Collaboration

How Leaders Avoid the Traps, Build Common Ground and Reap Big Results

Here Professor Hansen addresses key questions that are relevant for leaders in every organisation - critical issues such as, "when should collaboration be encouraged and when discouraged?", "what gets in the way of successful collaboration?" and "how can I be a collaborative leader without becoming a doormat?".

Know when to collaborate and when not to

The goal of collaboration is not collaboration itself but achieving greater results. Therefore it's important to maintain the discipline of ensuring that projects have a collaboration premium before embarking. So the opportunity costs such as extra time required and other projects not undertaken must be outweighted by the advantages.

The potential advantages of collaboration exist in 3 key areas which all need careful consideration: innovation, sales and operations.

Barriers to successful collaboration

Not invented here barrier - not willing to reach out to others

Hoarding barrier - not willing to share or provide help

Search barrier - not being able to find what you are seeking or need

Transfer barrier - not being able to work with people you don't know or understand

Three simple yet powerful levers for effective collaboration

1. Unify people - get everyone aiming for a lofty goal that they can all relate to and that is easy to describe and understand
2. Cultivate T-shaped management - this means delivering two sets of performance results; individual (the vertical of the T) and in collaboration with others in the organisation (the horizontal bar of the T)
3. Build nimble networks - leaders today must be able to harness diverse ideas, people and resources from across boundaries of all kinds in order to (1) identify opportunities and (2) capture the value added by collaborative activity

Powerful collaborative leadership

Hansen is clear that there are times when collaborative leaders have to be decisive; collaborative leadership is not the same as consensus seeking, and sometimes tough action is required. The key to success lies in what he calls "disciplined collaboration".

"Coming together is a beginning.
Keeping together is progress.
Working together is success."