By Guy Lubitsh
When businesses face complex problems, we might suppose that a process of collaboration is more likely to deal with them effectively than, say, employees working in silos. Well, yes, but … collaboration may actually fail to deliver. Here, Guy Lubitsh explains why, and considers how to ensure that collaboration works.
Introduction – Connection, trust and shared purpose decide performance
Collaboration is placing significant pressure on leaders across sectors. Tensions undermine connection, from balancing hybrid working with in-person interaction to building trust and psychological safety. The context is shifting rapidly, as described by Jean Jereissati, former head of one of Brazil’s largest drinks companies, who characterised modern business as existing in a state of continuous crisis. Many leaders would recognise this sentiment.
A significant proportion of leaders still choose to tackle complex problems alone rather than drawing on the wider organisational collective intelligence.
Our global research with over 500 senior leaders reinforces the point. While 97 per cent view collaboration as essential to organisational performance, siloed ways of working persist. Perhaps more concerningly, a significant proportion of leaders still choose to tackle complex problems alone rather than drawing on the wider organisational collective intelligence.
The organisations that stand out are those that build trust quickly, align around a shared purpose, and create the conditions for meaningful human connection. These are not soft capabilities; they are decisive factors that are critical for delivering bottom-line performance.
Wicked problems and the limits of heroic leadership
To understand why collaboration has become so central, it is helpful to revisit the distinction between “tame” and “wicked” problems. Originally articulated by Rittel and Webber, tame problems resemble technical puzzles. They are complicated but ultimately solvable through expertise, planning, and disciplined execution. Many traditional leadership models were built for this type of challenge. Wicked problems are altogether different. They are ambiguous, interconnected, and resistant to straightforward solutions. There is no single “right answer”, only a range of possible responses, each with trade-offs and unintended consequences. Today’s leaders are increasingly dealing with such problems, whether transforming organisational culture, navigating digital disruption, responding to global crises, or addressing inequalities within systems like healthcare. In these contexts, the notion of the heroic leader, operating as the primary source of solutions, begins to break down. No single leader, however capable, can fully grasp the complexity at play. At times, leaders need to accept that these problems will not be fully resolved. Instead of focusing on further control and setting further KPIs, effective responses emerge through dialogue, challenge, and the integration of diverse perspectives across the organisational hierarchy. Collaboration is not simply a desirable behaviour but is an essential capability for navigating uncertainty.
Yet this is precisely where many leaders struggle. Under pressure, there is a natural tendency to retreat into familiar patterns: to reduce complexity, to decide quickly, to rely on individual expertise, and to maintain control. The paradox is that the more complex the problem, the more leaders need to let go of this instinct, ask questions, and engage others across the organisational hierarchy, diverse backgrounds and settings.
The tension between value and overload
In complex environments, collaboration is indispensable, but it is not universally beneficial. Over the past decade, researchers such as Morten Hansen, a professor at Apple University and researcher of collaboration, have highlighted the risks of indiscriminate collaboration. Coordination consumes time, attention, and emotional energy. When poorly designed, it can slow decision-making, create confusion, and erode accountability. This tension is visible in many organisations. On the one hand, collaboration is widely encouraged, even mandated. On the other hand, leaders find themselves overwhelmed by meetings without clear objectives, overly complex cross-functional initiatives, and competing priorities. Teams are formed without clarity about purpose or decision rights, and individuals are expected to operate across multiple forums simultaneously, whilst still having silo-based incentives.
At the same time, genuine collaboration often fails to materialise where it matters most. Silos remain deeply embedded in organisational structures and cultures. Knowledge is still guarded, relationships remain confined within boundaries, and cross-functional working is often treated as additional rather than integral.
Effective collaboration, therefore, requires judgement and common sense. Leaders need to be explicit about where collaboration adds value and where it does not. Without this clarity, organisations drift into a default mode of either over-collaboration to the point of exhaustion or under-collaboration, missing opportunities for collective insight.
Hybrid work and the redesign of connection
The rise of hybrid working has intensified these dynamics. On the surface, it has delivered clear benefits. Many employees report improved work- life balance, reduced commuting, and greater autonomy over how they structure their time. For some, this has been transformative. Yet beneath these benefits lies a more complex reality. The same systems that enable flexibility also create ambiguity. Boundaries between work and home blur. Expectations around availability become unclear. Energy is stretched across multiple demands without sufficient recovery. At the same time, the nature of the connection in a changing workplace has changed. Virtual environments allow more people to participate, increasing formal inclusivity. However, they often reduce the depth of interaction. Individuals report feeling less visible, less heard, and more cautious about contributing, particularly in large digital forums. Over time, these shifts can erode the informal connections that underpin collaboration. Spontaneous conversations, shared context, and social bonding, once taken for granted in physical workplaces, no longer occur by default. Without deliberate design, collaboration becomes transactional, focused on tasks rather than human relationships.
This reveals a critical insight. Many of the challenges leaders attribute to behaviour are in fact structural. Organisations have introduced new ways of working without redesigning how collaboration itself is enabled.
Psychological safety: A hard driver of performance
Collaboration does not happen through goodwill alone. It requires clarity about roles, responsibilities, decision-making, and accountability.
At the heart of effective collaboration lies psychological safety. Harvard professor Amy Edmondson defines psychological safety as the belief that when individuals feel safe speaking up, without fear of embarrassment, rejection, or punishment, they are more likely to share ideas, raise concerns, and contribute to collective problem-solving. When that safety is absent, silence prevails. Importantly, psychological safety is not simply about creating a comfortable environment. High-performing teams balance openness with accountability. They create space for challenge while maintaining clear expectations of performance. In practice, achieving this balance is demanding. It requires leaders to be highly attuned to their own behaviour and its impact on others. Small actions such as interrupting, dismissing an idea, or even subtle non-verbal signals can quickly undermine trust. Conversely, moments of curiosity, humility, and genuine listening build it. What often strikes us in our work with senior leaders is the gap between intention and experience. Many believe they have created psychologically safe environments, yet when team members are asked individually, a different reality emerges. This gap is rarely malicious; it reflects how difficult it is to sustain consistent, inclusive behaviours under pressure.
Reframing collaboration through the 3Ps
To support leaders in translating intent into practice, we have developed a framework built around three pillars: Purpose, People, and Process. While simple in structure, its power lies in the way these elements interact.
- Purpose: Purpose provides the anchor. As discussed earlier (Morten’s research), without a clear and compelling answer to the question “Why are we collaborating?”, joint work quickly becomes fragmented. Teams may appear aligned on the surface, yet pursue subtly different goals. Over time, this misalignment leads to frustration and reduced effectiveness. Where purpose is clear and meaningful, however, it creates coherence. It allows individuals to move beyond their immediate silos, walk the extra mile, and connect to a broader objective.
- People: People form the relational core of collaboration. Trust, empathy, and the ability to engage constructively with difference are critical. Much of the work here involves developing self awareness. Leaders need to understand how they show up, how they are perceived, and how they influence group dynamics. Skills such as listening, influencing without authority, and navigating conflict become central. In our experience, the ability to disagree well respectfully, openly, and with curiosity is one of the most defining characteristics of high-performing teams.
- Process: Process brings the necessary discipline. Collaboration does not happen through goodwill alone. It requires clarity about roles, responsibilities, decision-making, and accountability. At the start of the collaboration, leaders should ask team members and themselves key questions such as: Who will do what? When will they do it? How exactly will they do it?
Are there sufficient resources / budget for this activity? How are we going to monitor progress? How do we agree a protocol for resolving conflict?
When these elements are undefined, teams spend more time negotiating how to work than doing the work. When they are clear, collaboration becomes more focused and efficient.
Addressing the deeper barriers
Even with strong intent and clear frameworks, collaboration can still falter due to underlying systemic issues. These often include misaligned incentives, unclear priorities, hierarchical cultures, and deeply embedded habits of siloed working. For example, when organisations reward individual performance more heavily than collective outcomes, collaboration becomes secondary. When priorities are constantly shifting, individuals struggle to make time for joint work. When hierarchy dominates, people may hesitate to speak truth to power or contribute, particularly in the presence of senior leaders. Addressing these barriers requires more than behavioural change. It involves redesigning aspects of the organisational system itself. Leaders must be willing to ask difficult questions about how work is structured, how decisions are made, and what is truly valued.
Conclusion: Collaboration as a strategic advantage
The organisations that will succeed in the coming decade are unlikely to be those with the most advanced technology or the greatest financial resources alone. They will be those that can collaborate more effectively, more intentionally, and more consistently than their competitors. In a world characterised by complexity and constant change, collaboration is not a peripheral capability. It is central to how organisations think, decide, and act. Those who learn to build trust quickly, align around a shared purpose, and create the conditions for meaningful dialogue will be better equipped to navigate uncertainty and deliver sustained performance.
Ultimately, the shift required is both practical and philosophical. Collaboration is not about adding more meetings or initiatives. It is about rethinking how work is designed, how relationships are built, and how leaders role-model collaborative behaviours when they engage with the challenges they face. When this shift happens, collaboration moves from a source of strain to a powerful source of energy, creativity, insight, and impact.
