So far, I’ve discussed some practical tools to help you clearly communicate your collaboration goals or success criteria and identified other tools or techniques to help mitigate challenges. However, we all know these tools will not solve 100% of the challenges we face when working across groups. This is especially true for those individuals who are accountable for a key component, but they do not have authority over the Individual Contributors (ICs) who will be completing the myriad of pieces (work items) on time in order to piece together the puzzle (final deliverable to the Customer).
There are many titles for people who are accountable, but have little or no authority. I like to collectively call this role of influence the Herder.
You’ve probably seen a western movie where a cowboy (herder) was responsible for moving the herd of cows from one ranch to another many miles away with numerous opportunities for countless things to go wrong along the trail. Some of you are likely smiling right now because the phrase many like to use on collaborative efforts is: it’s like herding cats! Whatever your favorite visual, the bottom line is to be effective in this role, you must:
- Negotiate collaborative goals (scope, schedule) and resources with ICs and their managers (see blog article on “Did you get the go decision?”)
- Identify and monitor risks.
- Clearly define success or acceptance criteria.
- Delineate must-have vs. nice-to-have work items.
- Specify deadlines for integration into the key component or final deliverable.
Some of the common pitfalls that Herders can fall into include:
- Confusing “buy-in” for an idea with a “go”/green light decision.
- Forgetting to gather (or routinely gather) information from the ICs on whether or not a deliverable can be completed in the specified timeframe.
Recognizing these pitfalls can help Herders proactively determine best practices to mitigate them. Think about a recent collaborative effort in which you were unpleasantly surprised when a work item you were expecting from an IC was not completed on time or according to specific acceptance criteria. What could have been done so that instead of being surprised, you would have been pleased with the work item received? You may have just discovered a new best practice to use in future collaboration across groups.