A meta-analysis of the consequences of virtualness on team functioning

Virtual teams in organizations have now become a reality, but there have been only a handful of quantitative reviews on “virtualness” (i.e., teams that are more or less virtual). We decided to conduct a meta-analytic review of the effects of virtualness on team functioning (conflict, communication frequency, knowledge sharing, performance, and satisfaction). To explain inconsistencies in the results of published material on the topic, we also examined the moderating effects of level of analysis (individual/group), method (experiment/survey), and time frame (short/long). Eighty studies were found that covered some part of this domain. Results seem to differ in the relative importance of the factors. Thus though aggregated findings suggested negative effects of virtualness on team functioning, results varied in strength and direction of the moderators, indicating that it was not possible to generalize. For example, the negative effects held only for short-term teams, while in longer-term teams the effects weakened or disappeared.