Character is an indispensable component of sustainable leadership performance. Ivey research has identified 11 integral dimensions of leader character essential for good leadership: accountability, collaboration, courage, drive, humanity, humility, integrity, judgment, justice, temperance, and transcendence. In this blog, we explore the leader character dimension of collaboration. Effective leaders must be capable of collaborating with others both inside and outside their organizations. Beyond this, leaders must be constantly striving to create collaborative networks and relationships that can be developed and mined to support creativity, innovation, and productivity to drive their organization’s interests, as well as the common good.
Leaders who are unwilling or unable to collaborate with others—whether in formal teams, looser working groups or committees, trade associations, business government panels or myriad other contexts—are of limited value in our increasingly interdependent world where networks of people and organizations form the basis of so much political, economic and social activity. A deep, visceral, and intellectual understanding of the nature of interconnectedness, in combination with the development of a disposition to collaborate for mutual interest and the greater good, are critical to becoming and being an effective leader in a wide variety of contexts.
The need for collaboration was made crystal-clear during the COVID-19 pandemic. Countries, communities, governments, organizations, and individuals around the world were forced to rapidly adjust and adapt to the ramifications of this global crisis. As the virus continued to spread and unleash its damage on the health and well-being of individuals and the global economy, one thing became unequivocally clear: there was be no easy way out for individuals and societies. A sensible approach to addressing compounding challenges as well as resolving differences and clashes of interests between individuals and nations was through dialogue.
Dialogue, of course, can be challenging, especially when all concerned are more interested in who can be blamed. For example, while using loaded terms like “the Wuhan coronavirus” or “the Chinese virus,” the Trump administration attacked China’s handling of the outbreak, hoping to draw attention away from the U.S. government’s initial downplaying of the crisis. The Chinese, in turn, argued patient zero might be an American. Saudi Arabia blamed its outbreak numbers on Iran, which blamed the epidemic on American bioweapon development. South Korea and Japan blamed each other. All this finger pointing simply made international collaboration difficult when it was needed the most.
When you are collaborative, you recognize that what happens to someone, somewhere, can affect everyone, anywhere. You value and actively support the development and maintenance of positive relationships among people. You strive to connect with others at a fundamental level, in a way that fosters the productive sharing of ideas. The Italians, at least, understood this. Instead of smearing China in public, the nation’s officials offered support when China was hardest hit. When the tables turned and the death toll in Italy dramatically increased, the Italians then asked for help. China responded by sending expertise and supplies. As Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi reportedly told his Italian counterpart, Luigi Di Maio, during a phone call on March 10, China was willing to “stand firmly by the side of the Italian people” because of the “the precious support” offered by Italy when “we were at the hardest moment fighting the epidemic.”
The behaviours associated with collaboration are important in and of themselves to facilitate good outcomes. However, the inclination to collaborate also creates a conduit of connection to others that supports humanity and can foster drive, since it often brings with it a level of contagious energy to tackle challenges. Demonstrating collegiality and open-mindedness, both aspects of collaboration, can facilitate candour and transparency, which are part of integrity. Lastly, being cooperative and demonstrating a sense of interconnectedness supports justice, because those behaviours tend to facilitate a sense of fairness and social responsibility, while positively influencing the degree to which leaders (or team members) take into consideration a wide variety of interests in any situation. Of course, to demonstrate justice in decision-making and actions, individuals need to activate several of the other dimensions of character. For example, in the absence of humanity and humility, a leader seldom bothers to understand how others may see things. Similarly, without temperance, a leader may rush to implement what is to him or her “the obvious course” without even considering the impact on other stakeholders. Such a myopic focus or tunnel vision is likely to negatively impact trust, respect, confidence, and anxiety.
As former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown observed in The Guardian, we now live in “a divided, leaderless world” because the rise of populist nationalism has given way to “an aggressive us-versus-them unilateralism.” And this puts us all at risk by limiting international cooperation, as COVID-19 shows no respect for national borders. “It used to be said of the Bourbons that they would never learn by their mistakes,” Brown wrote. “Centuries on, national leaders still seem unable to apply or even absorb the hard-earned lesson that crises teach us, from the Sars epidemic and Ebola epidemic to the financial meltdown: that global problems need global, not just local and national, responses.”
Unilateralism is the antithesis of interconnectedness and collaboration. While displaying bravado, it is infused with cowardice: unilateralism turns its back on humanity and justice in order to disregard its impact on large swathes of people and fails to engage in the hard work of dialogue and compromise. And so, as Brown went on to say, if we are going to truly make headway we “need political leaders in every continent with the courage not just to lead but to work together.” But for this to happen, we will need another of the resulting emanations of interconnectedness and collaboration: trust.
As Globe and Mail columnist Andrew Coyne wrote, “Of all the ties that connect us, the most valuable and most fragile one is trust: that willingness, indeed, to let down our guard, to work with rather than against one another.” As we look to our elected officials, medical professionals, and business leaders to forge a path through this global crisis, trust will play a critical role in the outcome. But that trust, fostered through a sense of interconnectedness, humanity, and justice, will need to be placed not only in our leaders but also our fellow citizens. As Coyne stated: “A reservoir of trust—respect for leaders, belief in experts, faith in each other—can mobilize individual citizens to meet collective challenges.”
The world of sports sometimes presents similar (and powerful) lessons. The 2014 Canadian women’s Olympic hockey team exemplified what trust and great teamwork looks like. Before the team went to Sochi, they had made special gold necklaces that each team member wore throughout the games. The necklaces were puzzle piece shaped. Every four pieces joined together to make a square. On each necklace was written: “Unity in Adversity.” The women worked as a team and realized that they were each a piece of a greater whole. As Chantal Bechervaise wrote: “That is how everyone in the workplace should see themselves … that they each form a piece of a greater whole and that each person is contributing to the overall success of the company. We are stronger, more innovative, and creative, and can accomplish more as a team than we can individually.”
George Cope— former president and CEO of Bell Canada Enterprises Inc. and Bell Canada—Canada’s largest telecommunications company—draws a similar lesson from the career of hockey legend Wayne Gretzky, who won four Stanley Cup championships with the Edmonton Oilers between 1984 and 1988:
“I’m a sports junkie, and I find it interesting that the Edmonton Oilers won the Stanley Cup after Wayne Gretzky left, but Wayne Gretzky never won the Stanley Cup again after he left. That was a profound lesson for me. Gretzky is the best hockey player the world has ever seen, but he never won the cup without that team. There’s no individual who’s bigger than the team. It’s always about the team.”
Cope is underscoring the fact that the end product—in this case, a Stanley Cup—requires the whole team to work together. A team will not reach its full collaborative potential if the participants, and especially its leaders, don’t believe deeply that collaboration is essential for success.
These examples illustrate the following key lessons: Being collaborative requires being open-minded and flexible, otherwise, you are simply asserting your own point of view.
- Being interconnected fosters collegiality and cooperation since you more readily acknowledge and appreciate other perspectives.
- Being interconnected also allows us to remain receptive and open-minded when others challenge our thinking.
- Collegiality and being open-minded facilitates cooperation.
Further, having worked at the Ivey Business School for almost two decades, it has never been more clear to me [Gerard] that success depends on the compassion, empathy and respect you show towards your fellow students; the courage to call out unacceptable behaviour; your sense of justice to act equitably and fairly; and your ability to engage in true collaboration, devoid of exclusion or stereotyping. This is no insignificant point as many students – women, LGBTQ2S+ and BIPOC in particular – will experience incidents of gender bias, discrimination, harassment, and / or inequality during their studies. These incidents can range from repeated acts of overt sexual harassment, to being called slurs of a gendered, sexual, or racial nature, to micro-aggressions that remind you every day that you are “other” and a bit “less than” and prevent a feeling of true belonging. At Ivey, we promote the development of responsible business leaders – needless to say collaboration and respectful relationships are cornerstones of effective and responsible leadership.
You can read more about collaboration in the book Developing Leadership Character written by Ivey Business School professors Mary Crossan, Gerard Seijts and Jeffrey Gandz (New York, NY: Routledge, 2016). You can also explore our website for more resources on leader character.