Jeannette is the Head of HR for a global biotech firm. During a conversation last week, we suddenly find ourselves commiserating about the perils of collaboration at work.
Collaborating with a bunch of A-team players can be exhilarating, Jeannette suggests with a sigh. Most of the time, however, collaboration feels like this complex and never-ending slog to an outcome you don’t love, and you wish you had just done it by yourself.
Yup. Sigh.
I love to collaborate with you if respect you and your skills, I confess to Jeannette. If I don’t, all my worst instincts come to the fore.
Collaboration is one of our workplace sacred cows. We’re expected to love it AND be good at it. I think of observations shared by Francesca Gino, a former professor at Harvard Business School. Leaders who want to create collaborative work cultures, Gino suggests, try hard to instill collaboration as a value. Sometimes they design physical workspaces that foster collaboration. This feels almost quaint in our post-pandemic universe, doesn’t it?
It is literally true that you can succeed best and quickest by helping others to succeed.”
Napoleon Hill
What such leaders forget is that collaboration requires good old-fashioned skills. More importantly, highly nuanced skills. The sort of skills that we hone through a commitment to life-long learning.
In an evergreen article in the Harvard Business Review – “Cracking the Code of Sustained Collaboration” (HBR, November/December 2019) – Gino highlights the work of companies such as Pixar and American Express who invest in collaboration-skills training.
When I look at the list of collaboration skills that Gino identifies, my first thought is yeah, I know these. Upon reflection I remember how “not easy” they are – and how quickly they can fly out the window when I collaborate with someone who for whatever reason is not my ideal collaborator.
But of course, you may say to yourself, I have taken an active listening class. Well, here are some very specific ways of practicing a higher-level of listening, especially when the conversation may not be flowing with ease:
When I was trained as a mediator at the Brooklyn Courts, one of the most potent techniques I learned was the “Shoe Swap.” Instead of rebutting what a speaker says, I intentionally pause, put myself in the other person’s shoe, for just a moment, to sincerely seek to understand why s/he thinks or feels the way s/he does. Hard to do. And powerful stuff. It changes any conversation.
Because so many of us have received vague, platitudinous or at times personally hurtful feedback, it is easy to shy away from giving honest and actionable feedback to others. Or we may, intentionally or not, signal that we don’t wish to receive feedback ourselves and just want to get on with things.
How do we begin to move into a more effective feedback environment that prevents collaborative endeavors from getting stuck? Have the courage to openly talk about aversions to feedback, choose to practice frequent feedback that is direct, specific, and actionable – and give each other feedback about the quality of feedback that is or isn’t happening.
I have taught these skills for years. Some folks call it switching from Advocacy to Inquiry. I like energy language and think of it as knowing when to Push and when to Pull.
Great collaborators are comfortable with both pushing and pulling. They have a keen sense of when to use one approach over the other. And they do so with clear purpose. Makes sense, right? The key success factor: Be comfortable with both communication styles AND use them with strategic intent.
Know when brainstorming is over. Know when abstraction, more big ideas and additional data will not move you closer to making progress. Know when it is time to get specific. Know when it is time to condense what you need to say into 3 or 4 sentences. Know when it is time to call for action. And have the courage to do it. You will elevate the collaborative discourse for everyone involved.
Sounds good, right? You may even have studied the terrific Harvard Negotiation model that teaches tools for getting to win-win. In reality, this is never easy. If I had to boil a win-win mindset down to 2 simple tactics, it would be these:
Chances are, you and your colleagues have already studied some of these skills. Chances are you, like me, think these skills are a fine idea. Good. Continue to train these skills. Continue to practice these skills. Stay mindful of them in every professional collaboration.
Since we live in a time of virtual collaboration, remember: Each of these skills works just as powerfully in our virtual world. Your practice opportunities are non-stop and endless.
