No work is done alone. This is true for the individual employee and perhaps more true for the individual function. Value is created interdependently across an organization. The C-Suite, HR, IT, Marketing, Finance – they all need each other. We know that in theory but often fail to practice it, causing stalled-out projects and frustrated employees. So what can be done to stitch these seams more tightly?
Here are a few things organizations must do to successfully manage the seams and realize their value:
- Identify strategic crossroads. Not all boundaries are meant to be crossed. However, if for example, legal isn’t involved in M&A activity, a major piece of due diligence will be overlooked. That is an essential seam, but does IT need to hear about your marketing plan? Maybe not. Identifying which boundaries must be crossed and effectively stitching them together is a critical starting point. Ultimately, the seams that must be stitched are those that enable the strategic requirements of the business. To assume all boundaries are created equal fails to take into account the asymmetric requirements of strategy.
- Get the right leaders involved. Every seam has a critical number of leaders on each side of the boundary who must effectively work together. Once identified, the goal is to create a common understanding of why they need each other, when their participation is needed, and what they will contribute to realize the strategic value of their seam. Beware that over-inclusion to make people feel important or under-inclusion as a power move can cloud the transparency between critical leaders and erode trust.
- Keep the interaction two-way. Often seams are made up of stakeholder sets consisting of business leads and functional/service-oriented roles – or the opposite: functional experts and businesses that feel subservient in the relationship. An imbalance of power can affect communication at the seams. When it goes unchecked, the interaction becomes one-way and collaboration wanes. Effectively managing the seams means that everyone involved has a voice, can push others’ thinking, and genuinely informs one another’s approach as needed to realize their goal.
- Identify commonalities between the stakeholders. Left unmanaged, organizational seams can become organizational fault lines. It’s easier for sales to explain how its goals and objectives differ from marketing, but those differences only serve to deepen existing fissures more than bringing those functions into an integrated working relationship. Start with what you can align on; begin getting traction there.
- Manage the inevitable tension at the seams. You must surface and manage conflicts at the seams. The reality is that differences do exist. There’s tension around how resources get allocated (or don’t). There are tensions about how the realization of your objectives makes the realization of mine more complicated. Tensions abound. The goal isn’t to get rid of the tensions and just ensure everyone plays “nice.” Quite the contrary. The goal is to ensure there is a methodology for effectively managing those tensions so that the organization can execute its strategy. Identifying which seams are most contentious and what must be overcome to ensure a more effective working relationship is a necessary step in bringing fractured boundaries together. Furthermore, creating rules of the road or other behavioral norms for leaders to abide by when working the seam is another way of ensure value from the seam.
- Manage multiple seams simultaneously. Any strategy worth its weight presumes multiple seams across the enterprise. Executing that strategy in the marketplace requires an enterprise to regularly assess the health and effectiveness of each seam that drives that strategy.
Organizational groups, teams, and boundaries and the seams associated with them are a given. How leaders manage them and the value they ultimately create (or erode) is not. We believe the relationships at the seams will make or break the interdependent value an organization is able to create.
Which boundaries are particularly difficult for your organization to manage? Why? What’s at risk if leaders are unable to manage this seam more productively? What role do you play in helping your organization make needed changes at this seam?