Less Planning, More Collaborating
Sometimes we can get a little paralysed by our urge to plan. I was recently working with a group responsible for coordinating works in partnership with others across a diverse and complex system. The client has a fabulous knack for creating “Playbooks” for action, describing in detail the approach for a range of tasks and projects. They are good planners and they do this important work well.
Detailed plans are invaluable when there is certainty around what needs doing and how it needs to be done. But I was invited to help them collaborate and in this realm there is less clarity and little certainty.
As I often do, I threw up a slide at one point listing some characteristics of a collaborative mindset. The one that seemed to jump out for my client was Less plan. More act. It sparked a discussion about what this means.
When thinking about how to collaborate with others it can be tempting to invest lots of time and energy in creating the collaboration plan. Yet while planning is good, I like to say that we can talk about talking to stakeholders, or we can talk to them. In other words, we can plan to engage or we can engage and when asked, I always encourage the latter.
Less planning, more doing. Less thinking about how to collaborate, and more getting started tomorrow. If you are uncertain how and why and what, then those are some good questions to get started with.
Of course, getting started when you don't have a clear and detailed playbook can be a little unsettling. This is why I get to this discussion in the context of the mindset. Doing things differently requires us to think differently. Authentic collaboration requires us to think more like collaborators and less like traditional project managers.
Are you thinking like a collaborator?
If you want to check the state of your collaborative mindset, take a look at our simple assessment tool.
The Need for Collaboration Transcends Cultures
On a recent camping trip to the Flinders Ranges, while sitting under the dazzling night sky and checking my phone only a little (ahem), an email caught my eye. It was from Medina, Saudi Arabia. The leader of a local program was enquiring about assistance on their city-wide, multi-agency collaborations.
We set up a Teams meetings upon my return to the office. On this call the thing that struck me most was just how familiar are the challenges we face inside bureaucracies. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but I had thought that given the very different cultural and governance context in Saudi Arabia, leaders there would face different problems to my other clients. But it seems that the barriers to effective collaboration are universal and the aspirations are very similar, including:
- Working better across silos
- Getting greater alignment across teams in terms of what to do and how to do it
- Reducing competition among teams and increasing collaboration
- Increasing commitment and accountability across the business
- Reducing rework, increasing efficiency
- Working more effectively with stakeholders.
What is it about our organisations, wherever in the world they are, that makes collaboration challenging? Why are we still not doing this better as a matter of course?
The second thing that struck me was that this client found Twyfords by Googling. They could have gone anywhere in the world, but found us. When I asked about that it became clear that it was our Collaboration system and toolsets that made the difference. When struggling to know how to collaborate more effectively and consistently, there is some comfort in being able to follow a clear approach, with a guidebook to follow.
I have since spent a fascinating week in Medina, during which time I’m sure I learned as much as my client. And I’ve been inspired all over again to continue to build our collaborative cultures and practices, wherever we are.
What IS a collaborative mindset?
I’ve just read a couple of articles posted to LinkedIn today that, in different ways, are practical demonstrations of a collaborative mindset.
The first is an interview with Margaret Gardner AO on Australian Leadership. It’s a long interview but the three bits that caught my imagination were, firstly, that good leaders are generous. Margaret says “I think the truly remarkable thing (about examples of exceptional leadership) is the variety of ways exceptional leadership can be demonstrated. But anyone who’s any good is generous. Leaders who make the biggest impact are generous in outlook and generous in how they work with others.”
Secondly Margaret makes the case for leaders who experiment. “I often feel we need to reignite the feeling of experiment and boldness.” She wants to hear leaders say “We could follow this bold new path because it would be consistent with what we think is a better life for our people or a better way of operating in the world.”
Finally Margaret refers to the person who “will cause the thing to happen, and in the end nobody is quite sure where it started because he doesn’t need to claim he started it but wants to make sure, with others, that it happens.”
Leaders who ... want to make things happen ... are willing not to have the answer but to experiment ... don’t look for accolades for what they do ... all demonstrate a collaborative mindset.
The second article is about someone I’d never heard of because I’m not a follower of sport. His name is Dwayne Casey, an American basketball coach who took his skills to Canada for seven years with significant success. In his seventh year, he led his team, the Toronto Raptors, to the best record in the NBA and won the NBA’s Coach of the Year award. However, two days later he was fired!
Instead of a frustrated or petulant response Dwayne sent a letter to the Toronto Star in which he thanked his team’s supporters without whom the team would not have been successful and he thanked Canadians for “teaching our all-American family the Canadian way. That being polite and considerate to one another is always the best way. That diversity is something to be embraced and celebrated. That taking the time to learn about each other’s cultures is the surest way to find common ground and understanding.” The letter goes on to say how important it had been for Casey to raise his children “in a country that shows through its words, actions and laws that all people deserve basic human rights, and a chance to reach their goals through education and hard work.”
Casey showed respect for the opportunity he’d been given and the values of the country where he’d lived. He chose to go beyond basketball to a bigger picture. He opened his heart and mind to a positive response of gratitude.
People who ... demonstrate respect for others’ values ... look for the bigger picture in adversity ... stay positive in negative situations .. also demonstrate a collaborative mindset. Without these characteristics, I can’t see how a leader could collaborate successfully.
