Poor Collaboration

Did you know that 78% of chief financial officers (recent poll, 2010) do not feel that their organizations are effective at fostering collaboration? That's a remarkable figure.  I would wager that independent schools are a bit better than that, but not by much. We talk with great frequency about collaboration, but rare are the times when we actually move in that direction. We end up blaming the schedule...and the reasons spiral downward from there.

What is more, only 21% of organizations have made investments in programs or technologies that are collaborative, or that promote collaboration. In other words, 8 of 10 organizations aren't doing anything to promote a collaborative culture.

Given what organizational design experts and researchers in management science point out regarding how collaboration results in innovation, how might we move the "collaboration agenda" forward? How can we move from "smart talk" to "action"? How do we execute such a plan?

I would submit that some form of incentive should play a role, but it shouldn't be a monetary one, necessarily or exclusively. Dan Pink does a great job of highlighting how monetary incentives are not the true driver of individuals; meaningful, purposeful work ("intrinsic motivation") is the real driver.

Might independent schools reconsider leadership development or professional development by creating collaborative spaces (e.g., social networking, project-based wikis, or even a piece of--gasp!--scheduled time) that encourage cross-divisional teamwork on common issues. In a sense, this approach would re-invent task forces and subcommittees, creating instead project-based teams. Heads of school would find out quickly who was "driven" (a la Dan Pink) and who wasn't! Plus, the teams would stand a good chance of designing solutions to existing issues, especially if failure was congratulated: try, try, and try again. In such teams and in such spaces, there would be no harm in getting things wrong. Through failure, the teams would hone their ideas; even if they produced nothing, there would be no monetary loss for the school. The incentive for each employee, to come back to my earlier point, would be the sheer joy of participating more fully in the work of the school, providing even more of a sense of ownership in the process of "how we do school." Ownership builds (increases) loyalty, and loyalty builds (increases) internal marketing, which we can't afford to be without in this day and age.