Chapter 1

Introduction to the VirtualWork Environment

I live in a world, a virtual world. Facebook is my house, Linkedin is my office and Twitter is my playground.

—Panchatapa Goswami

When I sat down to write this book, “The human side of virtual work: managing trust, isolation, and presence,” which is about the virtual work environment (VWE), I was asking the question which many of you might have asked: how can the VWE be anything other than a good thing? Virtual work offers flexibility and cost savings not only for the individual but also for the organization and the ultimate in work-life balance. Seems pretty good, almost too good to be true. You know what they say about that.

As we take the journey together looking at the VWE in this ...

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