Despite the fact that much has been published and delivered through the concept of 'sharing best practice' it still appears to be immensely difficult for businesses and individuals within it to break down silos, and by doing so deliver significant competitive advantage to the internal and external stakeholders of their organisation .
With the plethora of data, and access provided via technology, no one individual, team or organisation can possibly utilise all of the knowledge and information available to it unless it finds alternative ways of working.
Therefore the concept of working collaboratively must be a focus for future sustainability. Joint endeavour, which I define as ‘collaboration’ is becoming a mantra for how work gets delivered in modern day organisations.
I believe that collaboration is a key area on which HR practioners can and should focus their efforts in order to create a climate for individuals to feel it is safe and appropriate to collaborate outside their immediate team, or area of professional practice.
In 2012, in a study of high-performance completed by the Corporate Executive Board (formerly the Corporate Leadership Council), they stated:-
“Greater interdependence in work has led to a change in how employees get work done “
With the advent of new technology and increasing demands for top and bottom line performance, without additional headcount, it has become the imperative for organisations to find more effective ways of improving organisational performance to achieve business goals.
I believe, therefore, that HR’s role in creating a collaborative culture within an organisation is an essential prerequisite for future success.
Sue
Thanks for your thoughts. I often wonder why we ask 'Why should we have collaborative organisations?' rather than asking 'How can you possibly justify not having collaborative organisations?'. The only answers I have found to the latter question are in the space of unfettered egos and/or poor behaviours of senior management.
In talking about collaborative organisations, we are dealing with the same issues and processes that underlie employee engagement and systems thinking around leadership (rather than merely leaders). This implies the same potential benefits.
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Hi Sue,
How do you see this Hack working out in practice? What sorts of changes, processes and innovations are needed to create a collaborative culture?
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Hi Bruce
Hopefully the answers I have provided above will give an idea of some process changes to aid the development of a collaborative culture. Personally for me this is still a work in progress but the more we in the HR profession raise the profile of collaboration, encourage the power of ‘peer networking’ and engage senior leaders in the concept and ideas, the more the concept takes root and the joint endeavour starts to add value.
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Hi Sue,
Agreed - there's no question of the value of a collaborative culture and the more people who start to engage in this, in part as shift in their own mindset, the better. Likewise, these ideas are a work in progress, there's no question about that.
Some of the words you used in your reply above caught my eye - in particular, key relationships, culture of collaboration and network performance. They appear to chime in with some of the hacks that I've put forward:
Key Relationships + Predicting Relationships and Group Values
Culture of Collaboration + Predictive Change Management
Network Performance + Linking HR/Network Metrics to Financial Outcomes
It'll be interesting to see how these ideas evolve and what the next phase of the hack brings.
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Hi Bruce
Thank you for taking the time to respond and for drawing my attention to your previous hacks which I hadn’t seen before and which clearly reinforce some of the ideas I have been promulgating.
The concept of predicting relationships in advance is a topic which is very relevant to creating a collaborative culture and the advancement of network performance. Within our business we currently use the Insights Discovery Profile to develop team reports but I was pleased to learn about the 4G methodology which provides an even more in depth and sophisticated approach to optimising team performance based on relationships.
Like you I will look forward to reading further hacks with a view to deepening my understanding of the tools and techniques available to HR and OD practioners to firmly embed the concept of collaborative organisations.
Sue
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Thank you for your note Sue. I've signed up to join your hack as part of the hacking team, although I don't know if you're planning on pursuing it into the next phase of the hack, which I think will be about turning the hacks into more practical actions and activities.
Over and above your hack, I've signed up for some more teams, a couple of which might also resonate with your ideas around creating a collaborative culture and the advancement of network performance.
Attracting Adaptable People - probably the most relevant but I think you'll need to contact Debbie Stivala or Chris Grams/System Admin to join as there are already 5 people involved
Adapting to business metrics to build trust
Predictive Analytics
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Hi Sue, thanks for sharing such a thoughtful mini-hack... you're absolutely right on the collaboration imperative, and on HR's role in fostering collaboration across the organization. Would love to hear your perspective on what are some practical changes in which HR processes/practices could be changed to encourage collaboration--both at the individual level (e.g., instilling collaborative mindsets) and the institutional level (e.g., changing how roles and accountabilities are defined)
thanks again!
Michele
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Hi Michele
Thanks for your question.
In response I should start with the statement that I am not suggesting that organisations should collaborate on everything! However in order to create greater value an organisation’s competencies should include a balance between individual and network performance. Roles should be designed based on key relationships and not just task. Source 360 degree feedback based on peers knowledge and experience of workflow not just the organisation charts. This type of activity is promoted by the CLC research (see above).
Finally the route to creating a collaborative culture is not easy and for it to work successfully the organisations must be able to see the benefit. To this end Morten Hansen in the Harvard Business Review 2013 “On Collaboration” provides a helpful formula to look at the value created by collaborative projects.
PROJECTED OPPORTUNITY =
Cost – collaboration costs
___________________
Collaboration premium
I would contend that HR’s role is to promote a culture of collaboration so that individuals recognise that collaboration can deliver improved performance. In the privileged helicopter position we hold who better to make connections and cross organisational boundaries to improve collaboration?
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