My thinking is as follows;

• E2 can be framed both as a technology and as a cultural shift
• Its takeup is clearly very different from hard technologies e.g. email, personal computers, blackberries, databases etc.
• Adoption is also very different from technological/methodological hybrids e.g. CRM, BRP(?), ERP and JIT amongst others
• Likewise, the debate about top down and bottom up drivers of adoption is new(ish)
• E2 seeks a different culture from command and control in which to thrive

Thus;

• Given the potentially disruptive nature of E2
• Its perceived low cost of technology
• The apparent need to be integrated into processes (see Howlett for example!)
• Its material ‘distributed’ impact on culture and values (what can’t be E2′ed?)

It will either;

Take hold on a case by case basis, varying from organisation to organisation and function to function, eventually fulfilling its potential and bringing about a subtle change in culture, the credit for which will vary dramatically and some will claim it was their idea from day!

or

Fail to take hold as the organisation seeks to control and police (in the nicest possible way of course!) the various elements of E2

Therefore;

• E2 is a bit of a slippery eel, who knows where it will go next
• E2 doesn’t lend itself to linear outcomes and cost/benefit analysis (hard but not impossible!)
• Claiming credit and gaining influence for E2 is anyone’s guess

As Jon writes himself;

I am not aware of significant work in the general area of changes to mainstream HR practices as a result of embarking on the path towards Enterprise 2.0.  I will be delighted to learn from any of you of examples and / or issues I may have missed or glossed over.

My guess is that we’ll be waiting quite a while…

Rather than bandwagoning around E2, I think that setting out to claim a element of an organisation that can be improved and has thus far been overlooked will reap richer rewards.

Many thanks to Anne Marie for the brainstorm

The piece focuses on leadership, giving up power as a leader and witnessing corresponding improvements in performance. There are also case studies from CSC and ANADIGICS showing some attractive financial improvements as a result of this new way of working.

Over and above the financial improvements, perhaps the most interesting aspect of the article is the idea of “mutualism.”

Mutualism involves measuring workers not against revenue or other numerical goals, which we have observed to be ineffective as motivational tools, but against qualitative values such as trust, responsibility, and innovation.

And it implies that leaders don’t dictate vision or strategy; instead, they enable employees to create a common vision through, for example, off-sites for discussion of strategic issues and regular feedback and education. Hitting numerical goals has been the natural outcome.

It will be interesting to see if methods such as mutualism increase in popularity and adoption over the coming months.

• Shifting the Organisational Pyramid
• The McLeod Review on Employee Engagement
• The Leader/Manager Debate
• Line Managers who Lead
• The Intrinsic Motivation of Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose
• The Irrationality of Human Behaviour
• Tomorrow’s HR Professionals – A Multi-Disciplinary Background

Articles are included from the likes of Harvard Business School, Henry Mintzberg, HR Magazine, McKinsey, the McLeod Review, the Partnership Institute, Personnel Today, Strategy + Business and TED.

Tag Cloud

Shifting the Organisational Pyramid

The general consensus of commentators from a broad spectrum of disciplines is that the traditional organisational pyramid is not fit for purpose. See below to find out more. We are also seeing a notable increase in articles and blog posts focusing on recruitment in the upturn. Whether this is wishful thinking or a genuine sign of improving economic times remains to be seen.

On a continuing theme from previous updates, there can be no doubt that this year’s hot topic is employee engagement, whilst an acknowledgement of it’s importance is widespread, there remains considerable uncertainty around putting an effective engagement strategy into place. Furthermore as the discussion develops, it is becoming increasingly hard to separate engagement from other organisational issues such as; leadership, talent management and innovation.

The McLeod Review on Employee Engagement

July saw the release of the UK government backed McLeod Review looking into the impact of poor employee engagement in the UK. Undoubtedly this is a strong endorsement of the positive effect of engagement on performance. However, there has been criticism from some for the lack of new insight or practical suggestions. I think that this is slightly missing the point and the report is far from the “recycled rubbish” claimed by Nicholas Higgins. In a similar vein, Personnel Today explicitly criticises the lack of practical suggestions. In my view, the job of this report is to make CEOs sit up and take note and raise what is traditionally seen to be a “soft issue” up the corporate agenda. The report is also meant to raise the issue of engagement for businesses of all sizes, again I think this is something that it achieves. As a first step in an ongoing process, this report gives HR directors the evidence to support the case for taking a serious look at engagement.

Although short on new ideas there is no doubt that the Mcleod Review brings together lots of data and evidence supporting the argument for an increased commitment to engagement. A good summary by John Ingham can be found here. There is nothing revolutionary in the report and it is easy to see why some in the industry are frustrated by it’s lack of specifics. However as a document making the quantitative case for increased investment in engagement it is pretty solid and for those not directly involved in HR and its related disciplines, it is a good introduction.

Despite the shortcomings, the conclusions reached by McLeod are likely to resonate with many. In short, McLeod is calling for a more sophisticated approach to people management. The report openly argues that due to amongst other things changing demographics and technology, engagement is not something organisations can approach with a one size fits all mentality. True engagement is focused on the needs of each individual. Furthermore, if organisations buy into this assertion, the role of line managers has to evolve away from the traditional administration/assigning tasks role to a more collaborative/coaching type approach, as McLeod states;

“Many people we spoke to identified managers’ approaches and behaviours as key factors in disengagement – as one respondent said, they sometimes act as “a great impermeable damp-proof course.” Jeff Kelly, of the Partnership Institute, told us at a round table discussion for this review: “There is a territorial problem and a comfort zone problem. Many feel comfortable with managing staff on an adversarial basis and don’t want to give it up.”

My feeling is that what is being called for in the McLeod Review goes much further than encouraging organisations to adopt a formal engagement programme. If organisations are to fully realise the benefits outlined in the report it is going to require a complete rethink in the way corporations manage and engage their people.

Curiously enough there have been a number of other articles published this quarter that I feel more explicitly reflect the findings of the McLeod Review. Interestingly, these articles are all written by people from a variety of backgrounds or disciplines yet the underlying message is very similar.

The Leader/Manager Debate

To kick things off, Henry Mintzberg has created a buzz with a look at the perennial manager/leader debate. This was also a topic covered in the previous issue. In this article Mintzberg is critical of the traditional role of corporate leaders who he brands as aloof and disconnected from the workforce, therefore having little idea of what is actually happening in the organisation. It is this disconnection that hampers so many organisational initiatives. In Mintzberg’s view, corporate America is overled and undermanaged.

True leadership is something that may only be required on an ad hoc basis, in particular during times of uncertainty or dealing with specific challenges or unknowns. These are the challenges which we most associate and value strong leadership with such as charisma, determination and vision. Effective management on the other hand is something that requires a more mundane yet equally valuable approach.

“As Stanford University emeritus professor James G. March put it: “Leadership involves plumbing as well as poetry.” Instead of distinguishing leaders from managers, we should encourage all managers to be leaders. And we should define “leadership” as management practiced well.”

At the heart of Mintzberg’s criticism is that the traditional corporate pyramid encourages and supports this disconnection between leaders and the rest of the organisation. Jamie Notter has an good summary of the Mintzberg article and picks up on his assertion that organisations need to review the usefulness of the prevailing hierarchical model of organisational design.

Line Managers who Lead

The notion of line managers who lead is explored in this recent McKinsey article. An idea that is coming from a similar direction to Mintzberg, instead of training managers in process and administration, they can improve productivity by empowering the people around them. In this way managers can be seen as catalysts to creativity, innovation and devolved decision-making. In particular managers need to address the issues that are of particular relevance to them and their people. This can be anything from dealing with interpersonal issues to customer relationships. The article goes on to say;

“To unlock a team’s abilities, a manager at any level must spend a significant amount of time on two activities: helping the team understand the company’s direction and its implications for team members and coaching for performance.”

This prompts the question, is the traditional top down business model fit for purpose in the 21st Century? To highlight this confusion between management and leadership, one particular criticism outlined by Mintzberg in another article is what he refers to as leading through information or “deeming” as he terms it. This is where leaders deem that certain targets need achieving, such as sales need to rise by 10% or we need to cut 15% of staff. By any definition this is not leadership and as such is unlikely to engage or motivate employess apart from through fear.

Dismantling the organisational pyramid is also the topic of a Strategy + Business article. Ostensibly discussing talent management, the theme is the same as Mintzberg’s argument and calls for a fundamental reassessment of how organisations engage with their employees. The article argues that the traditional career progression structured through an organisational pyramid structure is outdated and not fit for current and future demographics. Instead organisations need to take a more sophisticated and flexible approach to career development based on the individual.

The Intrinsic Motivation of Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose

Further evidence to support a radical reappraisal in the way organisations structure themselves is outlined by Dan Pink who delivered an entertaining TED talk, well worth the 20 minutes if you have the time. In it he discusses the failure of bonuses and incentives to improve performance. Contrary to popularly held beliefs in the corporate world at least, the basis of Pink’s talk is that traditional monetary incentives fail to boost performance in all but the most mundane or mechanical tasks. Citing a number of scientific sources, Pink states that the traditional reward structure used by organisations is not an effective means of motivation. Clearly this view undermines many of the assumptions that organisations implicitly make about motivation and performance. In getting rid of the traditional carrot and stick approach, Pink focuses on three areas of what he terms “intrinsic motivation” of autonomy, mastery and purpose.

In discussing the role of autonomy, Pink is another to go against the orthodoxy and directly criticise the traditional organisational pyramid which concentrates decision-making in the upper echelons. By removing self-direction, organisations are undermining the ability of employees to fully engage with their work. At the same time feelings of unfairness are likely to grow. Clearly, Pink is suggesting that organisations need a fundamental rethink in the way that they motivate their employees. As Pink repeatedly summarises;

“there’s a mismatch between what science knows and what business does.”

The Irrationality of Human Behaviour

As if that isn’t enough, we are continuing to see an increase in articles focusing on the “irrationality” of human behaviour. In a posting on the Harvard Business School site Jim Heskett kicks off a decent discussion about a recent HBR article by Dan Ariely. Again, this has significant implications for our approach to management theory and assumptions about human behaviour.

“Reactions to our efforts as managers reflect what each individual receives in relation to what he or she perceives and expects. Because this is highly subjective, the argument goes, generalizations (many of them currently taught in conventional courses) about how to manage are practically useless. Instead, managers should encourage employees to set their own goals, appraise their own achievements, and reach their own conclusions about how to improve. Managers should also spend more of their time inspiring (through stories) and devising engaging activities from which employees may, to some extent, choose.”

Are you starting to see a theme here yet?

Whilst there is no shortage of new ideas being put forward, within the HR specific press, the focus has been more inward and arguably more pessimistic over recent months.

Tomorrow’s HR Professionals – A Multi-Disciplinary Background

In particular, HR Magazine in the UK has run a series of articles that have a generally pessimistic view of the furture for HR. The debate seems to have moved on from the rallying cry for HR to be provided with a seat at the top table to a questioning of whether the function can actually make a strategic contribution. For example, David Woods cites a Logica survey with the headline figure claiming that 70% of HR Directors feel that they do not have sufficient information to avoid a widening skills gap. Given new technology and information available to HR professionals, is there any excuse for this?

Elsewhere , Maurice Duffy muses on the future of HR. In a strongly worded article, he articulates a potential future for HR where it is able to contribute significantly to organisational effectiveness. Unfortunately, Duffy is sceptical whether the majority of current HR practitioners are capable of delivering this vision. As Duffy states;

“My view is that HR is populated with too many self-seeking, blame-shifting blockers and manipulators who kill the enlightened view and restrict and choke organisational progression. You know them – the pen- pushing administrators and positioners, who tell the business what it cannot do, build processes and systems that inhibit or dilute any sensible simplicity that is a key requisite in the current world where change, speed and innovation are the new business imperatives.”

On a similar note, Rhonda Eckert has a blog post asking whether HR is in danger of becoming extinct? She echoes Murray in her assertion that tomorrow’s HR professionals are going to come from a multi-disciplinary background. Maybe not the end of HR but possibly signifying a shift in the experience or requirements for HR professionals.

Likewise, Jan Kingsley at ASPEL talks about the fragmentation of learning and its possible resolution, saying;

“L&D is becoming more specialised with people developing specific competencies and skills in discrete areas, for example, becoming specialists in coaching, facilitation or learning design. This is being driven in part by customer and client expectations, but also the use of technologies which makes the whole issue of learning much more complex. Navigating this maze of information and techniques and overcoming their inherent complexities will be a major factor in making L&D much more effective.”

While debates on the specific themes will no doubt continue, the possibilities for HR and leadership going forward are intriguing and imply a number of changes. While the recession has almost forced people to reflect on their organizations and practice, the seeds of the future may well be taking route already.

(at least according to Seth Godin)

Here’s the full piece…

Is everything okay? Unless you work in a nuclear power plant, the answer is certainly no (and if you work there, I hope the answer is yes.) No, everything is not okay. Not in a growing organization. Not if your company is making change happen, or dealing with customers. How could it be? And yet, that’s what so many managers focus on. How to make everything okay. We spend so much time smoothing things out, we lose the opportunity for change, or for texture or creativity. Instead of working so hard to make everything okay, perhaps it is more helpful to work hard at living with a world that rarely is.

Reading it again, do we really want things to be just ‘ok’ or do we need to revisit the mission statments again?

I think it was Henry Ford or was it Barack Obama who said;

Being OK is what makes America great

Can anyone remind me please?

In lots of large corporations, innovation and integration are unnatural acts. Silos block cross functional cooperation and resistance stifles new ideas and concepts.

A piece in HBR then “explores how some companies are overcoming these boundaries by proposing and establishing two new types of cross-organizational teams.”

This also reminds me of Jody Hoffer Gittell and her work on relationship coordination to raise performance by integrating teams and departments.

They evaluated their metrics on the Codebase of Windows Vista (over 3400 Binaries, >50 Million Lines of Code, thousands of developers) with very astonishing results. They tried to estimate which binaries of Vista would have a fault in the field (are failure-prone) and which are not failure-prone. 86.2% of the predicted failure-prone binaries were actually failure-prone (precision) and 84% of all actual failure-prone binaries were correctly predicted (recall)… As it can be seen, the organizational structure metrics out-performed every other metric in terms of precision as well as recall!

I suspect there may be more lessons to come from such work and it may well apply to fields beyond software development.

By recognising the nature of the interactions, we can better understand the restrictions of, and relationship between, the associated behaviours. We can then focus more sharply on initiatives which (i) improve controls and efficiency, or (ii) add value through creativity and innovation, or more ambitiously (iii) both!

And whilst it’s a question of ‘when’ rather than ‘if’ companies introduce social tools, having a clear view of the driver for their introduction (i.e. tending towards efficiency or value-added/innovation) will ensure the appropriate technologies are implemented and organisational behaviours nurtured.

Johnnie then wraps things up with;

I’m wary of definition deckchairs, but I liked the idea of seeing a difference between collaboration and mere co-ordination. For me, collaboration involves something richer, more complex (so also messy), getting diverse groups to create things together. Co-ordination is more about getting everyone to stick to someone’s plan.

Preaching to the converted here guys, especially with regards to the debates about what consitutites collaboration and how it mingles with and differs from control

I doubt whether it will catch on, sadly, but I’ve also been advocating for years that there should be a process of psychometric testing, along the line of Myers-Briggs, for fund managers. This is actually not uncommon in other business scenarios involving large loans, buyouts, etc. and ought to be standard practice for any position of serious responsibility.

It is a strange paradox that many private sector clients are making genuine efforts at developing employee engagement in pursuit of profits while so many third sector and public sector organisations are developing processes and systems that alienate employees and volunteers in pursuit of efficiency.

As mentioned elsewhere, one possible way around this may well come from creating and encouraging ‘Small World’ networks.

There is a tension at the heart of our efforts to collaborate. This tension and its possible resolution is best captured by the following questions.

• Should we be putting people first, before technology, in our efforts to collaborate?
• Does collaboration benefit from a more formal process?
• Can collaboration be encouraged in a replicable and systematic manner (as much as anything concerning people can be repeatable and systematic)?
• Does the lack of a formal process for optimising collaboration hold back productivity and performance?

This article attempts to answer these questions and shine new light on what constitutes successful collaboration.

What is collaboration?

At the outset, it is useful to consider what we actually mean when we talk about ‘collaboration’[1]. Wikipedia defines collaboration as “a recursive process where two or more people work together toward an intersection of common goals, for example, an intellectual endeavour that is creative in nature. In particular, teams that work collaboratively can obtain greater resources, recognition and reward when facing competition for finite resources.” By way of contrast, Google offers us 26 possible definitions.

While wanting to avoid any jargon, what is most striking about the various definitions is how frequently the concept of informality is seen as being intrinsic to collaboration. By extension (and certainly from a management perspective), it is this apparent informality that creates a paradox, or at least some significant contrasts around collaboration. The table below illustrates these ideas and the tension between collaborative ways of working and more formal approaches.

Whilst acknowledging that an organisation’s preference is for methods of working that can be most easily measured and managed, the paradox of collaboration lies at the heart of knowing which way of working is most suited to the task at hand. Put another way, it is a case of more control versus less control, more spontaneity versus less, or even greater adoption of change or not. It is these contrasts and inconsistencies lying at the heart of how we choose to organise work that creates an apparent gap or tension in collaboration. This is then especially relevant for those who seek to encourage or promote collaboration within organisations.

Why collaborate anyway?

Whilst it is useful to acknowledge the informality of collaboration, at least when compared to more formal methods of working, it is also useful to examine why collaboration occurs in the first place. As with the formal/informal dichotomy, it would appear that collaboration happens for two reasons; the first because it just happens, the second because more formal working practices are introduced under the guise of ‘collaboration’, when in reality collaboration in its truest sense isn’t taking place.

From a managerial perspective, collaboration is often encouraged on the basis that it delivers greater productivity than the alternatives. At the heart of collaboration is the ability of the group to contribute more to the organisation than the sum of the parts. It is also the case that collaboration is one of a number of different ways of working and in that sense, it is important to pick the right ‘tool’ for the job. By way of example, the following list illustrates activities with particular relevance to collaboration;

• Change Management
• Government and Organisational Design
• Innovation
• Learning and Development
• Marketing
• Project Management
• Software and IT

Reading between the lines, it would not be foolish to argue that collaboration is not a vital component of any successful organisation. Equally, collaboration efforts have played a significant, if not essential role in the creation of open source success stories like Firefox, Wikipedia and Linux, amongst others.

Given the nature of collaboration and its current role in helping organisations (of various forms) achieve their objectives, it is perhaps worth revisiting the original tension in collaboration mentioned earlier. As before, an inherent contrast lies at the heart of organisational collaboration, namely how to manage and ‘control’ something that is by definition informal, ad hoc and spontaneous?

How is collaboration being encouraged?

Collaboration and its anticipated benefits are relevant to every organisation. By extension, the means of encouraging collaboration are extremely wide and varied. Perhaps the easiest way to explore this in more depth is to look at the classic People, Process and Technology mantra, in this instance however, the order will be Technology, Process and People.

Technology and collaboration

While it is evident that encouraging collaboration through the use of technology has merit, it is also important to realise that successful collaboration in this day and age requires elements of technology, process and people. That said, recent developments with regards to internet based technologies have seen a proliferation of new collaborative technology emerge, many of which can be seen in light of the recent Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0 memes. In brief, the creation of many free or low cost online applications has made sharing, editing, commenting and tracking group activities much simpler, aiding and abetting collaboration in the process. Examples of these programs include blogging, wikis and social networking amongst others.

While this new class of programs should be seen in the wider context of desktop (e.g. word processing, spreadsheet) and enterprise applications (e.g. CRM, payroll), it is their ability to share, comment and collaborate with others that is of greatest relevance. Such is the current popularity for collaboration in all things technology that even IT giants like SAP and Oracle have been doffing their caps in this direction.

While the recent emergence of Enterprise 2.0 technology has been well documented, how does this impact an organisation who wants to encourage greater collaboration? Clearly, technology facilitates greater collaboration, the possibility for more innovation and the better use of resources increases. As above, technology on its own doesn’t guarantee success. Instead, people must be trained and the benefits of the software must be given an appropriate purpose.

Processes and collaboration

As we have already seen, processes are by definition an oxymoron when it comes to collaboration. On the one hand, processes imply consistency, repeatability and reliability, Six Sigma being an excellent example of this. On the other hand, collaboration excels when there are few, if any constraints in place, there is a place to develop informal working, innovation and spontaneity can thrive[2].

Where does this inherent contrast leave our efforts for greater collaboration? There would appear to be two broad themes that seek to boost collaboration efforts across business processes. The first evolves around the ‘formalisation’ or ‘facilitation’ of collaboration through various organisational initiatives and ‘processes’, examples of which include;

• Communities of practice
• Facilitation
• Leadership
• Matrix management
• Mentoring
• Self managed and virtual teams

The above approaches all aim to improve productivity and maximise the use of available resources. In a similar vein, another approach seeks to encourage and facilitate collaboration, raising awareness and supporting participation. While these methods may differ, they all share a common goal in terms of increasing performance and helping realise wider organisational objectives.

The second theme acknowledges the fact that within the realm of processes, there will always be an aspect of work or interaction that is beyond definition or easy measurement. In acknowledging the existence of such ‘gaps’ in processes, there is an implicit creation of informality and by extension, this creates fertile ground (no matter how small) for the development of collaboration. Various approaches have been taken to measure these ‘gaps’ and by extension, their facilitation and development can be encouraged. Perhaps the best example of this is Social Network Analysis, or Organisational Network Analysis, an approach which measures interactions, levels of trust and frequency of communication within groups with the aim of understanding how work is really done, increasing efficiency and helping facilitate better collaboration. A second, related methodology is Value Network Analysis or VNA. VNA focuses on understanding and optimising the relationships through which commercial value flows.

Whilst the processes and approaches above seek to encourage collaboration, their strengths lie in providing support and facilitation for it, or in the case of SNA/ONA and to a lesser extent VNA, the strength lies in measuring and helping to find areas of an organisation that have a greater appetite for collaboration[3].

What appears to be missing from these approaches is a method to systematically encourage collaboration in a way that both enables people to work together in a genuinely collaborative manner, whilst retaining the inherent advantages of clearly defined processes. Combining these two abilities is particularly important when working on complex, large scale projects requiring the coordination of activities across multiple teams, divisions, projects or geographies.

People and collaboration

The third component of collaboration and by far the most important is that of people! Having explored the impact of technology as an enabler of collaboration and processes as a way to measure and encourage collaboration, people themselves must be free to choose to collaborate and to then be able to act upon this choice. In essence therefore, successful collaboration is at its best when the following conditions are created;

• Training around collaboration raises people’s awareness but genuine collaboration is often spur of the moment and is highly context specific, it isn’t just about training
• People need to value collaboration, they have to want to put it into practice
• Sustaining collaboration requires trust and the alignment of behaviours, relationships and culture

While it is important that collaboration is valued, spontaneous and is trusted, facilitating and systemically encouraging collaboration is far easier said than done. The following examples illustrate some of these challenges and how other people have articulated them.

• Behaviours
• Boundaries and Silos
• Culture
• Relationships
• Shared Interests
• Sustainability and Value

Behaviours

Behaviours are critical to successful collaboration. While we may talk of altruism and training activities, successful collaboration often calls for changes in our behaviour. “People have to change the way they communicate and interact with others. The breakpoint of my PhD…”[4]

Boundaries and Silos

The existence of boundaries and silos are particularly relevant when looking at more complex examples of collaboration, if an effort to collaborate crosses organisational boundaries such as departments, divisions or reporting lines, progress may slow. “We identify three key barriers to effective coordination and collaborative information sharing across organizational boundaries: intergroup bias, group territoriality, and poor negotiation norms.”[5]

Culture

Related to the three themes mentioned so far, culture acts as a social ‘glue’ and helps inform behavioural norms, etiquette and protocol within an organisation. “The problems we face now and into the future will only increase in complexity and it will require teams of people within and across organisations to solve them. At the heart of the problem is collaboration culture. Does the organisation have a culture that supports collaboration? And if not, how do you change your culture to be more supportive?”[6]

Relationships

Similar to behaviours and culture, relationships determine the type and characteristics of our interactions. “Individuals may have previous relationships with each other or may be new to each other. Those with previous relationships may have positive or negative views of each other… What adds complexity to collaboration efforts is not necessarily the number of people involved. It’s the number of relationships they have with each other.”[7]

Shared Interests

If interests aren’t aligned, or people feel that common interests don’t exist, collaboration can falter. This is particularly relevant with regards to objectives and adopting a perspective that is larger than initially thought. “For example, negotiations might also incorporate parties’ interests in the timing of information or of product sharing, consideration of short-term versus long-term needs, or the distribution of credit for joint outcomes. By identifying a broader set of interests and issues, it becomes easier for negotiators to make mutually beneficial tradeoffs that enlarge the pie of value.”[8]

Sustainability and Value

Over and above the issues mentioned already, the concept of sustainability is also key to developing successful collaboration. Ensuring that collaboration efforts provide value in the short and long term is key. “Perhaps the single most telling issue that professionals have to resolve in effectively networking online is identifying where to focus efforts. When online networking is done in-house the issue is not so much where to network online, but rather one of making sure that the resource provided connects effectively to business strategy and plans, priorities and to business processes, and that it helps people find each other and connect to collaborate effectively across what might otherwise be impeding organizational barriers. Then the issue of networking quality comes to play superseding selection of where to network per se, and quantifying networking value is one of showing that this resource can be more than just a cost center for the organization.”[9]

While the issues above all illustrate the complexities that go with fostering and assisting people’s efforts to collaborate, the role of trust as a catalyst in this cannot be underestimated. If anything, trust is the central theme, around which examples such as the ones above evolve.

Easing the tension

In attempting to resolve the paradox around collaboration, namely squaring its informal, ad-hoc nature with the means to manage and enhance it for the benefit of those involved and the relevant organisation(s), our themes to date have yet to reconcile them. While numerous approaches around people, technology and processes have been adopted, none seem to present a coherent resolution. As mentioned at the beginning of this piece, the following questions remain unanswered;

• Does collaboration benefit from a more formal process?
• Can collaboration be encouraged in a repeatable and systematic manner (as much as anything concerning people can be repeatable and systematic)?
• Does the lack of a formal process for optimising collaboration hold back productivity and performance?

By way of an attempt to answer these questions, perhaps the best starting point is to look at the work around ‘Small World’ networks and in particular that of Uzzi and Spiro[10]. Small world networks are defined as “a network structure that is both highly locally clustered and has a short path length”[11]. In other words, people’s connections in the network overlap with one another and the links or paths between people are small, people are tightly connected. The significance of ‘Small World’ networks in helping collaboration cannot be understated. Uzzi and Spiro write “Small world networks have been shown to arise in a surprisingly wide variety of organized systems, from power grids to brain cells to scientific collaborations. The high incidence with which they occur has led to the speculation that there is something fundamental and generalizable about how they organize and govern success in biological, physical, and social systems alike.” They then go on to state that “the varying ‘small world’ properties of the systemic-level network of these artists [Broadway Producers] affected their creativity in terms of the financial and artistic performance of the musicals they produced. The small world network effect was parabolic; performance increased up to a threshold, after which point the positive effects reversed.”

If we assume, like Uzzi and Spiro, that small world networks do play a major role in the success of social and organisational systems, “how do they arise and evolve? What factors lead to the formation of a small world as opposed to another type of network?”[12]

How 4G can help

From our own work with behaviours, relationships and cultures, a number of theoretically optimally collaborative groups or networks are defined via 4G which would appear to be ‘small world’ in nature, but which also create conditions that are highly conducive to collaboration, namely the greater likelihood of peer support, clear communication, trust, respect, shared values, balancing formal and informal ways of working and offering critical feedback. 4G makes this information available in terms of optimised, ‘small world’ or Social Groups and this can then be translated into practice. By profiling relevant people, understanding the specific relationship dynamics in a group, the underlying business context and making this ‘small world’ information available, two outcomes are possible.

From an individual perspective, people are free to self select colleagues and peers to collaborate with, knowing their relationships are likely to be more productive, successful and sustainable than average. Knowing this information in advance increases the chance of successful collaboration occurring and individuals and organisations benefiting accordingly.

From an organisational perspective, the information generated by 4G can be used to encourage and develop existing efforts around collaboration. This ranges from creating ‘ideal’ groups to form teams or communities of practice, through to helping better understand existing efforts at collaboration, enhancing facilitation and further developing existing collaborative projects.

The key to both individual and organisational outcomes is that the information from 4G helps replicate and enhance (if chosen) the small world effect via theoretical ‘ideal’ groups and the means of predicting and implementing their practical equivalents. The diagram below outlines and summarises how 4G helps the collaboration efforts from both an individual and organisational perspective.

Conclusion

At the heart of the collaboration dichotomy is the idea that the formal processes and structures employed by organisations only sporadically achieve the inherent benefits or opportunities from true collaboration. More often than not, because the organisation is not accustomed or prepared for these instances, the potential benefits are lost in the organisational machine. By using a selection of the techniques mentioned above alongside the power of 4G, it is possible to square this circle and benefit from the replicability and predictability of processes, combined with the innovation, problem-solving and accelerated productivity developed from an organisational structure which taps into collaboration in its truest form.

Footnotes and references

[1] Thanks to Guy Tweedale, Mike Tierney, Steve Dale and Tim Platt whose input helped shape and inform this article.
[2] This contrast, with particular reference to Six Sigma is, to some extent, already recognised and being worked through. The following post explores this in more detail
[3] Having measured aspects of an organisation through SNA/ONA/VNA, one great by-product is the ability to facilitate collaboration as part of a change in process or organisational design. This outcome is clearly very valuable and it is perhaps a moot point to argue if it is a. solely the act of measurement, or b. implementing changes as a result of the measurement that makes the promotion of collaboration a direct outcome or not. An example of this can be found at this page
[4] Review of “Let’s Have a Talk About Collaboration” – slide 39
[5] Boundaries Need Not be Barriers: Leading Collaboration Among Groups in Decentralised Organisations – links to a pdf
[6] Collaboration consulting—fostering a collaboration culture
[7] Seven Sides of Collaboration: Relationships
[8] Boundaries Need Not be Barriers: Leading Collaboration Among Groups in Decentralised Organisations – links to a pdf
[9] Private correspondence with Tim Platt
[10] Collaboration and Creativity: The Small World Problem
[11] ibid
[12] ibid