Today’s Essential Power Skill for Leaders: Cooperation

“I want to work in a way that is both productive and brings me joy — what does that look like, and how might I achieve this?”  In reflecting on productivity and joy over the past three years, the author has thought deeply about her own working life. She has surfaced memories from the earliest points of her career and considered the challenges she faced. She has also taken a deeper look at emerging research and spoken to experts. In the process, she has learned more about herself and about the world.

According to her she is now more sure than ever that great working lives are built through the skills we master and how we work with others. These two elements make us productive and give our work meaning. According to the author, those two elements — mastery and cooperation — as threads that hold the fabric of a long working life together. Keeping these threads strong means purposely investing our time, resources, and connections. Now more than ever, technology is transforming work, and external events, like the pandemic and economic downturn, are changing its dynamics. So we must be ever more adaptive and flexible in the ways we prioritize mastery and cooperation.

When you master an area of competence — such as managing projects, leading multinational teams, preparing strategy documents, negotiating complex deals, or coaching others — you are creating a foundation for productivity. If you choose an area of mastery that brings you satisfaction, you have a chance at finding joy and meaning. In her previous column, she reflected on how we develop mastery in ourselves and what leaders do that helps or impedes that growth in others. Here, she wants to focus on the other critical aspect of productivity: cooperation.

Networks help us build the mastery necessary to be productive.  Consider your own networks. At the center is you, and arrayed around you are those strong network ties with the people you’re closest to. Some are similar to you — such as work colleagues you know well and spend time with. If they are more expert than you are, there is much you can learn from them. Because they know what “good” looks like, they are in a position to provide tough feedback. When I reflect on the memories of my own path to mastery, this type of hard feedback from people on the same path of mastery was incredibly important to my development.

You probably have some strong connections with people who are dissimilar to you — perhaps from another part of the company, or from another part of your working life. Some of them may have networks that reach into places yours do not or skills that you lack. If they can help you learn these distinct talents, your own abilities might morph into an adjacent area of mastery.  And then there are weak ties at the outer periphery of your networks. Their sheer number and variety make them rich with potential. Within this diverse crowd could be role models that inspire you to take another pathway — images of the future you.

Many of the experiences from which mastery is created are solitary — you are head down, focused, wrestling a problem to the ground. These self-sufficient times are crucial to productivity. Many of our jobs require periods for focus and concentration to feel the flow of energy and inspiration.  But most of us don’t work on our own all the time. We work sometimes in partnership, occasionally in teams, perhaps as members of much larger communities. These can be some of the most innovative and fun moments of our working lives. That’s why the ability to be good at cooperation is so powerful in creating resilience and productivity.

Cooperating isn’t always easy, though. The connections that make cooperation possible can be fragile. I’ve discovered that this fragility often takes two forms. The first is indifference/busyness: There is nothing that really holds the cooperative partnership together, and you each go your own way. The second is unproductive conflict: The relationship deteriorates as you lose trust in each other and your differences overwhelm your shared interests.  According to the author’s experience, these two tricky challenges to cooperation can be tackled with focus and intent.  

Acknowledge that our being cooperative is a fragile state that is easily overwhelmed by indifference and busyness and easily hijacked by unproductive conflict. Finding an igniting question that overcomes indifference and developing a cooperative mindset that challenges unproductive conflict will be key.

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