WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — The Purdue Center for Serious Games and Learning in Virtual Environments will open with a reception from 3-5 p.m. Feb. 12 at Beering Hall, Room 3288.

The center, housed in Beering, Room 3288, seeks to encourage collaboration and establish a foundation for research at Purdue on serious games and virtual environments for learning and support innovative instructional practices, said the center’s director William Watson. The center will establish a framework for developing and implementing engaging and innovative instruction for both K-12 and higher education classrooms.

The center was established with the support of the Discovery Learning Center, the Office of the Vice President of Research and the College of Education. The center includes a lab for utilizing, designing, developing and evaluating serious games and virtual environments.

This reception is open to the public, but those interested should RSVP by contacting Watson at brwatson@purdue.edu.

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — With more companies conducting business globally, communicating electronically is a necessity for most, but there are several guidelines that can help when working on projects via e-mail or the Internet, says a Purdue University expert.

Michael Beyerlein, a professor and head of the Department of Organizational Leadership and Supervision, says nearly all companies and organizations use “virtual teams,” which he defines as groups that are working together to achieve a goal, but infrequently or never meet in person and instead rely on electronic communication, such as e-mail or videoconferencing.

“The idea of virtual teams has been studied for the last dozen years or so, so it’s a fairly new concept, but one that affects nearly every worker,” he says. “Expertise is spread out around the globe. To complete a project, you have to go where the people are, and it’s impossible to spend the time and money to bring everyone physically together.

“The alternative is to work in virtual teams, and the key is to be aware of their limitations in order to conduct productive interactions and successful projects.”

Beyerlein is one of the editors of “The Handbook of High Performance Virtual Teams:
A Toolkit for Collaborating Across Boundaries,” published in April by John Wiley & Sons. Other editors are Jill Nemiro, Lori Bradley and Susan Beyerlein.

Beyerlein says one of the largest drawbacks to working virtually is the lack of human interaction.

“Nonverbal signals, such as eye contact, are huge,” he says. “Researchers have estimated that about 90 percent of our communication is nonverbal, so obviously working electronically can create obstacles within a team. However, many of the basic meeting management guidelines can help workers get the most out of their virtual team experience.”

Beyerlein offers tips for those working in a virtual team:

• If possible, conduct the first team meeting in person. “It gives the group a chance to get to know who they will be working with and establish goals and norms for the project,” he says.
• Use meeting facilitators. Beyerlein says each group should have a leader who makes sure everyone on the team has a chance to be heard, helps the group stay on topic and makes sure any technical problems are solved immediately.
• Celebrate the successes virtually. Beyerlein says just as in-person teams celebrate the completion of a project, so should virtual teams. “Send congratulatory e-mails, glue pictures of your team to your computer, or if you can, get together and go out to a restaurant. If you’re working with people from Thailand, for instance, choose a Thai restaurant to recognize and celebrate part of your team’s culture. These are little things, but they can go a long way.”