Assignment: IT Support for Virtual Teams

Global organizations have branches that are located in multiple countries. Some of these organizations develop software and take advantage of the global talent pool of software developers while others have global technical support teams, customer service, and so on. Virtual teams are created when two or more people work together from different locations, organizations, times zone, and / or time shifts. Global organizations use virtual teams in order to provide global support, reduce travel costs, reduce training costs, and take advantage of local cultural knowledge that may impact the organization's operations.

Write a two to three page paper in which you:

1. Examine five issues that the IT department is likely to face when it comes to supporting virtual teams.

2. Create an architectural diagram that shows how the virtual teams would collaborate and access common repositories for documents, software, development, and testing facilities. Use Visio or an equivalent such as Dia. Note: The graphically depicted solution is not included in the required page length.

3. Describe five advantages and five disadvantages of using virtual teams for the organizations described in the scenario.

4. Describe challenges imposed by:

1. IT / IS national standards and propose how they could be handled or resolved.
2. Protocols and propose how they could be handled or resolved.
3. Procedures on virtual teams and propose how they could be handled or resolved.

5. Compare and contrast virtual teams and traditional teams with respect to communications, technology use, and team diversity.

6. Use at least three quality resources in this assignment. Note: Wikipedia and similar Websites do not qualify as quality resources.

Your assignment must follow these formatting requirements:

• Be typed, double spaced, using Times New Roman font (size 12), with one-inch margins on all sides; citations and references must follow APA or school-specific format. Check with your professor for any additional instructions.

• Include a cover page containing the title of the assignment, the student's name, the professor's name, the course title, and the date. The cover page and the reference page are not included in the required assignment page length.

• Include charts or diagrams created in Visio or an equivalent such as Dia. The completed diagrams / charts must be imported into the Word document before the paper is submitted.

The specific course learning outcomes associated with this assignment are:

• Describe the process of administering enterprise systems, including the use of virtualization and monitoring, power and cooling issues.
• Use technology and information resources to research issues in enterprise architecture.
• Write clearly and concisely about enterprise architecture topics using proper writing mechanics and technical style conventions.