Roles and relationships in virtual environments: a model for adult distance educators extrapolated from leadership in experiences in virtual organizations.

In this paper, Larkin and Gould's (1999) activity theory methodology for defining work-related roles and Burns' (1963) analysis of organismic organizational form are merged into a model that describes associate and leadership roles and relationships in virtual organizations. The effects of a lack of shared physical space and face-to-face social interaction, a continual need for learning and collaboration, and the temporalities that characterize roles and relationships in virtual organizations will be explored. This exploration will focus on the challenges that virtual workspace effects have created for two current leaders of virtual organizations. The acquisition and use of leadership power to meet these challenges will be discussed. Gifford and Enyedy's (1999) activity theory, as well as interview data from six educators, will be used as a basis for drawing parallels between associate and leadership roles and relationships in virtual organizations and learner and instructor roles and relationships in virtual learning communities. These parallels will be extrapolated into a tentative model for pedagogical leadership in virtual learning environments.

INTRODUCTION

Teaching in virtual learning environments poses new challenges for adult educators. Rather than computer-mediated replication of place-based or correspondence-based educational praxis, these challenges require evolving pedagogical models situated inside the virtual environment. While adult distance educators are familiar with the difficulties involved in managing the effects of a lack of shared physical space and face-to-face social interaction, mediating these effects inside virtual learning spaces may require the development of new skill sets. Emergent challenges posed by virtual environments, such as the continual need for learning and collaboration (David & Foray, 2002; Morrison, 2003) and coping mechanisms for the temporalities that characterize roles and relationships in both virtual learning environments (Daniel, Schwier, & McCalla, 2003; Knoll & Jarvenpaa, 1998; Morrison, 2003) and virtual organizations (David & Foray, 2002; Kimball, 1997; Sandhoff, 1999), require the development of new leadership models. These models need to address communication processes for "negotiations among different people with different knowledge bases, different histories, different hopes and aspirations, different personal styles and emotions, and different desires and needs" to sustain "focus on [shared] tasks" (Mitchell & Sackney, 2001, Building capacity for a learning community, para. 1, para. 8). Shared experiences of leaders, who have learned to work with associates in virtual organizations, and instructors, who have developed new skill sets within an online setting, may inform the development of a pedagogical leadership model that addresses many of the challenges of teaching in a virtual environment. A comparative analysis of the features of virtual organizations and virtual learning communities provides a context in which shared leadership experiences may be examined.

VIRTUAL ORGANIZATIONS

For the purposes of this paper, virtual organizations are defined as teams of associates or "networks of individuals" who are situated in various locations, are "striving, first and foremost, to produce and circulate new knowledge," and are often simultaneously "working for different, even rival, organizations" (David & Foray, 2002). These teams form for the purpose of completing a project or series of projects; as a result, they become virtual organizations. Upon completion or termination of shared goals, team members disperse or become less active until a new project is secured (David & Foray, 2002; Gronn, 2002). Teams then regroup or reform in order to align their collective expertise with the parameters of the new project (David & Foray, 2002; Kimball, 1997; Knoll & Jarvenpaa, 1998; Lefebvre, Lefebvre, & Mohnen, 2001; Sandhoff, 1999). Thus, virtual organizations are characterized by a lack of shared physical space and face-to-face social interaction, a continual need for work-related learning, and work-related collaboration (Victor & Stephens, 1994).

Effective working relationships among associates and between associates and leaders are challenged by a series of temporalities. Victor and Stephens (1994) identify three: shifting membership; ephemeral boundaries of commitment to associates from the organization and from associates to the organization; as well as a lack of status for individuals within the organization, as a result of individual obligations to the organization being networked and diffused.

As virtual working teams are assembled to solve complex problems, effective coordination of members' activities, though provision of leadership from a distance, is a critical challenge. Understanding associate and leadership roles within virtual organizations is essential to understanding how these challenges may be overcome.

The Role of the Associate in a Virtual Organization

The associate's role within a virtual organizational is to contribute to a collaborative set of activities that fulfill a complex set of responsibilities that are relevant to meeting project-oriented, as well as organization-oriented, goals (Larkin & Gould, 1999, August). Associates' work often involves having to cope with differing initial conditions and having to identify a most-effective course of action from a set of alternatives. Available alternatives and most-effective courses of action may vary significantly both across project tasks and among projects; therefore, associates must be able to apply high levels of expertise to decision-making. Associates "are expected to make decisions and judgments based on the demands of the specific situations" (Malhotra, 1997, para. 1). Associate expertise--the currency of individual survival in virtual organizations--includes specialized knowledge, as well as affiliations with members of the knowledge community to which the associate belongs; a willingness to accept information and consider advice from both leaders and colleagues; continual evaluation and renewal of required knowledge and skill, as well as a renewal of perception of an evolving situation of concern; continual adjustment and renewal of project-related tasks; constant monitoring of the spread of commitment she or he is willing to accept; and goal-orientation to accomplishment and expanded opportunities (Kimball, 1997; Larkin & Gould, 1999; Malhotra, 1997).

Applying associate expertise toward project goals, as well as organizational goals, requires a high level of commitment to participation in collaborative work that is conducted in physical isolation from other team members, as well as from the leader; therefore, explicit, open, and frequent exchange of knowledge and relevant sentiment is crucial (David & Foray, 2002; Knoll & Jarvenpaa, 1998; Turner, Turner, Green, & Mayne, 1998). A broad spectrum of tacitly held understanding of an evolving situation of concern--based upon individual synthesis and evaluation of emergent information--is a constant danger to project success because such a broadly held tacit understanding may lead to inappropriate--unproductive or counterproductive--self-direction (Malhotra, 1997; Turner, Turner, Green, & Mayne, 1998). Conversely, undue pressure placed on associates to make an overly broad spectrum of knowledge and sentiment explicit results in overly "demanding and intrusive" interpersonal relations, which leave individuals "no personal space" (Victor & Stephens, 1994). Lack of personal space may create "stressful consequences" (Malhotra, 1997, para. 2), which, in turn, may result in an erosion of associate commitment to or withdrawal from a virtual organization. Figure 1 illustrates an adaptation of Larkin and Gould's (1999) method of using activity theory to define work-related roles to represent a level of self-direction that Burns (1963) described as being "appropriate to changing conditions, which give rise constantly to fresh problems and unforseen requirements for action which cannot be broken down or distributed automatically arising from the functional roles defined within a hierarchical structure" (p. 46). Figure 1 also illustrates a proposal for an appropriate balance of tacit and explicit associate communication of knowledge and relative sentiment.

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

The Role of the Leader in a Virtual Organization

For the purposes of this paper, leadership in a virtual organization is defined as fulfilling the responsibility for arranging "conditions and methods of operation so that [associates] can achieve their own goals best by directing their own efforts toward organizational objectives" (McGregor, 1957, p. 183). Power is defined as a leader's ability to support and coordinate associates' activities in order to ensure organizational objectives are accomplished. Effective leadership of a virtual organization is posited as being dependent upon two forms of power: productive power and collaborative power. Productive power is defined as "access to resources, information, and support necessary to carry out" organizational activities, and collaborative power is defined as "the ability to mobilize resources (human and material) to get things done" (Kanter, 1979, p. 343; Katz & Khan, 1966).

While, the leader of a virtual organization, like counterparts in traditional organizations, is vested with legal responsibility for organizational activities, it does not follow that the person in this position is "an exceptional individual," who through "charismatic, transformational, or visionary" qualities will assume the status of "heroism or greatness" (Gronn, 2002, p. 660, p. 662). Further, the range of activities required to fulfill a leadership role are "rarely, if ever," carried out via "unequivocal, unipersonal leadership" (Gronn, p. 662). Conversely, an attempt to assume unipersonal leadership might subsequently erode the sources of power required to lead a virtual organization.

Productive and Collaborative Leadership Power in Virtual Organizations.

Within most organizations, a leader's productive power is derived from the ability to apply specialized knowledge, experience, affiliations, and expertise to an ongoing analysis of the external environment (Kanter, 1979; Larkin & Gould, 1999; Lefebvre et al., 2001) in order to access resources. Maintaining access to resources requires continual evaluation and renewal of leadership knowledge and skill, perception of an evolving situation of concern, adjustment of project-specific and broader organizational goals, monitoring of the spread of commitment that the organization and associates are willing to accept, and goal-orientation to accomplishment and expanded opportunities (Burns, 1963; Larkin & Gould, 1999). Figure 2 is an adaptation of Figure 1 that illustrates the activities involved in fulfilling a leadership role in a virtual organization. It is noteworthy that many of these activities overlap those of associates; therefore, it may be argued that leadership activities may be distributed in virtual organizations. Figure 2 also proposes an effective balance of tacit and explicit communications between leaders and associates, required for distributed leadership practice.

[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]

In addition to sustaining sufficient productive power through maintaining "connections with other parts of [the] system," a crucial leadership activity involves use of collaborative power to "get cooperation [from associates] in doing what is necessary" and strategic distribution of the resources required to support team activities are each bases for acquiring collaborative leadership power (David & Foray, 2002; Kanter, 1979; Malhotra, 1997).

Within virtual organizations, the ability to maintain an appropriate balance between dispersed and often temporally engaged team members' needs for explicit communication of knowledge and relevant sentiment, and individuals' needs for tacitly held personal space constitutes an additional, critical challenge. Research into the acquisition and use of collaborative power in order to "address social problems in temporal communities" has been conceptualized within the framework of social capital: the "social ties" that become a "social resource," which in turn, "cultivate norms of reciprocity" and "improve coordination and dissemination of information and knowledge sharing" (Daniel et al., 2003, p. 114). Creating the relational conditions that lead to high levels of social capital within virtual organizations involves determining an appropriate level of freedom for individual associates "to assume responsibility" (McGregor, 1957, p. 183) for making necessary knowledge and relevant sentiment explicit, while monitoring team members' activities and communication patterns in order to provide useful advice and productive direction. Effective leadership of a virtual organization, therefore, involves the acquisition and judicial use of both productive power and social capital to increase associate and organizational capacity through project accomplishment, and as a result, access to new resources and encourage a wider spread of associate commitment.

Challenges of the Leadership Role in a Virtual Organization

The effects of a lack of shared physical space and face-to-face social interaction, a continual need for work-related learning and work-related collaboration, and the temporalities that characterize work-related relationships in virtual organizations create specific challenges for leaders. These challenges include facilitating the construction of social capital, "building a community around shared values and common issues" through leadership skill in facilitating the creation "a culture of information sharing, relationship building and trust" (Malhotra, 1997, How can a virtual organization build community? para. 1).

In order to compare leadership strategies reported in virtual organization literature to current practices, two interviews were conducted via email exchange with leaders of virtual organizations: Alex Laks, principal of Epsilon Learning, and Kenneth D. McNicol, president and chief executive officer of Compass Airport Services Corporation. Laks and McNicol were asked to respond to five questions about leadership challenges and strategies. The leaders were asked to describe the structure of their virtual organizations and to identify the most significant challenge they encounter in providing effective leadership. They were asked to identify which, if any, of French and Raven's (1959) five sources of power they use to meet this challenge. French and Raven's (1959) sources of power include: a) reward power: the power to offer rewards; b) coercive power: the power to enforce punishments; c) legitimate power: power attained through subordinates' or associates' belief that their leader has a legitimate right to influence their work-related performance; d) referent power: power attained by subordinates' or associates' identification with the leader's values, beliefs, and goals; and e) expert power: power attained through subordinates' or associates' respect for the leader's expertise. The fourth question listed Victor and Stephens' (1994) analysis of problems that characterize associate experiences working within virtual organizations: a) unclear organizational boundaries for members, b) lack of shared physical space and real social interaction, c) shifting group membership, d) lack of status for members as a result of obligations to the organization being networked and diffused, e) an intrusive need for interaction that limits personal space, and f) a continual need for work-related learning. The leaders were asked to identify which, if any, of these problems they needed to address within their virtual organizations. Finally, the leaders were asked whether they agreed with McGregor's (1957) argument that leaders who give their subordinates and associates "a degree of freedom to direct their own activities, to assume responsibility, and, importantly, to satisfy their egoistic needs" (p. 183) are effective.

Both Laks (personal communication, May 22, 2003) and McNicol (personal communication, May 22, 2003) associated the most significant challenge in leading a virtual organization with dealing with the effect of a lack of shared physical space and social interaction. Laks (2003) identified "being able to inspire and provide direction at a distance" as his most significant leadership challenge. Lamond (2000a) supported Laks' (2003) observation; Lamond noted, that in virtual organizations, leadership challenges are marked by physical "distance between" associates and leaders (p. 107). He argued that the distance challenge must be overcome by communication--"the social glue that ties members, teams and organizations together" (Lamond, 2000a, p. 107). McNicol (personal communication, May 22, 2003) compared communication patterns in traditional and virtual organizations. "Where in a traditional organization, 'face-to-face' social interaction can contribute" to the exchange of "information" and "ideas," and encourage "thinking [about] and [taking] action towards objectives, opportunities or goals of the overall enterprise," in a virtual organization, "regular communication and interaction tends to be limited to conference calls, long distance calls or exchanges of e-mails ... By their very nature, [these modes of communication] promote brevity and a focus exclusive to the issues at hand." Focusing regular communication exclusively on "issues at hand" can increase the likelihood of divergence of leadership and associate perceptions of the total situation of concern, which, in turn, can erode associate perceptions of the leader's ability to "draw conclusions and make decisions." Likewise, Hightower, Sayeed, Warkentin, and McHaney (1998) stressed the need to "ensure effective information exchange" as a basis for informed decision-making, and acknowledged that this process is more complex when it is carried out in "computer-mediated communications systems" (p. 199). High-tower, et al. (1998) noted that communication via computer-mediated systems is more complex than face-to-face communication as a result of three factors: "reduced communication modalities, more uninhibited communication, and more equal participation" (p. 202). While the reduced modality has been noted as problematic in virtual organizations (McNicol, personal communication, 2003), less inhibited and more equal participation in communications may, in fact, support distributed leadership practices.

Knoll and Jarvenpaa (1998) argued that overcoming the challenge of effective computer-mediated communication requires "actively listening to others and remaining aware of communication barriers" (p.18). Laks (2003) supported Knoll and Jarvenpaa's argument, stating that in his experience as a leader of a virtual organization, he has learned that he must communicate "a deep understanding of the vision and the value provided by the organization," and maintain "strong listening and communication skills to ensure that everyone is on the same wavelength." A leader's ability to listen closely and communicate clearly, sustaining alignment between associates' immediate project-related activities and organizational goals, was critical to Laks:

    For the organization to be coherent [associates'] "freedom" must be
    channeled according to the goals and needs of the organization. If
    the direction individual freedom is taking is not in the (strategic)
    interest of the organization, then it's not productive (2003).

In addition to supporting productivity, McNicol (personal communication, May 22, 2003) posited that strong communication skills expand opportunities for associates to contribute value to the organization:

    Associates are advocates for both their particular field of
    expertise/endeavour as well as advocates for the overall enterprise.
    They regularly identify potential business opportunities and promote
    the organization through any appropriate venue offered or
    identified.

Frequent, clear communication between a leader and associates, as well as among associates, is essential to sustaining alignment between associates' activities and organizational goals (Hightower et al., 1998; Kimball, 1997; Malhotra, 1997; Tacoronte, Alzola, & Monroy, 2003). Given that maintaining shared perceptions of project activities and organizational goals fosters accomplishment, the ability to facilitate frequent, clear communication can become a key source of social capital. However, skillful leadership in the maintenance of an appropriate balance between organizational needs for explicit communication of knowledge and relevant sentiment, and individual needs for tacitly held personal space may be critical for keeping lines of communication open (Malhotra, 1997). Judicious use of collaborative power to construct social capital may be key to simultaneously maintaining lines of communication, sustaining associate commitment, and channeling associate activities to meet organizational objectives. As collaborative power is aligned with social capital, it may be argued that judicious use of collaborative power includes sharing of that power with associates.

In response to the question of which, if any, of French and Raven's (1959) five sources of leadership power are effective in the acquisition of collaborative power, Laks (personal communication, May 22, 2003) and McNicol (personal communication, May 22, 2003) identified combinations of referent, expert, and reward power. While individual leadership styles and differing organizational structures may contribute to variant weightings of the values of bases of power in virtual organizations, it is at least interesting that both of the leaders interviewed for this paper excluded use of both coercive power and legitimate power. Further, both leaders alluded to the use of power in terms of Follettian use of power with, rather than power over (Follett, 1926). For example, McNicol (2003) associated the structure of Compass Airport Services Corporation to his leadership strategy for acquisition and use of power:

    The virtual organization's structure encompasses several traditional
    structures/models. Identification of those with legal responsibility
    towards any undertakings dictates a hierarchy, while the overall
    organization is a flat line where no one group is seen as having
    responsibility or authority over another.

McNicol (personal communication, May 22, 2003) identified referent and expert power as sources of "respect" from associates and access to "the expertise of the group members" which, in turn, support effective decision-making. Comparatively, at Epsilon, "a fairly young (virtual) organization" where "the process of clarifying organizational roles and requirements" is still underway, Laks (personal communication, May 22, 2003) described a "team-oriented" structure that "relies on a spectrum of inter-related expertise to get the job done." Laks (2003) identified referent power as important, expert power as being "less so," and reward power as "the most effective basis for expanding opportunities;" he went on to say that "power is the rate at which work gets done" and "the fuel upon which the work is accomplished is the rewards received by the people who do the work." Laks (2003) defined "the freedom McGregor refers to as possibly the most important component of the 'rewards' that power the organization."

In summary, from these two leaders' perspectives, a combination of reward, referent, and expert sources of power is more appropriate than reliance on either coercive or legitimate sources of power for acquiring sufficient collaborative power to lead a virtual organization. These two leaders' perspectives may be rooted in a perceived alignment of reward, referent, and expert sources of power to personal preferences for Follettian power with. However, reliance upon coercive or legitimate sources of power in virtual organizations may be generally problematic because of a leader's inability to supervise associates who do not share either the leader's or other associates' physical space, who may simultaneously "work for different, even rival, organizations," and whose motivation for being involved in organizational activities may include "striving, first and foremost, to produce and circulate new knowledge" (David & Foray, 2002). Whether the former, latter, or a combination of both rationales for excluding use of coercive and legitimate power sources carries a relatively higher or lower degree of plausibility is of less import than the probability that the selection of a combination of reward, referent, and expert sources of power proves more effective for sustaining collaborative leadership power in at least two existing virtual organizations. The question of whether a similar combination of reward, referent, and expert sources of power may also be effective in virtual learning communities is, in part, dependent upon whether motivational, structural, and functional parallels between virtual organizations and virtual communities may be shown.

MOTIVATIONAL, STRUCTURAL, AND FUNCTIONAL COMPARISONS OF VIRTUAL ORGANIZATIONS AND VIRTUAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

The question of whether comparisons of virtual organizations and virtual learning communities are valid, at least partially, rests on comparable purposes. Evident differences between the underpinning motivations of virtual organizations and virtual learning communities include contrasts between for-profit and for-credential objectives, product-creation, and educational orientations, as well as monetary reward and academic achievement. Motivational commonalities include the production and dissemination of new knowledge, increased expertise, and increased associations with others who are knowledgeable in a field of interest (David and Foray, 2002; Morrison, 2003). Structural differences between virtual organizations and virtual learning communities include supervision levels of associate activities in some virtual organizations, which do not align with virtual learning communities (Daniel et al., 2003; Malhotra, 1997; Lamond, 2000a). Skill-based associate selection processes (Omari & Standen, 2000; Lamond, 2000b) and an emphasis on "person-organization fit" (Billsberry, 2000; Lamond, 2000b) are not consistently practiced in the formation of virtual learning communities. Virtual learning communities are formed in order to develop members' knowledge and skills, not to apply knowledge-based skills in a production process. While prior learner achievement may be loosely paralleled to prior associate achievements in selection processes, the parallel is not fully valid because the range of selection requirements is broader for associates. A more complete structural parallel is a distributed team orientation. "The components (individual workers, teams, departments, units or firms) that make up a virtual organization [like learners in virtual learning communities] are geographically distributed, electronically linked, and connected via lateral relationships" (DeSanctis & Monge, 1998; Virtual organizing, para.3; Knoll & Jarvenpaa, 1998; Morisson, 2003). The virtual team, "the core unit of a virtual organization" (Tacoronte et al., 2003, p.4), is key to the organization of virtual learning communities (Daniel et al., 2003; Knoll & Jarvenpaa, 1998; Morisson, 2003). Predominantly lateral, rather than hierarchical, structures are hallmarks of both virtual organizations and virtual learning communities (Daniel et al., 2003; David & Foray, 2002; Kimball, 1997; Knoll & Jarvenpaa, 1998; Laks, personal communication, May 22, 2003; McNicol, personal communication, May 22, 2003; Wiley & Edwards, 2001).

Functional differences include an expectation of associates in virtual organizations to be "advocates for the overall enterprise," to "identify potential opportunities and promote the organization" (McNicol, personal communication, May 22, 2003). While learners in virtual learning communities may become advocates for online leaning, they are not expected to do so. Their academic success is not linked to advocacy. Conversely, functional similarities can be drawn. Lateral structuring results in an often-stressed attribute of individual participation in virtual organizations: a paradoxically "high degree of independence or autonomy" combined with a "need for interdependence and collaboration" (Tacoronte et al., 2003, p.4; Gronn, 2002). Participants in virtual learning environments, like associates in virtual organizations, must learn to "work collaboratively" via computer-mediated communication to produce "coherent and detailed" evidence of accomplishment (Morrison, 2003, p. 24). Individual learner performances may be evaluated in isolation (including papers and contributions to discussions) and/or as parts of collaborative efforts (including projects and resource-sharing); therefore, learners in virtual communities experience paradoxical autonomy and interdependence (Knoll & Jarvenpaa, 1998; Morisson, 2003). Paradoxical requirements for autonomy and interdependence lead to the need for high social capital in both virtual organizations and virtual learning communities (Daniel et al., 2003). As virtual organizations and virtual learning communities are marked by the effects of temporality and shifting memberships (Daniel et al., 2003; David & Foray, 2002; Knoll & Jarvenpaa, 1998), constructing high social capital in temporal environments among dispersed and shifting members is a common challenge. Distributed cognition and high social capital play important roles in meeting this challenge in successful virtual working and learning communities. These roles may only be actualized when lateral relational conditions include distributed leadership.

Motivational, structural, and functional differences between virtual organizations and virtual learning communities exist. However, parallels are also evident. In particular, the need for high social capital, the efficacy of distributed cognition in goal accomplishment, and the potential benefits of distributed leadership practices in meeting common challenges suggest the a leadership model for virtual learning communities, rooted in an analysis of virtual organizations, may be worth exploring.

A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF ROLES IN ACTIVITY CENTERED VIRTUAL ORGANIZATIONS AND VIRTUAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

Gronn (2002) recommended activity theory as a promising "approach to the study of distributed leadership" (p.674). A synthesis of Burns' (1963) model of organismic organizations with Larkin and Gould's (1999) activity theory methodology for defining work-related roles is expanded to include concepts from Gifford and Enyedy's (1999) activity centered instructional design for virtual learning environments. Gifford and Enyedy proposed the creation of "computer-mediated environments [that] support and structure the interactions and interdependencies of an activity system" as an approach to creating effective virtual learning environments. Three basic tenets underpin Gifford and Enyedy's activity centered design theory. First, rather than "viewing learning as the rational abstraction of mental representations from one's experience, learning is re-conceptualized as learning to participate in a cultural practice" (Gifford & Enyedy, 1999, para. 3; See also Lave & Wenger, 1991). Second, learning activities "are distinguished by their organizing motives" or long-term goals that can be "examined in terms of ... actions and short-term goals," which, in turn, can be analyzed as "specific operations" carried out under "concrete conditions" (Gifford & Enyedy, 1999, para. 4). Finally, "cognition and the cultural tools that mediate it have their origins in social interaction (Gifford & Enyedy, 1999, para. 4; Gronn, 2002, p. 691). On the basis of these three tenets, Gifford and Enyedy argue that in the creation of virtual learning environments, educators should focus on the design of explicit "activities that help learners develop the ability to carry out socially formulated, goal-directed action through the use of mediating material and social structures" (Gifford & Enyedy, 1999, para. 5). As learners participate in collaborative goal oriented activities, they may learn "how to see from a variety of points of view," and in the process, develop perceptive, reflective, and metacognitive skills that, that in turn, may support novice attempts to develop expertise (Wilson, 1995). Instruction should support learners as they become efficient in procedural performance and deliberate in their self-reflection and understanding, para.2). As learners become involved in forming their own learning strategies--much like associates are involved in forming their own work-related strategies--"self-direction and control [may] be continually broadened in keeping with ... growing experience and ability" (Miles, 1965, p. 152). Broadening of self-direction and control facilitates the development of distributed cognition and supports construction of high social capital. Broadening of self-direction and control is a feature of distributed leadership. Figure 3 is an adaptation of Figure 2 that extends a synthesis of Burns' (1963), Gifford and Enyedy's (1999), and Larkin and Gould's (1999) analyses of roles in goal oriented and activity centered environments to provide a distributed leadership model for the learner's role in a virtual learning community.

[FIGURE 3 OMITTED]

Comparable Challenges for Learners in Virtual Learning Environments and Associates in Virtual Organizations

In order to determine whether learner challenges in online environments parallel associate challenges in virtual organizations, virtual learning community literature was examined and six interviews were conducted with adult educators who are currently involved in developing online learning environments and facilitating learning within these environments. The six educators were interviewed via an email exchange and they were asked the same five questions posed to the leaders of virtual organizations.

Two of the six educators involved in this study reported mediating the effects of a lack of shared space and face-to-face social interaction among students as the most significant challenge. While one of these educators reported that students "in the same local get together physically to work on the course, as well as working online" and as a result, "spend double the time on the course," the other expressed a concern that "the level of commitment to a virtual group is less than to a face-to-face group." The latter educator suggested that "shifting group membership" contributed to erosion of commitment. Comparably, Kunuka (2002) argued that pedagogical "problems tend to be magnified in on-line learning environments due to the transactional distance between and among learners and instructors" (p. 79). Knoll and Jarvenpaa (1998) argued that lack of face-to-face interaction equally challenges virtual learners and virtual associates in their efforts to establish "a sense of teamness," to "resolve ambiguity, reduce uncertainty, establish roles and identities, and take collective action" (p. 5). In short, the construction of social capital, as well as the development of distributed cognition, in virtual communities poses similar challenges for both organizational and pedagogical leaders.

One educator noted "unclear organizational boundaries" as "the main obstacle to a smoothly running community." Kimball (1997) describes a common problem in establishing organizational boundaries in virtual organizations:

    Virtual teams need to spend more time being explicit about mutual
    expectations for facilitators, managers, and members because the
    patterns of behavior and dynamics of interaction are unfamiliar and
    it's easy to fall into misunderstandings and become frustrated with
    each other.

Morisson (2003) concurred with this observation, but qualified his agreement with an argument that in activity oriented learning environments "the community learns from its individual participants, and each individual learns from the community: powered by the engine of cognitively engaging discussion, a functioning, dynamic learning system is created" (p. 27). Conversely, Morisson (2003) noted that the need for frequent interaction that dynamic learning systems impose on learners may marginalize some individuals.

One educator perceived "an intrusive need for interaction" as problematic for some online learners. Knoll and Jarvenpaa's (1998) analysis of individual participation rates in virtual organizations and learning communities supported this perception: "in nearly all teams, participation was high for two to four team members with marginal participation from others" (p. 12). As Lave and Wenger (1991) have noted, "an extended period of legitimate peripherality" provides learners with both "a lookout post" and "opportunities to make the culture of practice theirs" (p. 95). Therefore, high requirements for learner participation rates in online discussions may not consistently support learning or enhance community effectiveness. Comparably, Malhotra (1997) emphasized the need for leadership sensitivity to the "stressful consequences" of undue demands for interactivity on virtual associates (para. 2). The latter may be especially true for those associates who are newcomers to the practices of virtual organizations, as well as those learners who are newcomers to virtual learning communities (Lave & Wenger, 1991).

Five of six educators involved in this study agreed that "authentic," "work-related learning," combined with careful definition of boundaries and design of the learning environment mediate many, if not most, of the effects of a virtual learning space. Morisson (2003) concurred that "relevant activities and authentic tasks embedded within and contiguous with the larger online learning community or environment" are critical to success (p. 27). Situating learning experiences within professional contexts, Lave and Wenger (1991) argued, ensures "the meaning of learning is configured through a process of becoming a full participant in a sociocultural practice" (p. 29). Comparably, David and Foray (2002) argued that virtual associates place high value on collaborative production and circulation of new work-related knowledge within their communities of practice. Situated learning may be a vital component of both virtual organizations and virtual learning communities.

Comparable Challenges for Instructors in Virtual Learning Environments and Leaders in Virtual Organizations

Given the similarities among challenges for students who learn in virtual learning environments to those of associates in virtual organizations, the question of whether similar leadership skills are effective in meeting these challenges was posed to six educators. These questions mirrored those posed to leaders of virtual organizations.

Four educators identified communication skill as the most important leadership quality for successful management of a virtual learning community. Experimenting with "different strategies to get people 'talking'," "communicating clearly," "knowing when to be 'present,' knowing when to allow learning to take place within the group," and "paying constant attention to the operation, the flow, and the impact" of communications were reported as essential online facilitation skills. Educators' needs to balance sensitivity to students who "are shy or private by nature" and who may "feel somewhat exposed in an active learning community" and "encouraging [these students] to participate" parallel the leadership challenge of creating an appropriate balance between virtual organizations' needs for explicit communication of knowledge and relevant sentiment and individual needs for tacitly held personal space.

One educator reported communication skills as critical to the provision of the "flexibility" learners require for achievement in virtual learning communities. In parallel, Malhotra (1997), Sandhoff (1999), Estenson (2000), and Tacoronte et al. (2003) argued that flexibility is an essential element in virtual organizations. Three adult educators identified appropriate combinations of expectations for real-time or synchronous communications and asynchronous communications as an attribute of flexible virtual environments. Malhotra (1997) and DeSanctis and Monge (1998) concurred with this stance. One adult educator articulated the challenge of meeting student needs for flexibility within an organizational communication structure as a parsimonious question: "Can 'variety' be considered a structure?"

Awareness of "learner needs" and explicit expression of "genuine dedication to students and their learning" were reported as matters of high import by four educators. In parallel, Estenson's (2000) meta-analysis of literature on virtual organizations' employee needs was used to construct a series of models for virtual organizational structures, each of which reflects variant sets of employee needs. Similarly, McNicol (personal communication, May 22, 2003) reported the need for encompassing multiple organizational models in order to align instances of structures with an individual project team's needs.

One adult educator reported "organizational acumen" (leadership skill) in "managing interactions" as the most important skill for facilitating virtual learning communities. Comparably, Malhotra and Sandhoff stressed the importance of structuring social networks in virtual organizations in order to manage interactions through "relationship building and trust" (Malhotra, 1997, How do employees feel about losing real human contact? para. 4), and fostering "reciprocal, trustful interaction relations between autonomous partners" (Sandhoff, 1999, p. 107). Estenson (2000) argued that leaders of virtual organizations:

    Construct social networks, not for their own sake, but as means to
    an end. [Social] networks have a double function: on the one hand,
    they reduce uncertainty by making the behaviour of network actors
    predictable; and on the other they make possible an increase in
    performance that results partly from the predictability of the
    situation and partly from the positive effects of the exchange of
    resources" (p. 107).

Comments from the two leaders of virtual organizations interviewed for this paper supported Sandhoff's and Estenson's position on the effectiveness of team-oriented social structures in virtual environments. Laks (personal communication, May 22, 2003) described a "team-oriented" structure that "relies on a spectrum of inter-related expertise," some of which originates with the leader, but much of which is distributed among associates, and all of which is needed "to get the job done." McNicol (personal communication, May 22, 2003) emphasized the value of "the expertise of the group members" in achieving company goals. Comparably, Laferriere (2002) and Gronn (2002) listed trust and interdependence as critical components of collaborative learning initiatives. Daniel et al., (2003) identified "trust, cooperation, and collaboration" as key components of social capital (p. 114). Two of six educators reported incremental instructor assumption of the role of a learner as an effective avenue to fostering the trust and reciprocity required for team building--analogously, constructing social capital. Thus, construction of social capital may be both served by distributed leadership practices (e.g., instructor assumption of the role of a learner) and foster further opportunities to distribute leadership activities.

Although individual instances of organizational structures and roles in virtual learning environments tend to vary, five of the six adult educators involved in this study agreed that structures tend to be marked by "team-oriented," "flat" power relationships where learners benefit from a degree of freedom to direct their own activities, to assume responsibility, and to meet their own needs. A notable exception was reported by an educator who declared, "I'm in Asia and everything is hierarchical!" However, the latter educator went on to say, "a degree of freedom" is essential for the development of learners' "creativity and initiative." Balancing learner needs for autonomy with "guidance" directed toward ensuring learner achievement of course "goals," "outcomes," or "mission" was unanimously reported by the educators involved in this study as a critical pedagogical leadership skill. Comparably, Jonassen, Peck, and Wilson (1999) observed, "Intentionality is enhanced when a group of learners is committed to the same goals" (p.37). In parallel, Malhotra (1997) stated that effective leaders of virtual organizations need to balance associates' freedom to assume "greater responsibility" in order to "develop judgmental ability" with "an emphasis on sharing" company "philosophy," "culture," and common "values" and goals (para. 1-3). Provision of appropriate levels of freedom, autonomy, and opportunity to assume greater responsibility for shared goals, and possibly, to achieve formation of distributed cognition, may be the basis on which successful leadership is established within virtual communities of learning and practice.

Four adult educators involved in this study reported active participation from all members as a criterion of success for virtual learning communities. Each of these reports included an observation that the individual student's frequency of participation, as well as assumption of roles, changed over time. One educator reported that some students assume leadership or mentorship roles at the outset in order to assist others in becoming comfortable with the "structural" and "technological aspects of the course." Three educators observed that while some students initially require considerable instructor coaching and direction, most soon join peer-to-peer support networks. Lave and Wenger (1991) argued, "Conceiving of learning in terms of participation focuses attention on ways in which it is an evolving, continuously renewed set of relations" (pp. 49-50). Gibb (1954) defined leadership as being "best conceived as a group quality, as a set of functions which must be carried out as a group;" therefore, as a goal-oriented context evolves, Gibb argued that there is a "tendency for leadership to pass from one individual to another" (Gronn, 2002. p. 655). Five of six educators interviewed for this paper reported leadership shifts as evidence that individualistic participation within a virtual learning environment has transformed into a "team-based" virtual learning community.

In team-oriented virtual learning communities, the issue of acquiring leadership power is seemingly acrimonious. Paradoxically, the provision of guidance, judicious direction, and leadership is seemingly required for the creation of shared culture and common goals. Weiner (2003) argued that "educators engage in forms of cultural work," which are marked by "relations of power" where learning is an "outcome of diverse struggles rather than as the passive reception of information;" therefore, examining learning "contexts and power" is a critical activity that "enables people to act more strategically in ways that may change their context for the better" (p. 55). One educator interviewed for this paper rejected the notion of pedagogical leadership power. This educator stated that while virtual learning communities, "by definition, are not power free," she argued that control shifts from the teacher to the student, and that teacher-presence is "a supportive endeavor rather than one of control" or "ownership of power." In contrast, four of six educators identified expert power as an effective basis on which to build leadership within virtual learning communities. Rationales for the use of expert power varied from perceptions of expert power as a source of respect for the instructor, to "appreciation of the idea that [the educator] is an active scholar," to an interrelatedness of expert and legitimate power within academic settings. One educator suggested that referent power is effective "if students accept that the instructor is committed to his/her values, beliefs, and goals." Another educator acknowledged that "wise and equitable" use of reward power is "a useful device to manage a learning community," and that "the credit (evaluation) situation within higher learning" creates latent coercive power. Like the leaders of virtual organizations, none of the educators expressed an interest in the use of coercive power. Knoll and Jarvenpaa (1998) concurred that in both virtual organizations and in virtual learning communities, coercion "is an unpalatable and ultimately unworkable" leadership strategy.

Further, and also like the leaders of virtual organizations, five educators alluded to Folletian power with. The use of Folletian power with in educational contexts is extended in Ogawa and Bossert (1995) as an indicator of distributed leadership where "leadership is embedded not in particular roles but in the relationships that exist among the incumbents of roles" (p.235). Therefore, educators in virtual learning communities may benefit from using Folletian power with to create relational conditions, where high social capital contributes to "distributed cognition" or "group synergy" (Gronn, 2002, p. 691), which foster learner acceptance of responsibility for distributed leadership activities.

A TENTATIVE MODEL FOR INSTRUCTION IN ACTIVITY BASED VIRTUAL LEARNING COMMUNITIES EXTRAPOLATED FROM ACTIVITY BASED VIRTUAL ORGANIZATIONS

Given evidence of alignment of pedagogical and organizational functions and structures, communication concerns, leadership challenges, and preferred sources of and uses of power in virtual environments, further parallels between virtual organizations and virtual learning communities may be drawn. Gifford and Enyedy's (1999) model of activity centered instructional design may provide insight into effective ways for instructors to adapt pedagogical praxis to emerging leadership challenges posed by virtual learning environments. Thoughtful design of learning activities, based upon consideration of competing learner responsibilities, needs, as well as goals, and facilitation of learner accomplishment through provision of resources, information, and guidance may be critical instructional activities. The maintenance of an appropriate balance between cohort needs for explicit communication and individual needs for tacitly held personal space may effectively support learners in their collaborative development of expertise directed toward achieving explicit academic goals. Figure 4 is an adaptation of Figure 3, which extends a synthesis of Burns' (1963), Gifford and Enyedy's (1999) and Larkin and Gould's (1999) analyses of roles in goal oriented and activity centered environments to provide a distributed leadership model for the instructor's role in a virtual learning community.

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

In virtual environments, a significant number of leadership challenges are associated with "being able to inspire and provide direction at a distance" (Laks, personal communications, 2003). Comparably, "transactional distances between and among learners and the instructor" (Kunuka, 2002, p. 79), which must be bridged via complex computer-mediated communications (Hightower et al., 1998), pose similar challenges for instructors in virtual learning environments. Overcoming the challenges of pedagogical leadership in virtual learning environments, which are characterized by many, if not most, of the structures and transactions that characterize virtual organizations, may require acquisition and use of a combination of productive and collaborative pedagogical power. Whereas sources of productive pedagogical power may be primarily accessed from the external of a collaborative endeavour (Gronn, 2002, p. 672) may become a source of reciprocity and distributed cognition, sometimes referred to as group synergy. Group environment, (i.e., the academy, the larger community, and legislative bodies), sources of collaborative power used to construct social capital, may be contained within the learning environment itself. Social capital may be acquired through acknowledgement of competing learner responsibilities, as well as learner needs and goals, as basis for establishing trust. The thoughtful design of goal-oriented activities, which in turn, provide a basis for individual commitments to a "collective expression of the motive or intention" synergy may be enhanced by careful selection of resources to support goal-oriented activities. Judicious provision of guidance and direction, and adept promotion of frequent, clear communication between the instructor and learners, as well as among learners, may foster role interdependence, including learner acceptance of distributed leadership responsibilities.

[FIGURE 4 OMITTED]

Skillful maintenance of an appropriate balance between cohort needs for explicit communication of knowledge and relevant sentiment, and individual needs for tacitly held personal space may be critical for keeping lines of communication open. Pedagogical use of social capital to maintain lines of communication and to channel learners' activities to meet academic goals may be crucial to the success of a virtual learning environment. The selection of a combination of expert, legitimate, and referent, as well as, where appropriate, reward sources of collaborative power may be effective for establishing pedagogical leadership in virtual learning environments. The judicious use of power to establish social capital may be the basis on which educators can foster a culture of shared values and common goals, which, in turn, may provide the opportunity to relinquish power, assume the role of one among many learners, and facilitate learning within a truly democratic virtual environment that is marked by distributed leadership. The tentative model proposed in this paper for facilitating learning in a democratic virtual environment is, at this point in time, theoretical. The model identifies a variety of sources of information available to the instructor within the virtual environment and the larger context of the broader situation of concern. As well, the model posits an activity centered description of the role of the instructor and recommends provision of a measure of freedom for learners to assume responsibility for their own achievement, which may prove to be effective in virtual learning communities. A balance between tacit and explicit communications between the instructor and learners, including explicit communications of available resources, instructional goals, and guidance for learner interactions and activities are recommended.

The sample of interviews of leaders of virtual organizations and adult educators used to support the model is far too limited to justify generalization. However, the alignment of virtual organization and virtual learning community literature with interview information from leaders and educators suggests that the model may merit additional research in order to determine whether its foundational assumptions are valid. If there is evidence of validity, then ways in which the model could benefit from critique and refinement should be examined.

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GALE PARCHOMA

University of Saskatchewan, CANADA

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