I applied for CSC’s Solution Architect Development Program a few weeks ago – one of five at this site in Cambridge of which I was the only one to make it past the first round. I did my phone interview while I was on vacation at the Bitter End Yacht Club in Virgin Gorda , BVI. I got the notice of my interview when my office called me the day before, and it was a bit tricky making all this happen as I had not taken my laptop with me and had to fill out yet another form before the interview. I asked Muhannad to send the form to my public email on MSN. Fortunately my daughter had brought her laptop, and I was able to persuade her  to let me use it in the evening to download the form. The only decent wifi spot was in the bar area where a reggae band was playing, making concentration impossible, but I was able to download the form and work on it in the quieter hotel reception area. I did the interview the next day by cell phone sitting on the upper deck of the reception area, overlooking the bay, mimosa on hand. The folks who interviewed me asked  good penetrating questions, to which I felt I gave only mediocre responses, but the point is, that this could probably not have all come together like it did a few years ago. With cell phones, we expect to be directly reachable all the time, and we expect to have computers with common software installed  and good Internet access. With the emphasis on reduced emission, and now this latest scourge, the swine  flu, we have got to make virtual teams work. I’ve been reading Craig Larman’s book on Agile and Iterative Development and while appreciating all that he has to say on agile development, it remains  an assumption by most authors that team members can be collocated. As humans, we rely to a huge degree on non-verbal communication and the sense of camaraderie that working in the same place fosters, but we need to make virtual teaming work.