Global innovation
requires collaboration between groups of people located in different
parts of the world, and is a growing trend in industry. Virtual teams
are often used to manage new product development projects. These teams
are similar to traditional teams but are geographically separated and
rely heavily on virtual methods of communication (email, Skype,
teleconferencing, etc.) instead of regular face-to-face meetings.
Experience working as a member of a virtual capstone design team can
help prepare students for this growing trend. To begin preparing
students for work on virtual teams in industry, we co-advised two
virtual capstone design projects with students from Marquette University
and Smith College. This paper describes our experience with managing
two virtual capstone design project teams across institutions. Presented
here are the challenges we encountered, the lessons we learned as a
result of this experience, as well our recommendations for others who
might want to include virtual project teams in their capstone design
courses. We also include retrospective feedback from the students on
these teams regarding their perceived value of their virtual team
experience to their careers in engineering. © 2015 TEMPUS Publications.

Engineering controlled terms: Curricula; Design; Education; Product development; Professional aspects

Capstone design; Capstone design course; Capstone
design projects; Geographically distributed teams; Global innovation;
New product development projects; Retrospective feedbacks; Virtual team

Engineering main heading: Students