Mastering Collaboration

Preface

It’s Complicated: Our Love/Hate Relationship with Collaboration

Collaboration is a skill that many agree is crucial to deal with big, complex challenges where causes are unclear, and the knowledge and abilities required are diverse. We need to be able to harness the energy of lots of different kinds of people productively, without getting mired in conflict or hiding out on our own where we feel safe and in control. Collaborating well doesn’t happen naturally; it requires an understanding of what helps teams come together, and how to avoid or push back on forces that get in the way.

Working closely with different types of people to solve difficult challenges is something we say we value. Many blog posts and advice columns praise the virtues of collaboration as critical to how we work now, and schools have begun teaching it as a critical skill for the 21st century. We know that we can’t solve the complicated problems before us—from climate change to artificial intelligence to health care for our exploding population—with just a few people who think and act the same. When it goes well, collaboration brings out new ideas and joins varied skills to create something truly inspiring. But when it goes wrong, it drives us back into safe groups with defined rules where we can focus on something that’s easier to control.

And it does go wrong, because the reality is that most people aren’t taught how to work in a collaborative environment, with all of its messy interpersonal dynamics. ...