Conference paper
Emoji of a leader standing beside a mountain attempting to move it: Challenges and solutions for leading geographically dispersed teams (GDTs) in the COVID era
WA Teaching & Learning Forum (University of Western Australia, 01/02/2024–02/02/2024)
01/02/2024
Abstract
This presentation focuses on the challenge of leading teams at Australian Universities in a ‘post-COVID’ world. While working from home became a necessity at the height of the pandemic, academic and anecdotal evidence suggests that work-from-home arrangements remain commonplace. As such, this has become (for better or worse) the age of Geographically Dispersed Teams (GDTs), and it is within this context that I evaluate both my lived experience as a leader at an Australian university, and the academic research that details how managing GDTs can and should be done most effectively. The paper will show that a complementary and interwoven triad of leadership ‘tools’ is needed to manage GDTs (whether they be academic, professional, or comprised of students), either by choice or otherwise. This triad consists of (1) Building Trust, (2) Getting the Communication Right, and (3) Flattening the Leadership Structure (ie. embracing distributed and empowered leadership models). I argue that this triad can be replicated in a number of areas at the contemporary university as a solution to the ongoing shock of leading teams that are separated by distance.
Details
- Title
- Emoji of a leader standing beside a mountain attempting to move it: Challenges and solutions for leading geographically dispersed teams (GDTs) in the COVID era
- Authors/Creators
- Samuel K Teague
- Conference
- WA Teaching & Learning Forum (University of Western Australia, 01/02/2024–02/02/2024)
- Identifiers
- 991005633370107891
- Murdoch Affiliation
- Murdoch University
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Conference paper
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