ATTRIBUTES OF THE VIRTUAL ORGANISATION

It has been the largest downsizing (cutting cost and reducing staff) that Reuters has had in the corporation within the pst 10 years. Instead of 24 experts, Greg Garrison only started off with 2 people for the usability project. However, he was given a sufficient budget to make this project a successful one.

After an initial evaluation, Greg Garrison was convinced that no single consultancy in the UK could provide all the experts that he needed. In response he 'invented' a virtual organisation, cherry-picking the top talent from companies around the world. It is 'virtual' in the sense that most of the team members are not Reuters' employees. They are experts from a number of organisations such as Logica Uk Ltd, Microsoft Corporation, Admiral Computing Ltd, PA Consulting Group, and the University of Loughborough, working together on the usability project without relocating. This is evidence of an alliance.

The evolution of the virtual team was rapid, the team started with 6 experts in January 1993 and the number of experts has been changing since. The virtual team had a maximum of 83 members at one point of time, yet dropped down to 53 after a few weeks. "This is the beauty of the virtual team", as Garrison explained, "I need an organisation which would be a constantly evolving and changing team of experts - some of whom could be from other companies, some of whom would be independent - but most of whom would not be permanent Reuters staff. I want to employ them very flexibly on a project-by-project basis as and when I need them." Currently, the virtual team has 43 members consisting of a core of between 12 and 24 who work on-site at the Reuters' office in London. Some individuals contribute from other United Kingdom locations and consultants based in the United States and Europe participate in the team remotely using computer-based conferencing and video conferencing. Underlying ICT clearly facilitates this work.

Anoter business reason for Garrison to adopt a virtual organisation was so that the development team could work closely with customers. Without the need for relocation the team members can work closely with customers regardless of their geographical locations. Customers from different locations can join-in the desing phase and participate in the usability testing in Usability Laboratories located in New York, Tokyo, Singapore, Cyprus,Geneva and London. This demonstrates the presence of vertical integration and the importance of globalisation. The direct interaction with development teams takes place frequently via video conferencing. The idea of building the customers into the desing process at multiple stages enables detailed feedback to designers and product developers and improvements in desing and service provision. This demonstrates a high degree of collaboration. As Garrison said "there is something psychological about a developer sitting in a cubical watching a customer in a different country using their product. When they see it in 'real time' they are less biased".