Practical guidelines for implementing successful projects in multicultural teams across international networks

We will share the strategic planning aspects that need to be considered when planning a virtual collaboration project. Presented in a case study format, we will mirror our project involving students from DePaul University in the US and the University of Caxias do Sul in Brazil. In this project, students in both countries worked in multicultural groups on a four-phase project for ten weeks, where they analyzed international markets for a company’s internationalization.

International collaboration is an important driver of innovation and scientific discovery, but at the same time it brings some challenges related to different styles of communication, different decision-making patterns and creates possible conflicts that can arise in multicultural environments. Therefore, developing intercultural competencies and CQ for students across disciplines could enhance their global skills as well as broaden their career prospects.

Along the presentation, we will describe the planning process, as well as the challenges faced throughout the execution of the activities. The research method applied to measure and track the predicted results are also described, and the results from experimental measures were analyzed in order to understand the effects of virtual exchange over student’s cultural competency.

Since the effects of global exchange experiences are only beginning to be understood, academic research is necessary to better comprehend the impacts of such activities over students’ skills and competences, as well as to help develop proper teaching practices that optimize the process, results and effort demanded.

To address some of these issues, the groups were composed of students with different cultural backgrounds in addition to Brazilians and Americans, since at DePaul University there were also students from other countries. After two rounds of this ongoing experience, a great amount of practical learning was already produced and is ready to be shared.

We will propose a comprehensive model intended to serve as a guideline for those who are planning to start an extensive and all-inclusive virtual collaboration project as well as possible measures that can be used to track student’s performance related to intercultural communication.

This experimental research has also laid the foundation for a training program aimed at developing a proven process to engage corporate professionals while accelerating their CQ and intercultural competence.