#TEams365 #1506: 4 Essential ingredients for Collaboration

With relationships and collaboration being an essential skill set for leaders and team members of all types, I thought it fitting to make our Valentine’s Day post this year all about collaboration. Whether you are collaborating across your own team, or with others, collaboration allows us to tap into resources we do not have available, harnessing the talents of our network. Collaboration may be discrete for a fixed project, or longer for ongoing initiatives.

In today’s post I wanted to cover four essential ingredients for collaboration:
​1.       Be clear on why you are collaborating
2.       Consciously design your partnership: What do you bring to the table? What is important for you both
3.       Regularly check in and adjust
4.       Consider what end result you are looking for
 
Let us look at each one of these in turn:
 1.       Be clear on why you are collaborating
​Collaborating for collaboration's sake does not equal success! Why is this collaboration occurring? What is possible due to the fusion of your skills and abilities? What outcomes are you looking for.

​Partnerships and collaboration are not always a straight road. It's important to be clear on:

• why you are collaborating,
• ​what you hope to gain from the partnership,
• ​what you want to gain ,
• and what your expectations are.

​Spend some time as a partnership exploring this and coming back to it throughout your work together

2.       Consciously design your partnership
​Take time to intentionally, or consciously, design your partnership. Building in time for focusing on the relationship can be as important as creating or doing the work together. In a recent newsletter article  I shared several of the partnership planning questions I have written about over the years.
​In my writing I talk about at least four stages where you will want to focus conversation - pre-program/partnership, at the start, during the work and at the end of major projects. Refer to chapters 12 of Effective Virtual Conversations or Chapter 11 of From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching.

3.        Regularly check in and adjust. Regular check ins will look different for each projet. Ask yourselves regular questions such as:
What’s working well?
What progress have we made with this project?
What are we learning and need to make sure we do? We stop doing?
What changes are important going forward?

​4. Consider what end result you have in mind - As Steven Covey wrote years ago "Start with the end in mind". Our end result shapes our action. As you engage in every conversation think about the end result  you are aiming for. How does this influence your partnership? What roles you play? What attention you have? 

​These four factors - clarity, conscious design, check in, and end in mind - support partnering and collaboration to be a flexible, fluid process. What is important  for you to consider in your own work.

​Have a great Valentine's Day!

​Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Retreats.
Follow us on Twitter @Teams365
Phone: (416)996-8326

​Looking to enhance your virtual conversations - Conference calls? Webinars? Virtual coaching work? Pick up a copy of my new book, Effective Virtual Conversations, at Amazon.

​Join us this month to explore the topic of Emotional Intelligence at the Teams365 Leadership Lab - an annual group for leaders which meets every two weeks throughout 2018. Calls are held bi-weekly on Friday 845 am ET online. Download the call schedule here.

​Don't forget to join us for the February 2018 Teams365 planning tool - this month's template is a monthly one-page planner