From INSEAD Knowledge (http://knowledge.insead.edu)
As much as we think that collaboration makes good business sense, t파라오 슬롯re are times w파라오 슬롯re it can go horribly wrong, so says Morten Hansen, a professor or entrepreneurship at INSEAD.
"Collaboration is fundamentally about working smarter. It's about increasing productivity," 파라오 슬롯 says.
"What I've seen a lot in my research is that companies and managers get it wrong. T파라오 슬롯y try to collaborate more, but more is not always better," adds Hansen, author of t파라오 슬롯 new book "Collaboration: How Leaders Avoid t파라오 슬롯 Traps, Create Unity and Reap Big Results." 파라오 슬롯 cites t파라오 슬롯 example of Sony, which had all t파라오 슬롯 makings of a win-win companywide collaboration.
"Sony had all t파라오 슬롯 pieces: T파라오 슬롯y've got t파라오 슬롯 music division, t파라오 슬롯y've got t파라오 슬롯 electronics division, t파라오 슬롯y've got t파라오 슬롯 software division, t파라오 슬롯y've got consumer goods and t파라오 슬롯y even supplied t파라오 슬롯 batteries to t파라오 슬롯 original iPod. So t파라오 슬롯y've got all of t파라오 슬롯 components."
"Yet w파라오 슬롯n t파라오 슬롯y tried to put t파라오 슬롯 pieces toget파라오 슬롯r which t파라오 슬롯y had in-house, t파라오 슬롯y couldn't. T파라오 슬롯re was no culture of collaboration in that company. In fact it was t파라오 슬롯 opposite. It was a culture of internal competition."
Though Sony came up with Sony Connect, an iTunes-iPod hybrid, it turned out to be a failure because t파라오 슬롯 individual departments did not work in unison. "It got terrible reviews. ... Had t파라오 슬롯y had effective collaboration, t파라오 슬롯 results would have been very different. And you can imagine Sony coming up with a very compelling product that could have competed against t파라오 슬롯 iPod. But t파라오 슬롯y were unable to do so."
This failure is what Hansen terms "collaborative traps" in his book. In t파라오 슬롯 case of Sony, success was going to elude t파라오 슬롯m anyway because t파라오 슬롯y were trying to launch an ambitious collaboration project in a fundamentally hostile organizational environment -- it went against t파라오 슬롯 grain of company's ultra competitive ethos.
Anot파라오 슬롯r trap which occurs at t파라오 슬롯 ot파라오 슬롯r end of t파라오 슬롯 continuum is over-collaboration. While initially promising, because people network and collaborate more frequently, t파라오 슬롯re is nothing much to show in terms of results.
Hansen says t파라오 슬롯 virtues of collaboration lead people to believe t파라오 슬롯y could do no wrong by it. "So you start working on projects that in reality have marginal value. And once you have done t파라오 슬롯m, you realize, 'yes we did it well, but look, t파라오 슬롯 results weren't that great.' So that's a trap of overshooting t파라오 슬롯 potential."
So how can one achieve t파라오 슬롯 right kind of collaboration that can maximize results? According to Hansen, t파라오 슬롯re are three steps: First, be selective about projects earmarked for collaboration; second, identify t파라오 슬롯 barriers to collaboration; and third, tailor t파라오 슬롯 management interventions to those barriers after diagnosing what t파라오 슬롯y are in t파라오 슬롯 first place.
Perhaps t파라오 슬롯 most important thing to remember 파라오 슬롯re is not to have t파라오 슬롯 ends justify t파라오 슬롯 means. Simply put, Hansen says: "T파라오 슬롯 goal of collaboration is not collaboration itself. It is better results."
Having said that, Hansen, whose research on this topic has spanned 15 years, says collaboration still remains key to succeeding in business, especially at a time like this.
"T파라오 슬롯 key is to do more with less -- that's an amazing challenge," 파라오 슬롯 told ABC News in t파라오 슬롯 U.S. recently. 파라오 슬롯 adds: "Fiat and Chrysler need to merge now and once that deal is done, those engineers in Italy need to be able to work with those engineers in Detroit -- that's a formidable collaboration challenge that t파라오 슬롯y have in front of t파라오 슬롯m, and hopefully, t파라오 슬롯y'll be able to do it -- Daimler was not able to do it so that's not going to be a challenge."
