Virtuella projektteam : Ett förbättringsarbete för projektverksamheten inom ÅF Infrastructure

This thesis has been conducted inassociation with ÅF Infrastructure AB in Borlänge, Sweden. Within ÅF Infrastructure and other ÅF divisions it is common to make use of the geographically dispersed employees in virtual project teams. Some of the advantages from working in virtual teams are financial, due to the fact that a company can save money in recruiting costs, office rents and travel costs.Thanks to the technological progress since the start of the 1990’s the use of virtual teams is being considered a common way to cooperate nowadays. With the advantages though comes disadvantages, pitfalls and challenges to face for the virtual team toovercome.The purpose of this thesis was to conducta case study to find out how ÅF make use of virtual teams. With this in regard, the statement of issues for this bachelor thesis were the following: is the casestudy for this project affected by being geographically dispersed and how can the eventually negative consequences be fixed and improved, and how are the common virtual team pit falls and challenges handled and how can this make use in future projects? To answer these questions the decision was made to conduct a literature study, observation study and an interview study with the project members in the casestudy. During the literature study facts concerning the area of virtual teams and project management were gathered and made use of during the interview and observation study. The conclusion of this thesis was that the case study project isaffected by being geographically dispersed, but handles pit falls and challenges well in most cases. Some of the areas they can improve is first and farmost the meeting arrangements, where they are recommended to focus on effectiveness, preparations and include more videoconferencing. One of the approaches they can make use of in future projects are thekick off meeting, where they should focus on really make sure that every team member is aware of the projects goals, their own involvement and the scope of their assignment