How to elicit collaboration within teams

 (management tip) Don't Mistake Cooperation for Collaboration! 

Managers have to collaborate across functions.
 Yet despite being friendly and willing to share information, they often fail to do it.
 Priorities aren't aligned, so mis-communications slow down projects. 
This happens because managers mistake their cooperativeness for being collaborative ! 

 To start TRULY collaborating - 
(1) identify the goal, then
(2) map out the end-to-end work that’s needed. 

Consider the following questions .
(a) What will your team be responsible for? Division of accountability . 

(b) What will you need from other teams? Sketch out the sequencing of activities. 
When people know - 
(a)  what’s needed,  (b) in what form, and (c) by when, 
they can then tell you whether it’s possible—and then you can have a REAL dialogue about what can be done.

 Instead of going from one department to the next and trying to cobble together an agreement, get all the managers in a room together to work through the plans, make adjustments, and find ways to share resources and align incentives. 

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