COPING STRESS IN GLOBAL AND FINNISH VIRTUAL TEAMS
Niina Nurmi, Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership, Department of Industrial Engineering and Management, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland

Abstract
This comparative multi-case study aims at understanding the different causes of stress and wellbeing in globally and nationally distributed virtual teams (VTs). Literature identifies multiple boundaries of VTs e.g. geographic distance, time separation, cultural diversity of team members and their dependence on computer mediated communication. Despite the increasing attention to VTs, there is limited understanding of how these challenges presented as VT boundaries contribute to VT members’ psychological reactions and well-being. In this paper, the author discusses the context-specific job stressors and coping methods used in virtual teams. This research is based on semi-structured interviews with 54 members of three global and two Finnish VTs. A comparative case analysis is used to identify the special job stressors in global VTs, such as email overload, lack of overlapping working time, and Finnish VTs, such as frequent traveling to face-to-face meetings, loneliness, isolation, and inequality of team members.
Keywords: virtual teams, job stressors, stress, coping