They say experience is the best teacher; maybe….maybe not …..and definitely only if you can learn from it. So as a starting point for a #SMchat discussion on April 7th (1 PM EST) here are a few personal experiences. My goal is to use these experiences as a basis for extrapolating some key ingredients of successful collaborative leadership, and begin to answer the question: is collaborative leadership an enabler for successful social communication and social media, and/or is social media an enabler for successful collaborative leadership?

My first company: designed to produce environmental documentaries for television. My founder-partner; a brilliant unknown creative. Me; also unknown (brilliance tbd), no experience in the documentary space, but I was going to sell our first film to a major PBS tv series (no experience in selling into that space either Our partnership was a collaborative 50/50, however to avoid situations of stalemate, I had anticipated and included in our agreement, a clause limiting my partner to creative decisions, but giving me full decision-making authority related to marketing and all business processes. Early on we almost crashed and burned on this very point. The marketing video (a compilation of 16mm wildlife film sequences) was produced to sell our film production team to the TV producer, but did not meet my partners approval for creative (a long story in itself).  However, I knew I had designed an effective marketing piece and in the end I prevailed, and I was proven right. We made it onto the PBS Nature© series with our first film. This scenario was to replay many times, and the not-quite-50/50 collaborative relationship succeeded (with ups and downs) for several years.

I’ve consulted for quite a few early stage or start up companies, and too often too many cooks spoil the broth! Yes, there can be too much democratic leadership; the team of founders ”hash out” each point in question without regard for their individual expertise, and the” hashing out” becomes the activity rather than the resolution, ie: collaboration w/o resolution. Too often I’ve had to prod a CEO into authoritative “decision-maker” action. This was particularly prevalent in the dot.com era, when so many start ups were created by people with engineering & design smarts, but not necessarily business & leadership smarts.

In the early 90′s I interviewed IBM Senior Scientist Victor Witt, an Incline Village neighbor and friend, for a TV series pilot “Women Mean Business” (can’t remember now why a guy on a woman’s biz show…..), anyway, it was a good interview about leadership, and why his team at IBM was successful in giving birth to the first floppy storage disc system. Victor’s key point was: as the leader you hire the best people you can get, with varied talents, and always smarter than you are. This team process of collaboration and technology (talent) exchange, hatched a world-changing invention. I call the process collaborative leadership in the truest sense; Victor was however reputed to be somewhat ‘dictatorial’ in his management style, but maybe that’s what made the collaboration work: he knew when to make the decision, and move on to the next obstacle.

The collaboration by the two of us in my current company/consultancy has been in effect now for almost twenty years. It’s true 50/50, and though much of our expertise is duplicated, some is not. When one of us leads on a project, the other supports. Or we may lead in different aspects of the same project. Or we take on a project individually. There are often things we don’t agree on, so collaboration to get the job done is the name of the game, and sometimes results in many hours of unpaid overtime:-) Using email as an integral part of our business for over 16 years, allowing for quick, frequent communication, has facilitated the continuous collaboration between us “anytime, anyplace”. We try to avoid ego trips just to win the point, but we both are obsessed (I might say) on arriving at the best or most perfect solution for each client; whether a start up, an architectural project or ourselves. Through our collaborative process, perfected perhaps over many years, we both know when we have come to this point. Goal defined, collaborative problem-solving, goal reached. End of story.

And so to my new start up. I have brought together three founders with very different, though complementary expertise. The other two are both smarter than I (back to lesson 1 . One founder and I have used collaborative problem-solving activity on a project, predominantly by email, for over a year. My CEO (founder three) I met via twitter. Non-social media savvy people, who have not experienced the conversations and problem solving enabled by social media, think we are crazy. However, IMO, social media elevates collaboration to a different level. What exactly is it about SM that does this? Does SM facilitate collaborative leadership? Will my current founders team really remain a collaborative leadership, even when it is a real company; selling real product, with a positive cash flow?

I have searched online for literature on Collaborative Leadership with a definition and meaning those embracing SM might relate to, and as different to the democratic leadership cited in Dan Golemans 1990 Harvard Review article Leadership that Gets Results (or if this 15 page article is too long to wade through, see relevant excerpts from an e-zine article by Julie A. Fleming inserted as comment one, below).

Do you think any of the six leadership styles covered in this literature equate to Collaborative, or what about a combination of more than one? Let’s collaborate, and see what illumination we can put on the whole subject. Also please add any useful links in my comments below. I am certainly no expert, and can use all the information, help, and collaboration I can get

More about me here.

CASUDI
BUILDING BRIDGES BETWEEN PEOPLE ~ DESIGNING SUCCESS.

Links:

Thanks to Carl Robinson, Leadership Consulting, for reminding me of Dan Golemans article ~ Leadership that Gets Results

Leadership That Gets Results by Daniel Goleman By Julie A. Fleming

Special thanks to Heidi Cool for the use of her great wildlife image above of Blue-footed booby’s in the Galapagos. Heidi is gravity0069 on Flickr and @hacool on twitter.