Week 9: Justin

Could you please introduce yourself and tell us what you do and who you work for?

Elle McComsey -- Associate Director of Digital Strategy for The Agency inside Harte Hanks. We are a Digital CRM agency that works with brands such as Hyundai, Mercedes Benz, and Sony.

How do you communicate the message you need to communicate?

Means of communication depends on the message and receiver. Someone that I have a personal working relationship with may receive an email, twitter, instant message or text. Client communications may require a more formal method such as PowerPoint, video, or conference call.

Do you work in teams?  Can you describe the different teams?

I work on several types of teams -- internal agency teams and external teams.

Internal teams are geographically located in the same space. We tend to meet face to face formally and informally.

External teams are typically on the west coast and consist mainly of partner agencies that we’re connecting with to complete a campaign.

Are they all located in one office/geographic area?  If not, where are they located?

Internal team is located in one office.

External teams are located on the west coast.

How do you communicate and make sure work is completed with team members not in the same geographic locations?

We depend heavily on Project Managers to manage a campaign calendar. We also have workflow programs that help us manage that each task within a project has been completed. This program alerts you of what your assignments are within a specific campaign and when the due dates are. It also alerts you when the task before your assignment has been completed, so that you can start your assignment. Adoption of this program is not widespread. It does not meet all the needs of campaign planning. For example, anyone associated with a project gets an email update when a task is completed. Some projects have hundreds of steps and we would then receive hundreds of emails. The email management alone is cumbersome.

Does the distance make completing work challenging?  Why/why not?

Time zones are the worst thing in the world... because my external teams are west coast, my phone buzzes all night with emails and meeting requests. It is impossible to step away from the office at night.

Do you feel more connected to/trusting of/aligned with those that are closer in proximity (working in your office) compared to those that are located elsewhere?

I do feel more aligned with my internal team, but that’s because we are playing for the same team. External teams are playing for the same client. When there is overlap in competencies of an external team or agency, we see more heated conversations.

It is also difficult when we depend on the conference call. We lose that all-important non-verbal communication. Presenting over a conference call is often tough because you cannot gauge the understanding/acceptance of a plan without the non-verbal cues.

Is communication between those in your office different than those located elsewhere?  Is one more casual in style than the other?  Why or why not?

Internal team communication is more casual because I can develop better personal relationships with being so close.

There are some external members that I enjoy a more casual relationship with, but it is not comparable to that of an internal team member.

Do you prefer this situation or would you rather have everyone centrally located?  Why/why not?

The second option isn’t really possible. I sometimes work for clients all over the world and in a global economy there is a certain level of ambiguity that we have to get comfortable with. We’re not going to have the luxury of F2F communication as our networks shift from local to global from our usage and development of technology. My situation just is what it is. Acceptance of that opens the door for handling the frustrations that can happen from time to time.

I chose to interview McComsey because I knew she worked in and utilized various teams across the country.  I remembered one story she told me that consisted of coordinating one person tweeting from this year’s Coachella Music Festival.  I forgot which organization was sponsoring these tweets (I want to say Hyundai – as in this year’s Coachella tweets brought you by Hyundai but I’m not sure), but the tone of the story was of frustration in getting someone to use such a basic communication tool – McComsey was here outside of Philadelphia while Coachella is in California. 

I was thinking of that story while reading Hinds and Mortensen’s Understanding Conflict in Geographically Distributed Teams.  McComsey, in charge of making sure the amount and quality of the tweets were up to Hyundai’s demands, had issues with those that were self described “artists and musicians” (no offense artists and musicians as I probably fall into that too).  Not only were McComsey and her tweeters geographically separated but there was conflict due to what Hinds and Mortensen describe as conflict relating to not “the task itself, but about how the work should be done”(Hinds & Mortensen, 2005): There was McComsey and the sponsors way, and then there were those that were doing the works way.  

This is also seen in her answer to the question Do you feel more connected to/trusting of/aligned with those that are closer in proximity (working in your office) compared to those that are located elsewhere? when she answers that the conversations become “heated” between those working for different teams on the same projects. 

Her answer that “I do feel more aligned with my internal team, but that’s because we are playing for the same team” also supports Hinds and Mortensen’s (2005) idea that strong team identity reduces conflict.  Even though both teams are working toward the same goal and for the same client, those that she works with in her team and at her office have stronger bonds.  Although it didn’t come up, if I were to follow-up with McComsey I would want to know more about trust (whether it’s strong, weak, or moderate and how it works or doesn’t) (Majchzak, Jarvenpaa, & Hollingshead, 2007) when working with different agencies for the same client.  

I also liked hearing about the use of Project Managers to keep so many people so spread out on tasks, as I’d imagine trying to manage that type of team environment would be a challenge for managers.  It would seem that putting together and choosing agencies that work well together would be very important (Hill, 1995).  If I were to follow up I’d like to know more about how this works in this environment and if possible ask the Project Manager a few questions on keeping geographically dispersed people on task.

Luckily for McComsey, The Nut Island Effect reading was not applicable to her career, or not yet anyway. 

References

Hill, L. (1995) Managing Your Team, Harvard Business School, pp. 1-22.

Hinds, P. H., and Mortensen, M. (2005) Understanding Conflict in Geographically Distributed Teams: The Moderating Effects of Shared Identity, Shared Context, and Spontaneous Communication. Organization Science, 16, pp. 290-307.

Majcharzak, A., Jarvenpaa, S., and Hollingshead, A. (2007) Coordinating Expertise Among Emergent Groups Responding to Disasters, Organization Science, Vol. 18 No. 1, pp.147-161.