Power of collaboration

Humans@Center

Unlocking Transformational Success: The Power of Collaboration

Photograph of EY Belgium
EY Belgium

Multidisciplinary professional services organization

4 minute read 25 Oct 2023

Discover the key drivers and strategies to enhance collaboration in organizational transformations.

In brief:

  • Leaders play a key role in successful transformations and are enablers of collaboration.
  • Enabling collaboration benefits individuals, teams and organizations through various ways such as breaking down silos.
  • Collaboration can be enhanced by leaders through communicating a shared vision, supporting social interactions and defining structural elements.

Successfully managing transformations requires many components that need to be harvested and leveraged. In EY’s extensive research on Humans@Center, conducted in partnership with the Oxford Said Business School, it has been proven that six key drivers help to increase transformational success by 2.6x. Leaders play a crucial role in enabling the context for these six key drivers. After taking a closer look at the five first key drivers in previous articles, we now zoom in on the sixth and final one: collaboration. We will dive deeper into why collaboration is needed, what collaboration is, who collaborative leaders are, as well as how collaboration in transformations can be enhanced.

How EY can Help

Why do we need collaboration in transformations?

Collaboration stands out as a cornerstone for unlocking new possibilities and catalyzing progress in organizational transformations. Therefore, leaders must place collaboration at the core of their transformation initiatives to increase its success, generate innovative solutions, accelerate progress and improve stakeholder engagement. In addition, collaboration comes with other benefits on a team and individual level. It leverages diverse expertise, increases creativity, breaks down silos and enhances agility.

 

Take a moment to reflect: How do you see yourself and others collaborate during a transformation? What is in it for you and others when you collaborate?
 

What is collaboration and who are collaborative leaders?

In EY’s Humans@Center research, “collaboration” is defined as the purposeful adaptation of work practices, the empowering of employees to take ownership of their roles and the active cultivation of a sense of interdependence among teams and stakeholders. We can further identify four different forms of collaboration which depend on the type of objectives - both individual and collective - that should be achieved as well as whether the relationship is transactional or structural. The four forms of collaboration are: ad-hoc cooperation, ad-hoc collaboration, repetitive cooperation, and structural collaboration. 

Forms of collaboration

Collaboration amongst individuals or employees is one part of the success story. The other part is the impact of leaders on collaboration. Collaborative leaders are essential to foster teamwork and cooperation which are essential components of a well working collaboration. These leaders often demonstrate open communication, show high levels of empathy and inclusivity, provide a shared vision, and recognize and appreciate their team members. When a leader combines all these characteristics, they create a safe and open environment where individuals can work effectively together, which will result in improved team performance, positive organizational results, and successful transformations.

Traits of collaborative leaders

How can leaders support collaboration?

Leaders who possess a collaborative mindset and the associated traits constitute a vital element in fostering exceptional collaboration during transformation processes. In addition, they also play an important role in providing the right environment and culture to allow individuals to collaborate. To achieve the optimal environment, leaders can adopt the following three steps:

All these steps entail essential aspects to foster collaboration. Key takeaways to enhance your collaboration are the creation of purpose, generation of trust, alignment on ways of working, allowing autonomy, and the empowerment of people.
 

What is your next step?

It becomes more and more pertinent that leaders play a pivotal role in enabling collaboration. Living and communicating a purpose, providing a safe and trustful environment, clarifying roles and responsibilities as well as the best ways of working together are some of the many aspects that leaders now need to consider when embarking on a journey to a successful transformation. How will you, as a leader, be able to make a difference today and in future transformations?

Summary

Collaboration is one of the key drivers leading to success in organizational transformations. It fosters innovation, faster progress and stakeholder engagement while benefiting teams and individuals. Collaborative leaders, characterized by open communication and empathy, play a crucial role in these transformations. Leaders can support collaboration by aligning on shared intentions, creating a trusting environment, specifying interaction rules, enabling self-organization and clarifying roles.

About this article

Photograph of EY Belgium
EY Belgium
Multidisciplinary professional services organization
Related topics
Workforce
Consulting

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