When Leaders Struggle with Collaboration

It’s not uncommon for talented leaders to find collaboration unnatural. After all, rugged individualism set them apart and propelled their careers. And for many, that same focus on distinguishing themselves later becomes their demise. Most of an enterprise’s competitive value is created and delivered at organizational “seams,” where functions come together to form capabilities (think marketing, consumer analytics, and R&D, together developing innovation capability). That requires leaders of those functions to collaborate across the siloes to deliver that value. If you’re a leader who struggles to collaborate with your peers, you first need to understand why that is, then work to develop that skill.