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Winning with Collaborative Leadership

The most valuable thing about collaborative leadership is the employee attitude you can create.  We share what one hears from the members of a collaborative team:

Shifting your style from heroic leadership to collaborative leadership is hard work. You need to think differently, give up control, and trust your team to perform. People don’t like change. If you have been a heroic manager, your team will try get you to revert to Captain Kirk. Your employees may be uncomfortable with their new responsibility, and your boss may not understand why you are giving away power. You need to be clear about the benefits of a new management style to embrace it fully and educate others. You need to know what positive things you can expect from all this work so that you are motivated to make the change.

This is what you hear from the members of a collaborative team:

• “I’m responsible for the team’s results. It’s my job to do whatever I can to help the team meet deadlines and complete projects.”
• “Achieving our results is the team achieves it’s results, I will get the recognition that I want, and I’ll feel that I’ve done a good job. So if I need to sacrifice a bit to make it happen, I know that I’ll win in the long run.”
• “I need to share my talents and do what is best for the team. I will seek out ways to help others on the team achieve their goals. If there is a situation where someone else is better suited to do a job, then I will seek out that person’s feedback and involvement.”
• “I’m an independent person – I’m responsible for myself and my career.”
• “My manager is my coach and partner – I use my manager as a mentor and take advantage of the resources he or she can provide; however, I make my own decisions and guide my own career.”
• “I trust my manager and my teammates – I believe in telling it like it is and facing problems head on. When there is a mistake, I work with my manager and my team to fix the problem and move on.”

Would you like to have this type of employee on your team? Of course you would. You can create an environment that creates and attracts these kinds of people. And the best thing about creating an environment like this is that you will get personal benefits as well. Here are the wages for creating a collaborative team:

• Lower personal stress. You’ll experience less stress if you don’t feel responsible for everything and everyone in your department. In the end, it is thankless work. Being an adult for five to fifteen adults is a terrible job.
• A high-performing unit. Employees who are internally motivated and who work out of a sense of personal satisfaction will perform better than those who are being monitored and controlled.
• Time for high-value activities. You can focus on higher-level management activities such as coaching, collaborating with your boss, and strategic planning when you can trust your team to do the daily work.
• More rewarding work. Imagine that your job is to help people reach their highest potential. This is much more rewarding than chasing people, checking off tasks, and settling petty disputes.

Creating a collaborative environment is a lot of work. It can be scary to let go of control, and you’ll need to develop a new mindset and skills. However, the difference between guiding people and pushing people is worth the effort.

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