1. Cultural differences; from warning signs to win-win
MA Eva Haug Coordinator Internationalisation, COIL coordinator &
Lecturer intercultural competence
Faculty of Business and economics
Amsterdam UAS

2. COIL in AUAS: Faculty of Business and Economics
COILing since 2014, virtual collaboration since 2008
COIL coordinator and GPN partner
Semester 1: 4 COIL projects (USA, Finland and Mexico)
Total nr of COIL projects in : 25
Nr of students participating in COIL in :
Partners include: SUNY (Ulster, Oswego & Buffalo), RMIT (Melbourne & Saigon), Technológico de Monterrey (Campus Chihuahua), Haaga-Helia Finland, FH Wien Austria, PSB France, FH Dortmund Germany, University of Tanger (Morocco). And we’re not done yet…
Spin off: Summer Programme Entrepeneurship with SUNY Ulster

3. Outline What is virtual teamwork like? Student perspective
Phases and challenges in virtual collaboration
Warning signs & obstacles and how to overcome them

4. Nice to meet you!
How many here are doing a virtual collaboration? Or want to do a virtual collaboration?
How is the work distributed in your organisation? Collective effort? Pioneers only?
Who has ownership? Is it part of an internationalisation strategy or vision?

5. What is virtual teamwork like?
“To work with people and teams with different nationalities is a challenge most of the time. To work with them only virtually is much more difficult.”
“It was nice that each group had their own set of skills and that we could combine this during the project.”
“We had several skype meetings and made visualisations and the icebreaker with each other. But still you don’t know each other really well. I found out that due to this lack of relationship the project was harder than we thought in the beginning. So making a good relationship is really important when working in an (virtual) international group.”
“I learned a lot because of all these problems. At the time I found it a bit stressful but now I’m thankful for all these problems. Now I know that making appointments and deadlines are very important and to verify them; sometimes you think the other team understood you, but they didn’t.”

6. Phases & challenges in virtual collaboration
Challenges for students
phases
Getting to know each other (honeymoon phase)
Organising the work: tasks, deadlines, communication & collaboration tools
Doing the work: communication, communication, communication
Overcoming problems: problem solving
Finishing up, meeting deadlines and presenting end results
Communication styles
Time management & time orientation
Leadership styles
Trust and relationship building

7. Getting to know each other: Facebook group

8. Organising the teamwork: Tools

9. deliverables

10. Biggest challenge? Based on survey (nr respondents: 37)
Time (time difference, time orientation and scheduling): 16
Cultural differences: 5
Communication & language: 6

11. Warning signs & obstacles
What to do with problems in the collaboration process?
They don’t communicate anymore, what now?
Complaints about unequal work distribution, lack of motivation or differences in work tempo…

12. What to do with problems in the collaboration process?
Trust?
Tempo?
Team size?
Disagreements?
Different interpretations of the assignment?
Failure to see complementary contributions?
Do you help? Intervene? Coach? Is it a learning opportunity? How comfortable are you with ambiguity?

13. They don’t communicate anymore, what now?

14. Ideas? In class simulation exercise
Q&A in synchronous session: walk the walk, talk the talk!
Mandatory Skype sessions, screen shots, bonus points
E-coaching, Moodle forum, coaching with Skype
Try a variation of communication tools
…..
Do you help? Intervene? Coach? Is it a learning opportunity? How comfortable are you with ambiguity?

15. Warning signs & obstacles: communication
“What I mostly learned about the virtual project is the communication with the Danish students. I found the communication with them quite hard and they didn’t respond fast or at all. But while researching further into communication styles, I found out that maybe we are just communicating the wrong way and we should have used other communication tools to achieve a better understanding with them. Now I will be using Skype more. First I found this tool too time consuming, but now I find the investment in time worth it, because I think the results will be better.”

16. Scaffolding the assignment to create a collaborative effort
Create in-between milestones: opportunity for feedback, create short term planning and sense of urgency.
Create assignments and research where the students actually need each other to solve the problem.
Break down the final deliverable in smaller assignments with short deadlines.

17. Overcoming problems: Trying out different strategies and solutions
students
lecturers
Trying out different strategies and solutions
Invest time in communication: more listening than talking!
Work in sub-teams for faster and more personal communication
Invest in understanding the “other”culture and practice an open mind
Take suficient time to design, plan and organise
Build trust with your virtual colleague
Align expectations, learning outcomes, criteria
Match schedules, plan regular meetings
Exchange cultural and other expertise with E-lectures
Find support!

18. Student perspective Recommendations students made:
Communication (face2face, Skype etc)
Project management (organisation, tools, deadlines, scheduling etc)
Express and share expectations
Understand cultural differences
Start on time, tempo, avoid procrastination
Practice open mind about ideas and culture
Be patient
Be flexible

20. Thank you! For more information about Amsterdam UAS and our COIL experiences: e.m.haug@hva.nl