Want Collaboration? Accept - and Actively Manage - Conflict

Companies try all kinds of ways to improve collaboration among different parts of the organization: cross-unit incentive systems, organizational restructuring, teamwork training.

Although these initiatives produce occasional success stories, most have only a limited impact on dismantling organizational silos and fostering collaboration. The problem? Most companies focus on the symptoms ("Sales and delivery do not work together as closely as they should") rather than on the root cause of failures in cooperation: conflict. The fact is, you can't improve collaboration until you've addressed the issue of conflict.