Global Teams : How the best teams achieve high performance

Working for a matrix international organisation, with its ensuing diverse global teams, based in a variety of geographic locations is a fact of life for most leaders and managers today. These teams may be permanent, or they may come together temporarily to deliver a specific project. The challenges of making decisions, setting goals, communicating, building trust and managing the team are far harder when you are separated by time, language, culture and priorities. Global Teams will enable leaders, teams and organisation to deal with the challenges they face: How can you ensure that your global team delivers results? How do I trade off our local goals and priorities versus the global priorities? How do I find out what is really going on and how it will affect me? Can I trust top management to support my agenda and me personally? How can I lead people who I do not see and are not like me? Based on original research with some of the worlds leading companies, Global Teams is the definitive, practical guide on making the sharp end of globalisation work for you and your organisation. In this book, Jo Owen provides not only a thorough understanding of what make a global organization effective, but also ideas and reflections on how to go about it, in a way that is neither simplistic nor dogmatic. Great read. Bertrand Lavayssiere, Ayres and Co. Strategy Consultancy A perk of my job is that I get paid to read and review books. Nothing thrills me more than to know that one of my favourite management authors, Mr Jo Owen, has another book published. I enjoy reading his perspectives on the various aspects of management as he provides insights that can be easily digested by anybody yet has the necessary depth to help you with the skills needed in management. His latest offering showcases research that he has extensively carried out and provides astute insights that will benefit any executive from any level of management, be it middle or senior management. Quickly bookmark this for your to-read list as it is a useful, insightful read. Sadie Jane Nunis, Singapore Institute of Management, Publications Manager Jo Owen has done it again spotted a big gap in the literature and filled it elegantly and effectively with this splendidly readable, comprehensive, practical, and evidence-based treatment of a topic that is really challenging to our globalizing business world. Packed with great examples and quotes Owen leads the reader through the toughest and most interesting challenges in cross-cultural management: leadership, team dynamics, business context and systems, cultural intelligence and conflict resolution. This should be the first item for global managers to put in their hand luggage. Nigel Nicholson, Professor, London Business School, author of The I of Leadership: Strategies for seeing being and doing (Jossey-Bass, 2013) Original and practical book on a vital topic which no one has looked at in depth before; simple and clear to read; lots of real world case examples; escapes the normal orthodoxy where globalisation means spreading western practice. Alberto Forchielli. Managing Partner, Mandarin Capital Partners.