; thus, this had implied the shift from team leadership to virtual team leadership. The effectiveness of virtual team leaders remains a desideratum for companies, taking into account that now team leaders work in a unique context given by the COVID-19 pandemic situation. The purpose of this research is to analyse the way of working of a 100% virtual team, from a Shared Service Centre located in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, for the time frame March 2020 – March 2021. The case study was performed based on quantitative and qualitative empirical research; the primary data being collected from the targeted virtual team. Firstly, the focus is on presenting the organizational context based on the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic and secondly, the decisions taken by the management during this period in order to maintain the 100% virtual team performance are analysed. Several aspects at the analysed team level are identified, based on the perception of its team members, such as the level of connection, the sense of belonging to the team, engagement, cohesion, team coordination level, individual productivity in the MWFH environment and last, but not least, the team productivity level in the pandemic period versus the period before the COVID-19 pandemic. The main conclusions of this case study are reflecting that the level of individual productivity and also the level of the team productivity have remained at a constant level, which is indicating that the effectiveness of team leadership has been maintained at a high level. However, some of the analysed aspects such as, level of connection, team cohesion and the sense of belonging to the team, were negatively influenced by the virtual way of working despite the management decisions taken in order to support the virtual team environment.