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Are you a collaborative leader?
Collaborative leadership has not yet received the recognition that it rightly deserves, but that is, however, now beginning to change with recent academic studies giving it greater prominence in the scholarship about management and leadership. And practising managers are also starting to take more notice of its benefits within the workplace. Effective collaborative leadership can make a big difference to the successful delivery of a project and developing some of the qualities of a collaborative leader will give you a personal and professional edge in today's ever-changing environment.
But what is collaborative leadership?
In their influential book, Collaborative Leadership: How to succeed in an interconnected world, David Archer and Alex Cameron define collaborative leadership as simply the ability to deliver results across the boundaries within and between organizations. Or to put it another way, you may find yourself leading a team that is spread out, not only within other departments and teams, but across a range of other organizations and specialists too and even continents. They go on to say that,
Getting value from difference is at the heart of the collaborative leader's task… they have to learn to share control, and to trust a partner to deliver, even though that partner may operate very differently from themselves.
What has collaborative leadership achieved?
If you think about some of technological innovations of our age, many have been achieved collaboratively, rather than through the lone-wolf inventor working away in their bedroom. Where would Google be without the collaboration between Larry Page and Sergey Brin? Where would Twitter be without the collaboration between its founders, Jack Dorsey, Evan Williams, Biz Stone and Noah Glass? And I recently wrote about Steve Wozniak and his indispensable collaboration with Steve Jobs, without whose partnership we might never have heard of Apple.
What are the 5 qualities of collaborative leaders?
In a ground-breaking research project by the Center for Effective Public Policy and funded by the US Department of Justice, report author Madeleine Carter identified 5 key qualities of a collaborative leader:
#1: A willingness to take risks
The collaborative leader realises that ‘change is the only constant’, as the Greek philosopher Heraclitus said, but the organization cannot be a slave to the forces of change, instead it also needs to shape them. James Dyson was prepared to take risks with his revolutionary bagless vacuum, despite overwhelming feedback from focus groups and market research which rejected his invention.
#2: Eager Listeners
It is a truism that we have two ears and one mouth and good leaders should use them in that proportion. Old School managers may feel that theirs is the only voice that should be heard, but the collaborative leader in the modern connected workplace knows that a project will only succeed with the input from a range of specialists.
#3: Passion for the cause
The passion and drive of a leader can help to motivate the team to deliver the project. When you have a large cross-functional team comprising many different specialists, or even spread across many continents, the collaborative leader can be the focal point that brings everyone together and motivates them to achieve a common purpose.
#4: Optimistic about the future
The collaborative leader does not become mired in pessimism. Instead the leader sees the path ahead and believes in the team’s mission and the relevance of what they are doing in their joint enterprise. It is a key element of motivation that people like to feel involved in something that is bigger than themselves and a collaborative leader can be key in driving that vision.
#5: Able to share knowledge, power and credit
A quote variously attributed to US president, Harry S Truman, amongst others, states that, “it’s amazing what you can achieve, if you don’t care who gets the credit.” The collaborative leader instinctively understands this and is not protective of their own knowledge and they are prepared to share it and devolve authority and power when it is good for the overall mission. Credit is shared, rather than reserved for the leader.
Are you a collaborative leader and do you see yourself in any of these qualities listed here? Is collaborative leadership a new and important development in management and leadership, or is it just another buzz word or slogan?
Will Trevor is the Founder and Training Consultant at Windsor Training. Please click 'Follow' if you would like to hear more from Will in the future. Feel free to also connect via his Linkedin page, or via Twitter and Facebook or email: will.trevor@windsortraining.net
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