How To Effectively Manage Collaboration In 2020 And Beyond

Having people with different skills, strengths, and personalities work together in harmony is not an easy feat. Try adding some distance to that and you’re in for a challenge. But leaders do not back down, and you can conquer this obstacle, too. So, let’s dive into these tips that you can try out for your organization’s collaborative success.

1. Do Scheduled Checkups Daily

When each person in the team has a different task but ends results connect together, it’s important to let everyone have a chance to share their side and what they need from the team in a daily huddle. Not only will it boost accountability for everyone, it will also give people a better understanding of each other – without the barriers and unknown tone we get from emails and chat.

2. Be Clear About Your Expectations.

The proper way to show teamwork is to be clear and transparent with everyone in the group. Especially as a manager, you have to vocal about the exact output you are expecting from people in the team. Members of the team must know the exact details of their role in a project, what is expected of them, and the timeline that you expect them to deliver.

3. Implement Work Systems.

Just like any plan, not having a specific workflow will lead your business to fall apart. To make working easier, it is better to standardize the workflow so that each person in the team knows how to handle the expectations of them and the way they should deliver their task.

4. Use Collaborative Tools For Dealing With Customers

If you are working in a business where you have clients or customers to manage, it is important that you have a CRM software that allows you to keep all leads in one place, organize your emails, gain complete visibility in your sales pipeline, and create, monitor, and schedule each task, making project management such a breeze.

5. Choose The Right Communication Channels

When working with teams, there are different communication tools that you can choose from and each of them have their own purposes. You can try using them as follows:

a. Chat – Utilize this whenever you need a real-time response or interaction from a teammate.

b. Video Chat – Use this channel for discussions that you want to handle through voice. This is important especially for issues to fix, emotional things, and conflict management within your teams. Aside from hearing the tone of voice, video chat will also give you access to visual cues that will make the conversation seem more real.

c. Email – Email communication is essential for conversations that you need to come back on in the future and also when handling accountability and responsibility within different members of the group.

6. Use Collaborative Tools for Documents And Spreadsheets

If you have documents that are being edited by a various group of people, there are many tools that you can utilize with real time access and allows you to track changes in the file. There are also some that allows the master user to compare Word documents with each other, therefore, allowing the user to take note of each addition and input from all members of the team.

7. Establish ground rules within the team.

When you work with people, you have to be ready to face a variety of differences – from beliefs and principles, to skills, experience, and knowledge. Therefore, it can do good to keep peace within the team by assigning some ground rules for a semblance of control within each person’s behavior.

For instance, you should have rules on respecting everyone’s time, rules on keeping up with email responses, rules on video conferencing etiquette, politeness when somebody else is speaking, being respectful of each opinion, and avoiding finger-pointing when something unfortunate occurs.

Final Thoughts

Teamwork and collaboration do not come in just one click and it requires the whole team to stand up and do their part for this to succeed. May these tips help you in forming an action plan for your team and bring you closer to reaching all of your goals.