Finding Fulfillment Part 5: Collaboration
When you think of teamwork and group projects, a few characters come to mind:
The Hard Worker: Fully dedicated to the project and deliverables. Always on top of milestones and responsibilities. Frequent communicator. Highly organized. Does the bulk of the planning and preparation.
The Slacker: Never worried about meeting deliverables — they’ll get done one way or another. Radio silent after the first team meeting. Relies on other team members, especially The Hard Worker.
The Diffident One: Unsure about their role and responsibilities. Needs frequent affirmation, usually from The Hard Worker. Wants to help, but worries about stepping on toes. Doesn’t contribute ideas for fear of being laughed at.
The Follower: Can be trusted to get work done, but needs specific instructions. Doesn’t take initiative but follows orders. Very productive, but rarely thinks outside the box. Implements ideas, doesn’t initiate them.
The Devil’s Advocate: Likes to stoke the conversation and bring up alternative ideas. Eager to participate, but can delay progress. Tends to butt heads with The Hard Worker, who is leading the group. Struggles with purposeful ideas vs. ideas for ideas’ sake.
If you’ve ever worked on a team project, I’m sure some of these characters sound familiar. And we all know how it plays out. One, or a select few, do most of the work. Others skate by without contributing much, or they complicate the process. The project is filled with miscommunication and frustration.
What’s Missing from Team Projects?
It’s clear why people dread the idea of teamwork. From the infamous group project back in middle school to present-day team objectives — it feels like nothing has changed. It’s so much simpler to work on your own.
What if I told you working as a team can be a fulfilling experience instead of a nightmare scenario? All you need is collaboration.
Collaboration is actively working together to make progress.
It’s not letting one member do all the work. And it’s not everyone working in a silo toward a common goal.
It’s an active process of mutual communication, creativity, and achievement. And when it works, it’s one of the most energizing aspects of business. Just like in our personal lives, our work is enhanced when we let others in. We aren’t meant to operate alone.
Collaboration and Fulfillment
Hopefully, you’ve been following our series on fulfillment. If not, I encourage you to go back and start with part one: passion. As a quick summary, know that fulfillment at work requires three motivational drivers: passion, purpose, and progress.
But these drivers aren’t possible without the cornerstones of motivation: clarity, collaboration, and connection.
Today, let’s dive into collaboration.
How to Collaborate Effectively
I’m going to borrow a quote from our Fulfillment Theory:
“Collaborating well entails a lot of good communication, openness, and honesty.”
It may sound obvious, but you’d be surprised at how much intention it takes to accomplish those three objectives. As a leader, your first step is to model them every day. Let’s take a closer look at how to communicate clearly and be open and honest.
Good Communication
Great communication is a two-part activity. First, it requires clarity (one of the cornerstones of motivation).
For leaders: Have you given your team all of the information they need to excel? The project scope and purpose, plus parameters like budget and deadline? When things change (as they always do), have you kept them up-to-date so they can adjust in real time?
For team members: Have you clearly stated what you can contribute to the project? Any background knowledge or product insight? When you make decisions, do you share them with your team?
Of course, communication goes both ways. The second part of it is listening. To quote Stephen R. Covey (The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People):
“Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”
When someone else speaks, are you truly trying to understand, or are you planning your rebuttal?
I’m a big fan of restating or summarizing what someone has said before I reply to make sure I understand their perspective. Otherwise, group communication can devolve into that old elementary school game of telephone.
Openness
Openness takes listening a step further. It’s not just hearing what the other person has to say or even trying to understand their perspective. It’s being open to changing your mind.
Group work requires decision-making, but it’s nearly impossible to make decisions when everyone refuses to budge. If you arrive with your mind already made up, you miss out on potentially great ideas. You’re also a source of frustration for the entire group.
As a leader, I strive to create a culture of openness by being willing to change my mind. The fact is, most people want to emulate the leaders they respect. If you are never open to others’ ideas and input, your team won’t be, either.
Honesty
“Brutally honest.”
“Painfully honest.”
“The truth hurts.”
There are so many phrases that paint honesty like a torture device. No wonder people shy away from it. But I think we can reframe honesty into something positive.
Brené Brown, one of my favorite thought leaders, often uses a phrase she learned years ago in a 12-step program:
“Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.”
Talk about reframing! When you think of honesty as the kind choice, rather than the brutal or painful one, it changes your entire perspective. And probably your delivery, too.
It makes sense. It’s kinder to be crystal-clear about what you think instead of leaving people guessing, especially if you’re leading or working as a team.
The difference is doing so with respect and purpose. Honesty should never be a tool to put someone down or get your own way. Instead, it should be an exchange built on respect with the intent of progress.
Collaboration: Good Housekeeping
Besides great communication, openness, and honesty — which are incredible personal skills that everyone should develop — there are also a couple of good housekeeping rules to follow when you’re collaborating.
The first relates to meetings (after group projects, everyone’s second-favorite activity…NOT!) Keep them short, sweet, and to the point. One of the biggest pain points of teamwork is endless meetings where a lot gets discussed but nothing gets accomplished.
Plan ahead for meetings and make sure there’s a defined objective. If you can’t clearly state the objective in a sentence or two, reschedule the meeting.
Set a (short) time limit and stick to it. I’m talking 30 minutes or less. Any longer and people start to lose focus.
The second housekeeping rule relates back to good communication. It’s clarity. Specifically, clarify who is responsible for what right from the start. Who is participating in which deliverable, and who needs to communicate with who. This prevents one person from shouldering all of the work.
I find it helpful to document roles and responsibilities to make them extra clear. This also adds some accountability.
But First, Set the Stage
Before any of it will work — communication, openness, honesty, successful meetings, or clarity — you have to set your team up for success. This requires creating a culture built on respect, trust, and empathy.
Treat everyone with dignity and professionalism, no exceptions. Make this behavior the norm and expect it from everyone around you.
Build trust through honesty. Follow through on what you say and keep peoples’ confidence. Otherwise, you’ll have a culture of backstabbing and gossip.
And lastly, practice empathy. Seek to understand where people are coming from — including what’s going on in their lives and their past experiences. I believe an integral part of empathy is erring on the side of positivity — believing the best of people instead of the worst. When someone says something that could be perceived negatively, my goal is to first assume they had good intentions. This goes a long way in reacting and responding with empathy.
The Fruits of Collaboration
Now that we’ve talked about what it takes to collaborate well, let’s get to the fun stuff — the fruits of great collaboration.
Collaborating with your team isn’t doesn’t just alleviate the pain points of group work. Instead, it makes group work enjoyable. Yes, I said it! You’ll be amazed at what you can accomplish — and how you’ll feel — with successful collaboration.
First, collaboration lays the groundwork for innovation. The more ideas, viewpoints, and experiences in the mix, the better chance for groundbreaking advancements. It’s synergy: creating something much greater than the sum of its parts.
Next, collaboration enables efficiency. With everyone sharing the workload, more can be accomplished — faster and better. And, when done correctly, collaboration makes room for rest and rejuvenation. Unlike individual work, which comes to a grinding halt when you’re burnt out, collaboration allows you to cover for others and vice versa.
And finally, collaboration is energizing. Remarkable new ideas, mutual respect, and shared accomplishment — collaboration can fill you with excitement and leave you eager for more. It’s an exercise in community and belonging.
Collaboration for Passion and Progress
In our article on clarity, we mentioned that each cornerstone of motivation is at the intersection of two motivational drivers.
In this case, collaboration fuels passion and progress.
- Passion: When you love the work you do, can you think of anything more thrilling than working alongside others who also love their work? Imagine what you could accomplish together, and how your passion would fuel one another.
- Progress: Think of how much you can achieve when you engage in effective collaboration. With everyone sharing the load and improving processes, you’ll reach milestones faster and more seamlessly than ever before.
Collaboration can be a source of true joy at work, if you’re willing to engage effectively. It also plays an integral role in fulfillment.
Stay tuned for our next — and final — article in the fulfillment series: connection. While collaboration is the how of teamwork, connection is the why. You won’t want to miss it.