• by Jim Solomon and Bruce LaRue, Ph.D. •

The most complex challenges we face today cannot be solved by any single individual or functional group – we need integrated solutions. If we want to create integrated solutions, we need to first know what we need from each other to be successful. This includes asking your team what they need from you as their leader. Let the team know that, while you will hold them accountable for the outcomes they achieve, you exist ultimately to help them succeed.

Remind your team that no one is an island unto themselves; we are all in this together. If we do not have efficient flows of information and knowledge within the team and across the critical functions of the organization, the outcome we achieve will be less than optimal, if not disastrous. If an initiative goes sideways, we do not want to provide employees or management with a convenient excuse to say, “It’s not our fault, we did our job.” To eliminate this problem and any ex-post-facto excuses about why things didn’t work, we must build effective channels of cross-functional communication, coordination, and integration into our change effort upfront.

What we are speaking of here is fundamental to the concept of knowledge management and knowledge transfer. While information systems are one important aspect of knowledge management, they are not synonymous with it. That is, good knowledge management systems should be as transparent and user-friendly as possible in facilitating the flow of critical information required to coordinate tasks across functions within the enterprise.

Peter Drucker believed that knowledge management is fundamentally about everyone within the organization asking two basic questions:

1. What do I need from you, in what form, and by when?
2. What do you need from me, by when, and in what form?

Asked another way, seeing the operation through the eyes of our peers, what do we need from each other to successfully fulfill our mission? Cross-training within a team and between interdependent departments and divisions goes a long way toward furthering this objective. Walking a mile in another’s shoes is still one of our best antidotes to organizational misalignment. This creates a form of organizational empathy that helps us focus on shared goals and objectives. Quite simply, we need to see the big picture and what the end zone looks like, then zoom out and ask ourselves what we need from each other to move the ball down the field, through the end zone, and to replicate this process in a flexible and nimble fashion moving forward.

Does your team understand what they need from one another to succeed in their mission?