The Borderless Workplace: The critical 4 capabilities for the new world of work

borderless learning

TheBorderlessWorkplace

4Terence Brake

The critical4 capabilities for the new world of work

Foreword Borderless workinge-book series

BorderlessCollaboration

Terence Brake

People working together across borders to create value

CulturalIntelligence

Terence Brake

People building productive relationships in a world of difference

DigitalFluency

Terence Brake

People making the best use of new borderless technologies

MatrixWorking

Terence Brake

People working flexibly in complex environments

The Borderless Workplace series of e-books is aimed at providing people at all organizational levels with a map for navigating the changing world of work.

The first e-book in the series – The Borderless Workplace: The critical4 capabilities for the new world of work presents an overview of how globalization and digital technologies are transforming where, when and how work gets done.

The four remaining e-books are practical guides to four people capabilities needed for achieving high performance: Borderless Collaboration, Cultural Intelligence, Digital Fluency, and Matrix Working.

© 2013 Transnational Management Associates Ltd

All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any license permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP, United Kingdom. First Published in 2013 By Transnational Management Associates Ltd (TMA World)180 Piccadilly, London, W1J 9HF, United Kingdom.

ContentsPersonal note

The new era of work

Borderless thinking

The critical4 people capabilities

Wrap up

About TMA World

Main references

Borderless working at the ground levelThe borderless challenge

A world without borders?Thinking about thinkingThe mindset challenge

Critical4 overviewMatrix WorkingBorderless CollaborationDigital FluencyCultural Intelligence

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Personal noteI am writing this e-book in a house on Main Street in Waterford, Virginia. Established in 1733, Waterford is now largely residential, but was once a center of commerce. As I look out my study window, I imagine the noise and bustle of millers, blacksmiths, furniture makers, farmers, and shopkeepers. I imagine shrieks and cries of children playing in the yard of the one-room schoolhouse. I imagine them sitting in pin-drop silence listening to a teacher who is the source of all knowledge. I imagine the street and the tavern buzzing with news and gossip. If I had grown up in this village in the 18th century, my work, social and learning networks would have been very limited – immediate family members and small groups of friends and neighbors. My work would have been local, and I would have worked with my colleagues in the same physical space – a workshop, a mill, a farm, a shop. Where are my work, social, and learning networks today? Not in the village.

My social network is mostly online, as are my sources of gossip, news, and learning. I carry my worldwide network of work colleagues, and 24/7 information resources, in my pocket or in an over-the-shoulder bag.

The agrarian work life of the early village gave way to the industrial age, and that, in turn, is giving way to the age of digital networks. My workplace is my laptop screen.

Cisco has calculated that mobile Internet devices (including laptops) are on the verge of outnumbering the people of earth, reaching 10 billion by 2016. Already an estimated 1/3 of the world’s population is online. As a consequence, where, when, and how work gets done, and with whom is flexible. Most of my work colleagues are based in other parts of the US, different countries in Europe, or in Asia. Much of the time we work together in virtual space, and very occasionally we meet face-to-face. We have different cultural backgrounds, and operate from different time zones, but we work as a borderless team.

The borderless workplace is not a futuristic concept. It is the present day reality for a rapidly growing number of companies and individuals worldwide. In this context, the question posed by management thinker, Gary Hamel, is important to each of us as well as our organizations.

…are we changing as fast as the world around us?

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The new era of work

. . . we have moved decisively from what we called ‘globalization’ into a new era of global inter-connectedness [Global 2.0], where not just goods but information and ideas flow across borders constantly and (for the most part) freely as near universal access to Internet-enabled communications moves closer to reality.

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William J. Amelio, CEO Lenovo

Borderless working at the ground levelThe new era of work

if they can meet for lunch. Given his background in social media, David has taken the initiative to explore the use of crowdsourcing for developing project solutions.

Walking to the office from the station, her phone rings and she takes a call from Istanbul, Turkey. Azmi, the HR manager is worried about some local issues with the new performance management software.

This could be a long call, so she decides to call him back from a coffee shop that’s on her way. The issues are troubling, and could have an impact beyond Turkey. She is visiting the R&D facility in Bangalore, India, next week, and thinks it might be worthwhile breaking up her return trip with a visit to Azmi and some of his team. However, before using her smartphone to change flights, she posts a message on the internal social media system to see if anyone else has heard of other local issues with the software.

While on the social media site, she checks if anyone in the business has responded to her request for ideas on developing more effective collaboration

between her software developers and the mobile European sales teams. There is some good thinking, so she decides to set up an online meeting in which those ideas can be explored. During the program manager feedback session, she decides to find two freelance software developers who can help complete the XYZ project on schedule. Before leaving the office, she conducts a search on LinkedIn and sets up four interviews on Skype for the coming Wednesday and Thursday. On the train back home, she accesses a cultural information database and starts reading about the business cultures in India and Turkey. She has never visited either country before, and believes some background research would be useful, e.g. communication styles, negotiating tips, and what to expect in meetings.

The scientific writer, William Gibson, said that “The future is already here – it’s just not very evenly distributed.” Elizabeth’s day may seem somewhat futuristic to some, but ‘business

as usual’ for others. If we really wanted to be futuristic we would have Elizabeth conjuring up workplaces – complete with 3D avatars of her colleagues – by touching an interactive surface covered with ‘smart paint’. That’s futuristic – for the moment!

One of the problems of writing about the borderless workplace is that the focus tends to be on the capabilities of the technology, not on the capabilities and needs of the people using the technologies to get work done.

In this book, we look at the borderless workplace challenge from the people perspective. It is guided by the question, “How can I help myself and my organization be successful in this new world of work?”

After an early morning teleconference at home with the virtual team she leads, Elizabeth is going into the London hub for a feedback meeting with one of her more experienced program managers. She could do it via Skype, but she prefers to have such a meeting face-to-face.

Elizabeth knows that in a highly competitive, rapidly changing, and uncertain environment, the business as a whole needs to be very agile, and so does she in order to get the best out of her diverse team members. Elizabeth has four generations on her team, as well as different national, organizational, and functional cultures. While having breakfast, she checks emails on her tablet computer, sends replies to the most urgent, and re-prioritizes some tasks. Following the teleconference with members of her team, she realizes she forgot to ask whether any of them were going into the London hub today. On the train, she checks the calendars of her virtual team on her smartphone. She notices David is going in and texts him to see

Elizabeth’s day

Business as usual?

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The borderless challengeThe new era of work

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The global stage is in astate ofperpetualmotion.

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Kenichi Omae

Visualize a game of soccer at kickoff. Two teams of 11 players are facing each other on a field whose outer boundaries are marked in white; a line across the field marks the half-way point. The players on each team are distributed in their half of the field depending on the position they play. At each end of the field are goal posts, and there are also white lines that mark penalty areas. It all looks very orderly.

The kickoff whistle is blown. Now imagine the scene if all the white boundary lines suddenly disappeared, and other teams with an unlimited number of players ran onto the field to compete; also imagine the scene if the goal posts were continually moving and numerous referees joined in – each one with a different set of rules.

The nature of change has changed.

You get the picture. This is today’s business environment.

ChangePast

Change Present/Future

The borderless challengeThe new era of work

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Gone are the days when globalization was simply multinationals from advanced economies spreading their power and influence across borders. Companies from emerging markets are wielding much more power. Think of:Lenovo (China) – now the world’s largest maker of PCs

Tata (India) – a conglomerate with a market capitalization of $90 billion that earns 58 percent of its revenues outside of India. The Reputation Institute ranked Tata as the 11th most reputable company in the world.

While Lenovo and Tata are becoming well-known names, there are many other emerging market companies becoming ‘global challengers’. The Boston Consulting Group issued a study on 100 fast growing and fast globalizing companies from emerging markets [1]. The companies included Alibaba (the largest e-commerce company in China), Trina Solar (the world’s 4th largest solar panel manufacturer), Naspers (a South

African media giant). While China and India dominated the list, there were also companies from Egypt, Colombia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Chile.

While the digital revolution and globalization have been with us for some time, how are businesses doing in their response? According to research conducted by Accenture and the Economist Intelligence Unit:

Change has been driven by two powerful and interdependent forces in the business environment:

Digital technologies

Multi-polar globalization

New information can impact the rest of the globe at the speed of the Internet, and information is being created 24/7. As Eric Schmidt of Google said, “There is more content being created in 48 hours today than was created from the beginning of time ‘til 2003!” The digital age is not simply about the transfer of information in its many forms. As Don Tapscott, author of Wikinomics says, “This is not an information age. It’s an age of networked intelligence.” This is an age in which we have access to the intelligence of not just a few, but multitudes; an age that makes mass collaboration possible. Such collaboration radically alters our capabilities to innovate, influence, and get things done.


Multi-polarglobalization

Strikingly, only 11 percent of business leaders surveyed believe that their companies are significantly advanced in their strategic response to the disruptive business environment brought about by the intersection of the multi-polar world and developments in IT.

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The borderless challenge: RealitiesThe new era of work

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Competition: Multi-polar globalization means competition is coming from here, there, and everywhere. This means there is a continuous need to be proactive, responsive, and agile. We experience rapid changes in the marketplace requiring continuous adaptation in strategy, decision-making, and action. It is increasingly more difficult to plan for change often leaving us feeling disoriented, overwhelmed and unprepared.

Complexity: Diverse – yet often interconnected and conflicting - business models, management systems, legal and regulatory systems, customers, suppliers, stakeholders, geographies, employees, and socio-political systems make up a complex business environment. Often, complex problems cannot be managed with existing knowledge and know-how; they require collaborative solutions and innovation.

Connectivity: Information technologies have long been used to create efficiencies and productivity. Advanced virtual communication and collaboration technologies are going further by enabling business transformations. The ‘connected’, ‘networked’, ‘matrixed’, ‘latticed’, and ‘borderless’ enterprise are names for organizational forms enabled by the digital revolution.

Cultures: Being more digitally connected doesn’t mean we are more culturally or psychologically connected. In a world of virtual and face-to-face interactions across borders we often experience difficulty in understanding what is happening or in identifying what is significant. There is an increased chance for misreading situations because the reality might be interpreted in more than one way.



Competition

Complexity

Connectivity

Cultures

Agile

Innovative

Tech smart

Adaptable

Matrix working

Borderless collaboration

Digital fluency

Cultural Intelligence

Environmental forces Realities Organizational Capabilities People Capabilities

These are some of the specific business realities triggered by the powerful environmental forces.

The new era of work

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The borderless challenge: Organizational CapabilitiesThe new era of work

Agile: The ability of an organization to change rapidly in response to changes in the environment, e.g. the emergence of new competitors, disruptive technologies, and sudden changes in market conditions. Based on research by both McKinsey and The Economist Intelligence Unit, 90 percent of executives rank organizational agility as critical to business success [3]. Research at MIT shows that agile firms grow revenue 37 percent faster and generate 30 percent higher profits than non-agile companies. [4] Innovative: The willingness and ability of networks of people and teams to innovate their way through complex problems, by working together across internal and external boundaries. The story of Procter & Gamble (P&G) is telling [5]. In early 2000, the company’s share price had fallen nearly 50 percent, resulting in the loss of $85 billion in market capitalization. Despite huge spending on R&D, only 35 percent of new products reached their financial objectives. The new CEO, A.G. Lafley, was confident that

collaboration was the key to the company’s future value. He wanted to make P&G the company that “collaborates inside and out, better than any company in the world.” A study showed that P&G’s most profitable innovations came from internal collaborations across business units or from external collaboration with researchers on the outside. Twenty cross-functional ‘communities of practice’ were established within P&G, and Lafley determined that 50 percent of P&G’s products, ideas and technologies would be developed externally.

By 2008, P&G had improved its R&D productivity by 60 percent, and more than doubled its innovation success rate.

Technologies facilitate collaborative innovation, but they are by no means sufficient. As Jim Whitehurst, CEO of Red Hat said, “. . . collaboration is a culture, not a set of tools.”



Competition

Complexity

Connectivity

Cultures

Agile

Innovative

Tech smart

Adaptable

Matrix working


Digital fluency



Four organizational capabilities stand out as being of highest priority at this time

The new era of work

Tech Smart: The traditional view has always associated information technology with efficiency and productivity. That is certainly a valid perspective. Work networks (based on social media technologies) will become a common feature in organizations seeking greater agility, and according to McKinsey, “…by fully implementing social technologies, companies have an opportunity to raise the productivity of interaction workers – high-skill knowledge workers, including managers and professionals – by 20 to 25 percent.” That includes:

25-30% productivity improvement in reading and answering e-mail30-35% productivity improvement in search and gathering information25-35% productivity improvement in communicating and collaborating internally [6]Productivity is only part of the story. According to IBM:

“The view that technology is primarily a driver of efficiency is outdated; CEOs now see technology as an enabler of collaboration and relationships – those essential connections that fuel creativity and innovation.” [7]

Adaptable: The ability of people in an organization to handle the uncertainties and ambiguities that are inevitable when vertical, horizontal, regional, national, professional, functional, and linguistic boundaries are crossed.

Research by the Economist Intelligence Unit points to cultural and language differences as being particularly challenging:

“The single most common challenge, selected by 56% of executives polled, relates to the misunderstandings that emerge as a result of cultural and language differences from teams operating globally.”

The borderless challenge: Organizational Capabilities



Competition

Complexity

Connectivity

Cultures

Agile

Innovative

Tech smart

Adaptable

Matrix working


Digital fluency



Four organizational capabilities stand out as being of highest priority at this timeFour organizational capabilities stand out as being of highest priority at this time

2019

The new era of work

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The new era of work

The borderless challenge: People Capabilities



Competition

Complexity

Connectivity

Cultures

Agile

Innovative

Tech smart

Adaptable

Matrix working


Digital fluency



Based on these critical organizational capabilities, four specific capabilities emerge for people development – The Critical4

Matrix WorkingPeople with the thinking and behavioral agility to produce high levels of performance in complex environments.

Digital Fluency People with the ability to make the most effective use of new communications and collaboration technologies.

Borderless CollaborationPeople with the mindsets and skills to work together across borders to innovate and create value.

Cultural IntelligencePeople with the adaptability to bridge and leverage differences between individuals and groups.

The new era of work

The borderless challenge: Summary



Competition

Complexity

Connectivity

Cultures

Agile

Innovative

Tech smart

Adaptable

Matrix working


Digital fluency



Organizations that can acquire these capabilities stand to benefit in a number of ways:

Faster responsiveness in pursuing growth opportunities and managing risks

Increased organizational cohesion and integration

Deeper and more value-added collaborations with customers and other stakeholders

Faster and better quality decision making through increased sharing of knowledge, skills, and experience

Faster workplace learning and application of best practices

More efficient and effective face-to-face and virtual project collaborations across the organization

Increased innovation through the cross-pollination of diverse perspectives and styles

Increased productivity through more seamless cross-border communication

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Key messagesThe new era of work

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Connectivity of people on a global scale; and multiple Cultures needing to communicate and work together.

Faced with these realities, businesses must actively work on capabilities for the organization as a whole, and capabilities for people in the organization.

The borderless organizational capabilities are: Agile; Innovative; Tech smart; and Adaptable.

The borderless people capabilities are: Matrix Working; Borderless Collaboration; Digital Fluency; and Cultural Intelligence (The Critical4)

The borderless work ‘place’ is often just a screen and an ear piece

Borderless working is about working with anyone, anywhere, at any time and from any device – across a city, a country, or across continents

Managing in a borderless workplace is more about orchestrating people and resources rather than establishing command and control

Organizational and personal agility are critical to success

The nature of change has changed

Two forces have been transforming the business environment and driving the borderless workplace: Digital Technologies and Multi-Polar Globalization

These two forces have put the spotlight on four realities for businesses to contend with: Competition from everywhere; Complexity in the environment and inside the organization;

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Borderless thinking

Organizations that remove the artificial boundaries around how, where, and when work gets done are those that are winning in today’s marketplace. They are more flexible, more efficient, and better able to respond to rapid change.

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Fiona Laird, Co-Lead, ‘Agile Working’ program, Unilever

A world without borders?Borderless thinking

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…despite the steady falling away of many boundaries in society, government and commerce, the global workforce still finds itself encumbered by numerous impediments that inhibit the ability of organizations to quickly respond to emerging opportunity.

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Working Beyond Borders. IBM, 2010

businesses efficiently. In conditions of rapid change and increased complexity, many borders have become obstructions to effectiveness.

New technologies like social media are making an assault on traditional borders. Just think of the borders being tested by the generation, processing, and mobility of information.

Company – Customers

Products - Services

Functional Silos – Multifunctional Virtual Teams

Work Place – Home Place

National Borders – Digital Communities

In reality the workplace isn’t borderless, but we must – for the sake of responsiveness, innovation and overall competitiveness - think and act as if it is or can be.

Do we live and work in a world without borders? The answer is, “No, we don’t.” In the past, we relied heavily on up, down, and across organizational borders to run our

Thinking about thinkingBorderless thinking

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Borders? I have never seen one. But I have heard they exist in the minds of some people.

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Thor Heyerdahl

The room was separated into two halves by an aisle way – about 8 feet wide. Before beginning my presentation, I asked the members of the audience to shake hands with people sitting next to them. As I suspected, not one person on the end of the rows (those sat next to the aisle) crossed over that 8 foot gap to shake hands with their more ‘distant’ neighbor. The physical effort to cross that ‘border’ wouldn’t have been at all difficult for the great majority of the audience, but the psychological effort was daunting.

Borders – real or imagined – influence how we think and behave.

If we are to be successful in the new workplace, we must pay attention to how our minds are influencing our perceptions of borders, and of our ability to cross them.

We all have habits of mind, and it is important that we develop greater awareness of what habits shape our typical understandings of the world, our judgments of others, and of the

The invisible borderline strategies we use for solving problems (in psychology this is known as metacognition). We would be engaged in metacognitive thinking if in The Invisible Borderline illustration, we asked ourselves questions like, “What assumptions am I making about ‘next to me’?” “What thought process is constraining me from getting up from my chair and walking across the aisle?”

Let’s look at another example.

Roland has been collaborating on a multicultural virtual team for a few weeks and is increasingly frustrated with some of the other members. Roland knows he needs to spend more time getting to know his colleagues, but he also realizes he needs to get to know himself better. After one virtual meeting he decides to spend some time reflecting on what his responses to others can tell him about his own way of thinking and decision making.

He realizes that the problem solving styles of some of his colleagues cause him to judge their information and ideas more negatively than others. For example, when first discussing

a problem, one of his colleagues always wants to explore the context of the problem in great detail. Roland wants to get to the point much faster, identify a solution, and move to action quickly. Reflecting on the meeting, Roland becomes aware that his own approach could have caused the team to miss some vital information. With this awareness, Roland decides to monitor his thinking more consciously, to suspend assumptions, and to see through others’ eyes more often.

By thinking about his own thinking, Roland is developing a more borderless mindset.

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In a VUCA world, complex (not just complicated) challenges are common and collaboration is the only effective way forward. No one has all the answers or all the information, or even the one true definition of the problem.

Opening up our thinking to self-examination and self-monitoring is extremely important. Why? Ours is a world of complex problems that do not respect traditional borders or ingrained habits of mind.

We are faced with a business environment with features that often leave us feeling bewildered. One useful framework used to describe this kind of environment is VUCA. What does this strange sounding acronym mean?

VUCA is a framework that helps describe our 21st century world - from battlefields to business environments. It stands for Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity. It comes from military vocabulary developed at the U.S. Army War College, and has been in use since the late 1990s. To some observers VUCA is the ‘new normal’.

Complicated vs. complex problems VolatilityV

UncertaintyU

ComplexityC

AmbiguityA

Fast change without a clear predictable trend or pattern.

Frequently disruptive changes; past is not a predictor of the future.

Multiple, interdependent causes.

Little clarity about what is ‘real’ or ‘true’.

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What is common to the complicated set of problems is that specialist expertise can be applied, and that there is a high degree of certainty of the outcome at different times. The answer or solution will be true or false.

With complex problems – like raising a child – the fact that you have done it once is no guarantee of future success. You have to be responsive to the individual child, and the changed circumstances. With complex problems, mindfulness of the ‘here and now’ specifics, and adaptability are critical; there is always incomplete information, changeable and contradictory needs and requirements, and a tangled knot of interdependencies. Experimentation and innovation are required, and the solution (at least for now) is only better, neutral, or worse. Complicated and complex thinking are neither right nor wrong. They are appropriate responses to different types of problems. A great deal of business education focuses on solving complicated problems (which we need), but in the VUCA and borderless world described, more and more problems will be of the

complex type. Taking a complicated (part by part) approach to a complex problem often makes things worse because the problem resides in the interrelationships between the parts.

Again, the challenge for us is to think about our ingrained habits of thinking, and to challenge ourselves to fit the thinking to the problem and not the problem to the thinking.

Complicated ComplexThe problem is easily definable

Existing know-how is adequate; you can solve with the application of a blueprint, an algorithm, a formula, or procedures

The context is stable, and outcome is predictable. You can plan for change

Only parts of the problem might be definable, other parts are not

Existing know-how is inadequate; the context is unstable and outcomes unpredictable

There is a need for constant adaptation, improvisation and experimentation

Unplanned change is the norm

Here are some examples of the different types of problem:

Complicated ComplexPutting a man on the moon

Brain surgery

Identifying the most profitable customers

Forecasting sales

Raising a child

Increasing the morale in Human Resources

Increasing creativity and collaboration across the business

Leveraging diversity within the business

What’s the difference between complicated and complex?

The mindset challengeBorderless thinking

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Our thinking habits are part of something larger – our fundamental orientation to the world. The success of each one of us in a borderless world depends not just on our knowledge and skills – important as they are – but on our mindset. What is a mindset?

An established pattern of assumptions, attitudes, and emotions that consistently influence how we interpret and respond to situations.

There are basically two types of mindset: Open and Closed.

Open: A borderless mindset that is always looking to expand, take in new possibilities and learn. It favors ‘both/and’ thinking, and flexibility. With an open mindset there are numerous ways to achieve a goal.

Closed: A limiting mindset that puts up barriers to new possibilities and learning. It favors ‘either/or’ thinking, and takes a relatively fixed view of how things should be done.

We should think about these mindsets as being on extreme ends of a

Organizations will become leaner, and people know they need to become more productive... They need to stay current and interpret changes in corporate strategy so that they can continue to position themselves as a vital contributor to the organization. They know they must try to stand out as individuals, because currently there are plenty of other very able people throughout the world doing what they do just as well.

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The Global Talent Index Report, 2011 [10]

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spectrum. Most of us will have an open mindset about some things, and be closed about others, although – in general – we may tend to favor one type over another. Self-awareness and adaptability beat the mindset challenge.

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Mindsets are very powerful, but they have been learned, so they can be unlearned.

Mindset change does not always mean a complete transformation of assumptions, beliefs, etc. Sometimes it means more of a shift in thinking and doing rather than wholesale change. It does always involve a change in doing; unless a shift in thinking results in a change in behavior, the mindset change has not gone deep enough.

How can you change a mindset? Here are some tips given from a virtual team leader (VTL) to a team member (TM).

Mindset change


VTL: While we’re on this call, I wanted to talk through some feedback I’ve been receiving. Some of your colleagues think that you don’t really have an open mindset about working virtually. What do you think about that?

TM: I can understand why they might say that

VTL: Tell me more

TM: Well, I could give you a whole list of reasons. For example, I think you just can’t build good relationships working virtually, and virtual communication is just inferior to communicating face-to-face.

VTL: OK. Anything else?

TM: I think results are of a lower standard, and virtual team members are less committed and accountable.

VTL: That’s quite a list. Have these views surfaced just by working with your current colleagues?

TM: No, no. Experiences over time, even at my previous company. And

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I’ve spoken to a lot of others here who feel the same way.

VTL: I think it’s important that you take some time to reflect on your mindset about virtual working. If you don’t, it could really hurt your progress in the company.

TM: I suppose that’s true. What do you suggest?

VTL: First, you need to really explore why you feel the way you do? Who did you talk to? Did their negativity come from their own lack of skills in this area? Do you feel you have a lack of virtual working skills, and that is affecting your attitudes? TM: I can see that might have something to do with it.

VTL: Ask yourself if all of your virtual working experiences have been negative? If not, what did you or others do differently on those occasions? What can you learn from them?

TM: OK. That makes sense.

VTL: To be honest, you also need to ask yourself what you might have contributed to making them such negative experiences. Did your mindset doom the virtual work from the beginning?

TM: Ha ha. Maybe. I hadn’t thought about that.

VTL: What you really need to do right now is give yourself a very strong reason for changing.

TM: Well, wanting to get ahead in my career is pretty strong! I appreciate your honest feedback? What else can I do?

VTL: Think about what parts of your existing mindset are most unhelpful to you? Target something specific so that you don’t feel overwhelmed by changes you need to make. You might identify one specific assumption, attitude, or emotion that if adjusted by just 10 percent could have a positive ripple effect.

TM: I can’t believe I’ve let things get so bad.

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VTL: Don’t go there. Making negative judgments about yourself is wasted energy. What matters now is what you do with the feedback. Be objective. When you look at your mindset don’t say, “That part is good and that’s bad.” Say something like, “That part really doesn’t work for me, but that part does.”

TM: I like that. It helps me think of my attitudes as choices I’m making, and not as personality flaws.

VTL: We don’t want you thinking that way (laughs). Something else you can do is to look at colleagues you think are pretty good at working virtually. What assumptions, attitudes and behaviors seem to work for them?

TM: Great, thanks. Any final thoughts?

VTL: A simple exercise one of my German colleagues taught me is to think of myself standing on a 1-10 scale drawn on the floor. Let’s say that number 1 on the scale is your current mindset, and that number 10 is where you’d like it to be. Imagine taking one step forward, and saying to

yourself, “What is one thing I’m doing differently at this point? What is the one thing that has enabled me to take a step up the scale?” You can repeat that process until you feel you are where you want to be.

TM: What a great idea. I’m going to do that as soon as we finish this call.

VTL: Super…let’s talk again soon.

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To what extent do you agree or disagree with the following statements about yourself?

I collaborate well across company boundaries

I freely share my knowledge and ideas with others

I work very effectively with others through technology

I work well with people who have very different perspectives and styles

I am very open to learning from anyone, anywhere

Reflecting on your mindset

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Did you rate any of the statements 3 or below? If you did, you should be asking questions of yourself and, possibly, others. For example:

What experiences in my life and work have caused me to be less open?

Have I let those experiences have too much influence over me? What are the likely consequences at work if I don’t become more open?

What can I do now to increase my openness?

Strongly Disagree

1Disagree

2Neutral

3Agree

4Strongly agree

5

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Key messagesBorderless thinking

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There are two basic types of mindset – open and closed

An open mindset is becoming as critical as knowledge and skills

Mindsets are learned, and can be unlearned

A mindset change results in changes in behavior; if it doesn’t, the mindset change hasn’t been deep enough

Borderless working doesn’t mean there are no borders to be crossed. It means having a mindset in which finding the best solution, achieving a shared goal, and finding common ground for making progress have a far higher priority than egos, personal agendas or territory

The world isn’t really borderless, but we must think and act as if it is

Borders are obstructing our effectiveness

New technologies are making many borders irrelevant

Borders influence how we think and behave

Metacognition is our ability to monitor and manage our own thinking

In a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous world we will be faced with more complex (rather than complicated problems)

No one has all the answers or even the true definition of the problem; we have to collaborate to find the best way forward

We must fit our thinking to the problem, and not the problem to our thinking

Our thinking habits are part of our overall orientation to the world – our mindset

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It stands to reason that being continually adaptive in response to the ever-changing marketplace requires three things: more autonomy on the part of the individual, greater global collaboration among virtual team members, and a vast proliferation of project-based work.

“

“

Tanya Clemons, Pfizer

4The Critical4 capabilities

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The Critical4 people capabilities support companies in bringing about the organizational capabilities needed for competitiveness in our knowledge-based and technology-enabled borderless economy.

New communication and collaboration technologies – along with multi-polar globalization – have unleashed a competitive storm. In response, companies have been seeking ways to optimize their distributed talent by flattening hierarchies, fostering collaboration, promoting agile working, and enabling company-wide networking. Telepresence, webconferencing, wikis, blogs, microblogging, social media, VoIP, texting, instant messaging and many other tools are creating new multidimensional and non-linear pathways along which knowledge and skills can flow and work get done.The real workplace revolution is not in the technologies themselves, but in the massive creative and productive potential available in the interconnections.

Critical4 review The Critical4 capabilities

The critical4 people capabilities should be seen in the context of this new world of work. Here are the critical4 with a reminder of the organizational capabilities they support.

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AgilePeople with the thinking and behavioral agility to produce high levels of performance in complex environments.

Innovative

Developing people with the mindsets and skills to work together across borders to innovate and create value.

Tech smart

People with the ability to make the most effective use of new communications and collaboration technologies

Adaptable

People with the adaptability to bridge and leverage differences between individuals and groups

Matrix Working


Digital Fluency


The Critical4 are interdependent capabilities; each one is supportive of the others. For example, the mindsets and skills for Borderless collaboration are supportive of working in a complex environment, working in virtual teams, and working with cultural differences. Each one contributes to achieving the benefits of interconnectedness in a borderless world.

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Matrix WorkingThe Critical4 capabilities

Two basic principles for global working

Fit‘One size fits all’ thinking is inadequate in a multi-polar world. A borderless organization must try to capture the economic benefits of standardization, while also adapting to market diversity.

At the core of any borderless organization is a dilemma that can be summed up in two words: Convergence – Divergence. Where does it benefit the organization and its customers to have sameness (e.g. corporate values and standards, core processes) and where does it benefit the organization and its customers to have difference (e.g. in adaptability to local differences, among people on innovation teams). This is a complex problem so there is no ‘one true answer’, only ongoing experimentation and adaptability.

Always be asking the question: “Is this solution the best ‘fit’ for generating optimum results for stakeholders – the customer, the business, the investor, employees, and the community?”

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Western culture has spent decades drawing lines and boxes around interconnected phenomena. We’ve chunked the world into pieces rather than explored its webby nature. Think of all the lines and boundaries that exist: organizational charts, job descriptions, nation states, ethnic identities… This is now a huge problem, because our safety and future depend on whether each of us can step outside the boxes and participate intelligently in a complex world of interconnections.

““

Margaret J. Wheatley

FlowIn order to achieve solutions that produce optimum results in a fast-changing environment, it is vital that resources (e.g. ideas, information, knowledge, and skills) can flow seamlessly to where they can add the most value at any point in time.

Another dilemma at the core of borderless organizations is between Fixed and Fluid. When does it benefit the organization and its customers to establish fixed structures and processes to manage the flow of resources (e.g. people and knowledge)? Or, alternatively, when does it benefit the organization to have fluid structures and processes for the flow of resources?

Talent – from a fixed perspective – has value within borders. This has helped deepen expertise within functions, for example, but has restricted the value of that expertise to the organization. On the relatively fixed side, knowledge management systems have aimed to capture, codify, and distribute knowledge in relatively formal ways. These systems are useful

when conditions are stable, but in an environment of rapid and disruptive change, needs and opportunities are always in flux. Web 2.0 technologies – like blogging, microblogging, and social media - are enabling more spontaneous and organic flows of resources. The focus shifts from systems to connections; connections up, down, and across organizations as well as with other stakeholders like customers, partners, and suppliers.

Before moving on, it is important to stress that neither Convergence or Divergence, or Fixed and Fluid are right or wrong solutions. Agile organizations need flexible people who can navigate between extremes.

Those working globally should consider their decisions and actions in the context of two principles: Fit and Flow.

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Matrix Working skills The Critical4 capabilities

Given the borderless working principles of Fit and Flow, what general skills need to be developed in our people?

Change Management: The ability to anticipate and adjust to changes in our fast-paced environment.

Communication: The ability to create shared understandings across borders (e.g. national, organizational, professional, functional).

Conflict Management & Negotiation: The ability to build bridges between cross-border colleagues and/or other stakeholders.

Information, Media, and Technology Skills: The ability to use the right communications and collaboration tools efficiently and effectively.

Leadership: The ability to take on leadership roles in a matrix without formal authority.

Networking: The ability to develop a broad network of connections whose knowledge and skills can help accomplish goals.

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Polarity Thinking: The ability to navigate between opposites and apply ‘both/and’ thinking.

Relationship Management: The ability to develop and maintain strong, trusting relationships across borders.

Resourcefulness: The ability to improvise solutions in complex situations where existing knowledge and know-how won’t work.

Self-Management: The ability to regulate oneself (e.g. emotions, thinking, and behaviors) in a complex, fluid, and diverse organizational structure.

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Matrix working skills: the interview The Critical4 capabilities

Ron: Monica, thank you for sitting down with me today. As I mentioned on the phone, I’m writing a piece for the company blog on working in a matrix organization. I’m hoping you might give me some insights. What lessons can you share with the readers? What helps you succeed?

Monica: One of the first things I learned is to expect a mess and work with it. Matrices weren’t created to make our lives a misery, but for a legitimate business reason - to help us be more responsive to customers; to serve them better. I used to plead for an old-fashioned hierarchy, but I learned to adapt.

Ron: How did you do that?

Monica: I came to understand that I needed to take more personal accountability for my own success. The only person I can control is me, and if things weren’t working out, I had to stand up and let people know. That would involve me in making sure my managers knew I was faced with conflicting priorities, or that my role and responsibilities were not clear enough.

Ron: Do they always have answers? Monica: No. That can be frustrating, but working in a complex organization with fuzzy boundaries means constant change and the need to be adaptable. If I can’t be adaptable, I should find another job.

Ron: So would you say that you have had to become more of a manager?

Monica: In today’s organizations, I think we all have to be much more engaged with managing; perhaps managing ourselves most of all. In the old hierarchies, I think there were a lot of parent-child relationships, with the manager being the parent. Today, I think it has to be adult-to-adult.

Ron: Interesting. What else?

Monica: You’ve always got to be alert to what is going on around you, and you’ve got to try and anticipate changes even though you can’t predict.

Ron: Good point.

Monica: Something else I’ve learned

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is that you have got to network and collaborate. I have very few solutions to my problems, so I’ve learned to be very open and listen to others. I also try to look at the big picture, and to align myself with the vision, values, and strategies of the company. They help when I need to make decisions on my own.

Ron: I imagine you also have to be very creative when there is no clear answer.

Monica: I think I’ve given up on finding answers. All any of us can do in this kind of environment is to experiment with ideas and keep testing them. I don’t waste time looking for permanent solutions.

Ron: Any other advice?

Monica: Always try to communicate with your colleagues – wherever they are in the world - in very clear and precise language. Always remember that your goal is shared understanding.

Ron: Any last words?

Monica: Develop not only your skills, but also your resilience. It can be tough working across time zones and cultures, and in different reporting relationships. But it’s never boring!

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Key messagesMatrix WorkingThe Critical4 capabilities

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Those working in a borderless environment must consider their work in relation to two principles: Fit and Flow

The Fit principle involves striking the right balance between standardization and adaptation

The Flow principle involves finding the right balance between fixed and fluid structures and processes for distributing resources (e.g. people and knowledge)

Matrix working requires more personal accountability

You need to anticipate changes even though you can’t predict

Networking and collaboration are essential

Don’t waste time looking for permanent solutions

Develop not only your skills, but also your resilience

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Borderless CollaborationThe Critical4 capabilities

Collaboration is the number-one trait CEOs are seeking in their employees, with 75 percent of CEOs calling it critical.

“

“

Leading Through Connections, IBM, 2012 [11]

What do we mean when we talk about ‘collaboration’? And how does it differ from words with a family resemblance like ‘cooperation’, ‘coordination’, and even ‘teamwork’. Let me start with a broad definition of collaboration:

People with different skills and perspectives co-creating ‘something’ that none of the individual members could have created alone.

The ‘something’ could be anything from new understandings about a problem or solution, a new process or product or event. As Michael Schrage says in his book Shared Minds: “…there is nothing routine about it. Something is there that wasn’t there before.”

So how does this differ from related terms?

What is collaboration?

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Cooperation: Is about saying and doing things that make working with others an agreeable and constructive experience. A group can be cooperative, however, while only producing a routine outcome. Cooperation can simply be compliance.

Coordination: Is about all the parts of a system working together efficiently – each part knows what to do, when to do it, in what order, and where the output needs to go next. It’s about efficient and effective relationships between the parts, but like cooperation it may not produce anything that wasn’t there before.

Teamwork: Is about working together to achieve a shared purpose, but teamwork itself doesn’t necessarily reach the level of ‘collaboration’. Some teams might be geared toward achieving relatively routine, non-surprising outcomes. You want the team to comply with policies, procedures and processes rather than collaborate and create.

With the emergence of transformational digital technologies, ‘collaboration’ is being reinvented.

Large numbers of people can work independently on the same project through social collaboration tools like wikis. Wikipedia is the most famous example of mass collaboration or crowdsourcing. Companies like Giant Hydra and Tongal use this idea to bring problems (from anyone) and people (from everywhere) together in fluid and temporary collaborative networks. Suddenly, the talent pool for organizations becomes borderless.

The composer, Tod Machover, is going further. He has invited the inhabitants of Toronto to compose a symphony with him. “I think of it as massive collaboration. Crowdsourcing is a one-way ask for something very specific. Collaboration is something that goes back and forth, and turns into something truly open…I want something to be created that I couldn’t have done by myself, and for everyone else to feel that way too.” [12]

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Borderless CollaborationThe Critical4 capabilities

I work with groups of smart people who often can’t collaborate. Why is it so difficult? There are, of course, multiple reasons, some of which have to do with individual egos, mindsets, skills, and behaviors.

What I find most often is not a lack of good intentions or goodwill, or a surfeit of anti-collaboration behaviors, but a lack of awareness and respect for the causes of collaborative pain. Smart people believe that it should be relatively easy for them to come together and solve problems (after all they are smart), but often their expectations are dashed.

A study by Bain & Company (October, 2012) of a connected company found that “Many people and teams around the world…collaborate physically and virtually on nearly everything they do. Instead of increasing productivity, the volume of information and collaboration was adding to complexity; critical decision-making was slowing to a crawl, trapped in an endless cycle of data collection and

The BorderlessCollaboration challenge

debate. An invitation to collaborate has blurred the distinction between participative and consensus styles of decision making and risks turning every decision into a referendum.” [13]

This isn’t a condemnation of collaboration and connectivity, but it is a warning that we need to pay much more attention to the purpose and practice of collaboration.Greater realism and awareness can empower people to collaborate by raising the level of risk alertness in the group.

Chris Huxman and Siv Vangen developed the concept of collaborative inertia, and they see it as happening when, “the output from a collaborative arrangement is negligible, the rate of output is extremely slow, or stories of pain and hard grind are integral to successes achieved.” [14]

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What are some of the risks we need to pay attention to?

Overly idealistic views that see collaboration as always desirable

Differences in organizational cultures, processes, tools, and policies represented in the group

Conflicting interests and goals

Likelihood that benefits will only be realized in the long-term

Likely complexity of collaboration structures and processes

Likelihood of political maneuvering, game playing

Differences in professional languages, practices, and cultures

Differences in fluency of the group’s working language

Tensions and conflicts already existing between members (the burden of the past); lack of

trust; competition for scarce resources

Sharp differences in power and authority levels

Pronounced skill level differences in using technology

Too little understanding and connection with key stakeholders, sponsors

Poor likelihood of maintaining group continuity

Collaboration fatigue among members

There will always be unknown risks and uncertainties, but with a greater awareness and respect for possible risks, a group can be more proactive and vigilant.

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Borderless Collaboration: the meetingThe Critical4 capabilities

For some ideas on how to collaborate well, let’s sit in a meeting of a multifunctional new product development group.

Ben: Thanks for coming everyone. Julie, we’re sorry you couldn’t make it, but at least we have you here on the telepresence system. You’re looking well.

Julie: Thanks, Ben. Apart from the weather, everything is going well over here in London.

Ben: At the first meeting we agreed that collaborating on this new product was the best strategy and that there is shared agreement on what we are looking to achieve. The potential for the product is global, and the return on our collaboration could be very significant for the company in this tough economy. Some of us have worked well together before which should help a lot, but I don’t think we can rely on just liking each other. I thought we should spend some time thinking through how we want to work together over the next 18 months or so. Any thoughts?

Desmond: One of the best things we did on another collaboration project I was involved with – after we agreed on our goals - was to get a sense of the overall process we would work through. Let me put the steps we came up with on the whiteboard.

Ben: Excellent.

Desmond: Here are the five steps: Engage: Come together around a shared problem or interestExchange: Swap information/ideas to define the what, why, where, when, and howEvolve: Work together to craft an outcome most likely to produce a returnEmploy: Apply the outcome in the real world Evaluate: Measure you success

Huyla: Thanks. I applied a similar process in Turkey. One of the insights we had was that evaluation needed to be built in from the beginning and not left to the end. We needed to evaluate the process of our collaboration as well as our progress on accomplishing objectives. The collaboration progress discussions really helped us make course corrections on how efficiently

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and effectively we were working together.

Sam: I really like what you’re saying, Huyla. On one project we brought in an external facilitator who could help us ask the tough questions. Conflicts were being avoided, and people were withholding information that could benefit the collaboration. It was messy!

Ben: Desmond, Sam and Huyla could you work together before our next meeting and make a proposal on what might be a good collaboration process for us. Any other ideas from anyone?

Jaks: I remember a collaboration – that went on for some time - we hired a consultant for a couple of days and he told us we could be more efficient if we developed some collaboration patterns.

Ella: What are they?

Jaks: Well, in any collaboration there are problems that recur repeatedly and a collaboration pattern is a reusable methodology or set of behaviors or activities that people use to solve these problems.

Ella: Can you give me some examples.

Jaks: Sure. We might agree on a methodology for how we’ll elicit ideas from everyone or how we’ll make decisions.

Wyatt: Some we found useful were how we would set priorities and handle disagreements.

Ben: Morgan, Wren and Yuan Yuan, we haven’t heard from you yet. Anything, you want to add?

Morgan: I’ve got a few things I need to take care of before I can get fully involved, but when I do I’d like to lay down some guidelines on our evaluation metrics strategy.

Yuan Yuan: I can work with Morgan on that.

Wren: I’ll work with Jaks, Wyatt, and Ella on thinking about collaboration patterns. It seems to me that we could be productive very quickly if we could identify some primary patterns we need, like how we’ll make decisions.

Ben: Thanks, everyone!

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Key messagesBorderless CollaborationThe Critical4 capabilities

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Collaboration is the co-creation of something that individuals could not have created alone

It differs in kind from cooperation, coordination, and teamwork (although teamwork can produce collaborative output)

With digital technologies like social media collaboration is being reinvented, e.g. crowdsourcing

Collaboration should not become a universal solution for every problem

We need to develop greater awareness of the risks and uncertainties of collaboration

We can increase the productivity of our collaborations through identifying shared processes and patterns

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Digital FluencyThe Critical4 capabilities

Collaboration is the number-one trait CEOs are seeking in their employees, with 75 percent of CEOs calling it critical.

“

“

Leading Through Connections, IBM, 2012 [11]

A great many of us are now information/knowledge workers, and our workplace is a screen – computer or otherwise.

The critical importance of digital fluency is highlighted by the rapid adoption of two types of virtual working:

Remote working: Working individually from anywhere, at any time, from any device.

Virtual teaming: Collaborating over distances via technologies.

According to Forrester Research (August, 2012) – the population of information workers will grow from 600m in 2012 to 865m in 2016. A Reuters poll (January, 2012), says about 1 in 5 workers around the globe, particularly in the Middle East, Latin America, and Asia, telecommute frequently, and nearly 10 percent work from home every day.

The borderless work revolution has been made possible by the exponential growth in digital collaboration

What is digital fluency?

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tools, such as: wikis, blogs, social networking, web conferencing, and groupware.

Those who have grown up with digital consumer technologies like iPods, smartphones, and iPads – the Digital Natives – are becoming more and more influential in the workplace. Their impact will be felt in many ways. In their book Future Work, Alison Maitland and Peter Thomson make the point that:

There have been a number of studies showing that those who work from home tend to be more productive. A recent study by Stanford University reported the results of a working from home (WFH) experiment in CTrip - a 16,000 employee, NASDAQ-listed Chinese travel agency. Call center employees who volunteered were randomly assigned to work from home or in the office for 9 months. Home working led to a 13% performance increase, of which about 9% was from working more minutes per shift (fewer breaks and sick-days) and 4% from more calls per minute (attributed to a quieter working environment). Home workers also reported improved work satisfaction, resulting in a reduction of staff turnover. [17]

The main digital fluency challenge is not learning technical skills for exchanging information, but using each one to build productive relationships when remote working and virtual teaming.

They [Generation Y] have grown up with the means to connect with their peers anytime, anywhere, and they expect to be able to work this way too. Young knowledge workers are as likely to want to work while munching on a sandwich over their laptop in a wireless-enabled café as behind a desk in a traditional office.

“

“

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Remote workers – for the most part - should be free to decide how they can be most productive. Paying attention to certain underlying principles, however, can make a huge difference to the quality of the remote experience and the output. The principles are the:

PRIME principles forremote working

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Focus on connecting, not just making connectionsNew communication and collaboration technologies give us the capability to connect electronically and build informal networks with huge numbers of other people. The number of electronic connections we make, however, is basically meaningless.

Reality Principle: Determine what’s real from what’s imaginedWorking remotely we have many gaps in our knowledge of others. What is going on in their lives? What makes them feel comfortable or stressed? What is their working environment like? Our brains don’t like these gaps and they fill them with assumptions and stories.

Reality principle

Inclusion principle

Momentum principle

Easy Principle

People principle

People principle Reality principle

To apply this principle:

Think quality, not quantity of connectionsEveryone needs to feel some sense of connection and engagement with you. In a world of digital connection, personal relationships still rule.

Give, don’t just takeGood networks are built on mutual give and take - reciprocity. If we continually take, take, take, our network will quickly be resistant to our demands.


Beware the stories you tell yourself about othersYour real colleague might not be the person you imagine online. If you have only been communicating by email, you may have even mistaken someone’s gender (especially when working across cultures).

Understand that you might be the problemWhat the research tells us is that when problems arise in virtual work, we tend to attribute the blame to the dispositions and personalities of our distant colleagues rather than the challenges of virtual working.


Keep assumptions of similarity in checkWe should assume differences until our similarities are clearly demonstrated. There can be no inclusion without fully recognizing and respecting differences. Understand the preferences of othersWe cannot assume similarity in how people like to work. We can wait for preferences to emerge, but it is usually more productive to have constructive conversations.

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Communicate to bridge differencesWorking face-to-face with people, we typically make some adaptations to be inclusive. In virtual space we don’t feel the same urgency to adapt because the differences tend to be less obvious and, therefore, we assume similarity.

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Make life easy for yourself and othersWorking at a distance can be difficult and frustrating. For example, misspelled and ungrammatical emails, unclear and imprecise messages, too much information, too little information, lack of responsiveness, and lengthy virtual meetings with no interaction.

Inclusion principle


Minimize uncertaintyUnclear purpose, fuzzy roles and responsibilities and vague performance measures – all of these faults are likely to create chaos in virtual work where opportunities to gain clarification are far fewer.

Deal with conflict sooner rather than laterGiven that we work across distances, we might be tempted to suppress or ignore conflict. We have to bring virtual conflict to the surface where it can be dealt with constructively. Unrecognized virtual conflict often becomes uncontrollable if not dealt with.

Keep the energy flowingThose who work remotely might lose some of the distractions of an office environment, but they can also lose the energy and motivation of working closely with others. There are multiple reasons why remote workers can feel demotivated, but two of the most common are increased uncertainty and unmanaged conflict.

Momentum principle Easy Principle


Take responsibility for communicationThere is no communication without shared understanding between the sender and the receiver. Many times the receiver is made to work too hard to find with any accuracy what is being said or written. This is not the receiver’s fault; the sender must always take responsibility for a message being interpreted correctly.

Help others connect the dotsThere can be a real problem with a lack of shared contextual understanding in the virtual workplace. Everyone is likely to be working on a small piece of a larger project, and we cannot assume that our virtual colleagues know what we know.

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“My other remote colleagues used to be so helpful, but now I can’t get anything out of them. I’m lucky if they respond to my emails or my phone messages. I suppose everyone is very busy, but so am I!”

Select the best choice from the following:a) Easy Principle: Help others connect the dotsb) People Principle: Give, don’t just takec) Inclusion Principle: Keep assumptions of similarity in checkd) Reality Principle: Beware the stories you tell yourself about others

“I know we’ve had some differences in the past, but today he really attacked me on the phone. I thought the issues we had were all in the past. I don’t know where his anger suddenly came from. I hadn’t done anything on the call to upset him.”

Select the best choice from the following:a) Momentum Principle: Minimize uncertaintyb) People Principle: Think quality, not quantity of connectionsc) Inclusion Principle: Understand the preferences of others d) Momentum Principle: Deal with conflict sooner rather than later

“I’m tired. I tell people what I want in my e-mails, but they keep coming back with question after question. I studied English in college so I know it’s not my writing. They are obviously not reading my e-mails carefully enough.”

Select the best choice from the following:a) Easy Principle: Take responsibility for communicationb) People Principle: Give, don’t just take c) Inclusion Principle: Keep assumptions of similarity in check d) Momentum Principle: Minimize uncertainty

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PRIME Principles: What Advice Would You Give? “I really like my virtual colleagues, I really do. We have so much in common. At least I thought so until today. What she said in that email was so unlike her. We haven’t worked together very long, but I’ve always felt we shared so much and trusted each other.”

Select the best choice from the following:a) Easy Principle: Minimize uncertaintyb) Inclusion Principle: Keep assumptions of similarity in check c) Easy Principle: Help people connect the dots d) Inclusion Principle: Understand the preferences of others

“I can’t say I really enjoy working with my remote colleagues. They are always so slow in getting back to me, and I really don’t think they listen. It’s so frustrating.”

Select the best choice from the following:a) Easy Principle: Help people connect the dotsb) People Principle: Give, don’t just take c) Inclusion Principle: Keep assumptions of similarity in check d) Reality Principle: Understand that you might be the problem

1

2

3

4

5

Best answers: 1 b, 2 d, 3 a, 4 b, 5 d

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Virtual Teaming: Working with others on a shared goal across distances via technology

Virtual teams have become the way organizations undertake projects. In the past, teams tended to be collocated because of the interdependencies in project work. Teams can now operate over distances, and bring together the best people for the job no matter where they are located.

Virtual teams have challenges like isolation of team members, fragmentation of effort, and confusion, but as three researchers reported in the MIT Sloan Management Review (July, 2009), “our research shows that virtual teams can outperform their collocated counterparts when they are set up and managed in the right way.” [18] What is the right way?

Two types of processes are required: Task-related processes and socio-emotional processes.

The processes that drive the accomplishment of tasks are most important (e.g. task-related communication and coordination), but they need strong support from the socio-emotional processes that increase cohesion on the team (e.g.

page). Teams could use the Six Cs as a tool to have structured discussions on how they were performing as a collaborative team.

The teams relied heavily on teleconferences which was a mistake.

The Japanese were more comfortable reading English (official team language) than listening. The teleconference conversations often left the Japanese confused; the Japanese avoided asking questions for fear of losing credibility in front of their colleagues.

More attention needed to be given to technologies that focused on the written word and document sharing, e.g. e-mail, document libraries.

informal communication, conflict resolution). Co-located teams with high levels of these processes were still outperformed by virtual teams.

Does it make a difference if team members are across the hallway, on different floors, in different buildings at the same site, or on different continents? Not necessarily. If robust task and socio-emotional processes are in place, the degree of distance doesn’t hurt the collaboration, but as the researchers say, “Don’t underestimate the significance of small distances.” People working together over small distances tend to assume that virtual collaboration won’t be challenging. Wrong!

Some years ago, I worked with a number of under-performing European – US – Japanese virtual teams. Based on my research, I found the problems resulted from confusion due to the lack of a shared collaboration framework and poor use of technology. Working with them, I developed a framework that focused on six collaboration zones. These zones needed ongoing team performance reviews. I called these zones the Six Cs (see next

We’ve got virtual teams all over the world, and I’m willing to bet there are many in which no team member has ever even met another team member. It’s really easy to turn everybody into a voice on the phone and a line on a screen, and we don’t want that.

“

Rebecca Ranninger, Chief Human Resources Officer, Symantec

“

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The Six Cs It is the responsibility of the team leader to create the conditions needed for high levels of performance in each of the Six Cs. It is the responsibility of team members to ensure that their individual participation contributes to high performance in each of the Six Cs.

Too many teams – either co-located or virtual – lack a mutually agreed framework for their teamwork. Performance measures are often created for project deliverables, but not for the quality of the teamwork itself – which, of course, is critical to achieving the deliverables.

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Reflecting on Your Virtual TeamworkSpend some time thinking about your experiences on virtual teams.

In which of the Six Cs did the teams tend to do well, and in which did they tend to do poorly?

What do you think the reasons were?

What role did the good or poor use of technology play in team outcomes?

Could the poor performance have been avoided?

What was your contribution to both the high and low areas of performance?

What might you do differently on your next virtual team?

1

2

3

4

5

6

Cooperation

Convergence

Coordination

Capability

Communication


Developing supportive relationships across geographies, time zones and cultures

Maintaining a clear purpose, direction, and shared set of priorities across distances

Sharing processes, routines, tools, standards, and structure

Leveraging the knowledge, skills, and experiences on the team

Creating shared understandings across the team

Developing an inclusive virtual workplace for all

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Key messagesDigital FluencyThe Critical4 capabilities

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Two major types of virtual working are remote working and virtual teaming:

Not using the right technology for the right job with the right people and in the right way can cause great damage to working over distances

Applying five principles (PRIME) can make a huge impact on the quality of the remote work experience:

People Principle: Focus on connecting, not just making connections

Reality Principle: Determine what’s real from what’s imagined

Inclusion Principle: Communicate to bridge differences

Momentum Principle: Keep the energy flowing

Easy Principle: Make life easy for yourself and others

Virtual teamwork effectiveness requires team leaders and members to actively engage in developing Six Cs of collaboration

Cooperation Capability

Convergence Communication

Coordination Cultural Intelligence

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Cultural IntelligenceThe Critical4 capabilities

There are truths on this side of the Pyrenees, which are falsehoods on the other.

““

Blaise Pascal

Culture is the set of values, beliefs, and behaviors that define the way of life of a group.

Family, friends, schools, the media, and religious institutions are just a few of the influences that shape our orientations to what is ‘normal’ - in relationships, communication, time, power, problem solving, making decisions, sharing information…and so on. Learning to work and collaborate with people from other cultures is a vital skill in the borderless workplace. You don’t have to interact with people from other countries to experience cultural differences. Diversity within countries (and within organizations) can be just as exhilarating and challenging. Different professional cultures (e.g. R&D, Marketing, HR, Sales, and Finance) can also create barriers to collaboration. At the same time, the place where differences intersect is the most likely location for creativity and innovation.

Culture

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Cultures have different layers. On the surface are the tangible differences that you can hear, touch, taste, and see. Below that are less obvious orientations; here is a sample of four:

Meaning is stated directly. Say what you mean, and mean what you say.

Explicitcommunication

Meaning often has to be inferred from what is said and not said, and from body language.

Implicitcommunication

Value placed on punctuality, meeting deadlines. Time is money.

Tight use of timeThings will happen when the time is right. Rushing leads to mistakes.

Loose use of time

Analytical, step-by-step process toward a solution.

Linear thinking

Focus on exploring and integrating perspectives in a relatively unstructured way.

Circular thinking

Emphasis on dataand concrete experiences.

Facts

Emphasis on reasoning, concepts, and logic.

Thinking

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There is no right or wrong way in the above orientations, just different cultural expectations. Anyone working across cultures – either virtually or face-to-face – must learn to become culturally self-aware, recognize differences, understand their potential impact on working together, identify the best way to manage the differences, and practice self-management. The latter means recognizing your own ‘emotional triggers’ (e.g. someone who doesn’t get to the point), managing your typical response (e.g. a tendency to communicate impatience, even anger), and demonstrating a more considered and constructive reaction.

There are a number of ways we can work with cultural differences. For example:

Adapt – We can make adjustments in our behaviors, e.g. switching from an explicit style of communication to one that is more implicit.

Blend – We can create a cultural mix to gain the benefits of our different approaches, e.g. having the first half of a meeting operating in a Circular way while moving into a more Linear approach for the second half.

Co-Create – We can work at developing a shared culture, e.g. a team culture

Divide – We can do things our own way; our differences don’t significantly impact our working together.

Enforce – We have no choice, e.g. company policy mandates a specific behavior.

In working across cultures, we must avoid stereotypical thinking. A stereotype is a relatively fixed perception of a group, e.g. the [nationality] are always late for meetings. The problem with a stereotypical statement like this is that it doesn’t allow room for individual variation. Is every [nationality] late for meetings? No. While acknowledging that there are statistical tendencies in any group, you must pay attention to how the individuals you are working with think and behave.

In a borderless workplace making cultural adaptations can be a daily occurrence. What does it involve?

Making relatively small and often temporary changes in behavior; it is not about changing your cultural identity or undergoing radical personality change

Continuous learning. People and cultures are complex, and every cultural interaction has unique characteristics. The learning from one interaction cannot be applied rigidly to another.

The Cultural ADAPT Cycle is oneway to look at the overall process.

Culture

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A senior marketing manager from New York – Sophie – is going to pay her first visit to her counterpart in France - Alphonse. Sophie has done some background research on French business culture, and is going to apply the ADAPT Cycle.

AnalyzeBased on her research, Sophie recognizes there could be significant differences between herself and Alphonse, but she knows she must not make the mistake of thinking that Alphonse will be ‘typically French’. He is an individual, not a generalization, no matter how useful that generalization might be as a preparation tool. What she notices from her research is that the following might be potential challenges:

Explicit Communication (Sophie) vs. Implicit Communication (Alphonse?)

Tight (Sophie) vs. Loose Use of Time (Alphonse?)

Linear (Sophie) vs. Circular Problem Solving (Alphonse?)

Facts (Sophie) vs. Thinking Cognitive Style (Alphonse?)

Cognitive Style: She has gathered lots of data about the problem, but decides not to push it too hard at the beginning of the meeting. She will present a sound argument first. She will mention that she has brought some data, but wait until the timing feels right before presenting it.

DecideBased on her preparation, Sophie decides the following adaptations could be appropriate:

Communication: She will soften her communication style and become less explicit. She will make suggestions rather than give instructions.

Time: She decides to show up for the meeting on time, but not take it personally if Alphonse shows up a little late. She also decides not to look frustrated if the meeting is interrupted by others, or if it runs over time. She builds some extra time in her schedule before her next meeting.

Problem Solving: She decides to be very patient in the meeting and not drive toward a solution too quickly. She wants to give Alphonse time to explore the problem in depth and not feel rushed into a decision.

The ADAPT cycle inaction

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ApplyWhen she first meets Alphonse she decides to start slowly. She has done her preparation, but knows that what matters is what she learns about Alphonse in real time, and how she adapts in real time.

Before she left the US, she suggested to Alphonse that they meet for lunch before the meeting; that would give her time in a relaxed atmosphere to gain some insights about him. This helped a great deal because she learned that Alphonse had been an engineer before becoming a marketing manager, and that he had worked for three years in the United States. She realizes that her planned adaptations might not be totally appropriate. She needs to listen and learn; if she doesn’t she could easily impose a misleading ‘French’ stereotype on him.

ProcessCommunication: By letting Alphonse take the lead, Sophie learns that Alphonse is as explicit as most of her American colleagues. She sees no need for adaptations.

Time: The meeting is interrupted several times by phone calls, but Sophie has prepared herself for this. The meeting also runs over the allotted time, but again she is prepared, and doesn’t allow herself to show any sign of impatience. She uses the time during the interruptions to gather her thoughts, and reflect on the meeting so far and her performance.

Problem Solving: Sophie was prepared for a more circular approach to problem solving than her own, but she was surprised initially by his very linear approach (probably the influence of being an engineer). He suggested a process of five clear steps, although his approach to discussing the steps was wide-ranging

TuneSophie had been flexible, and she left the meeting feeling she had accomplished what she came to do – begin a productive working relationship with Alphonse. She had slowed down her normal pace of interaction, and by doing so had allowed herself to listen and watch carefully for signals that she was adapting appropriately.

She would reflect more on the meeting, but didn’t feel the need for major adjustments. The relationship was off to a good start.

If Sophie experiences further differences in Alphonse’s behavior, she will return to the Analyze step and cycle through the process again.

and sometimes tangential which was more of what she had expected. She decided to match his style and ‘go with the flow’, but occasionally she guided the discussion back to what she considered to be the main topic. At one point his body language suggested that she had been too assertive in trying to bring closure to a discussion, but she recognized this quickly and asked a question to open up the discussion again.

Cognitive Style: Her prepared strategy for holding off on introducing data was the best one. It became clear very quickly that Alphonse wanted to engage in a logical, well-thought out argument in the meeting. From the energy and enthusiasm he put into the debate, it became clear to her that Alphonse wanted to be persuaded about the robustness of the idea, and not just the validity of the data sample.

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Key messagesCultural IntelligenceThe Critical4 capabilities

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Culture is a set of values, beliefs, and behaviors that define the way of life of a group

You don’t have to interact with people from other countries to experience cultural differences

On the surface of culture are tangible differences that you can hear, touch, taste and see

Beneath the surface are more intangible differences like preferences for explicit or implicit communication

Stereotypes ignore individual variations in a cultural group

Several ways we can work with cultural differences are: Adapt, Blend, Co-Create, Divide, and Enforce

Adapting to cultural differences is a process:

Analyze

Decide

Apply

Process

Tune

My first experiences in the borderless workplace were in face-to-face meetings during seminars and workshops I delivered in countries like India, Japan, Vietnam, S. Korea, Norway, Poland, and France...over 30 countries in all. Globalization was the hot topic at that time which for the participants meant planting company flags around the world.

The audiences in those training sessions were mostly small groups of managers who spent a considerable amount of time at 30,000 feet. We were all frequent-flier warriors with passports packed with visas and immigration stamps.

Along came 9/11 - and advanced digital communications and collaboration technologies - and the dynamic changed. Not only were small groups of managers crossing borders, but thousands of others were confronting the realities of a world with diminishing border lines: competition from everywhere, complex problems, new networked organizational structures, and increased cross-cultural interactions.

These new realities challenged organizations to develop far greater agility in trying to lead and respond to fast, unpredictable, and ambiguous changes in the environment. To not only survive - but thrive - organizations needed to look harder at how they could bring diverse minds, skills and experiences together to collaborate on finding solutions and creating new value. The new digital tools enabled virtual collaboration across internal and external boundaries, but technology alone was not enough. People needed to develop higher levels of adaptability as they began interacting with unfamiliar cultural styles, and increased organizational complexity.

It is in this context that the Critical4 people capabilities came into clear focus:

Matrix Working: People with the thinking and behavioral agility to produce high levels of performance in a complex environments.

Borderless Collaboration: People with the mindsets and skills to work together across borders to innovate and create value

Digital Fluency: People with the ability to make the most effective use of new communications and collaboration technologies

Cultural Intelligence: developing people with the adaptability to bridge and leverage differences between individuals and groups.

I get excited by the borderless workplace. It presents us with a huge opportunity for creating a more fulfilling, innovative, and prosperous world . . . for everyone.

Terence Brake

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Wrap up

borderless learning

We help people work better together in today’s borderless workplace. We understand the challenges of managing change in a global and virtual world. We know the skillsets your people need to make the most of the opportunities. And we have the experts, the solutions, and the technology to develop your talent: across teams, across cultures, across the world.

The Critical 4 CurriculumThe Critical 4 Curriculum develops leadership in Matrix Working, Borderless Collaboration, Digital Fluency, and Cultural Intelligence. Find out which solutions will transform the performance of your people at tmaworld.com. Learning on demandWe have the technology and global facilitator network to bring the training to you, wherever you are. You tell us how you’d prefer to learn and we’ll make it happen through a flexible combination of: workshops, virtual classrooms, e-learning, mobile learning, apps, forums and online tools, all coordinated through the TMA World Learning Portal.

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Main referencesThe Critical4 capabilities

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1. Introducing the 2013 BCG Global Challengers, January 15, 2013.

2. From global connection to global orchestration: Future business models for high performance where technology and the multi-polar world meet.

3. Organizational agility: How business can survive and thrive in turbulent times. Economist Intelligence Unit, 2009.

4. Race to success: Speed and agility are keys to winning the future. Forbes, February 29, 2012

5. The Collaboration Imperative. Ivey Business Journal, Jan/Feb, 2012

6. The social economy: Unlocking value and productivity through social technologies. McKinsey Global Institute, July 2012

7. Leading through connections: Insights from the IBM Global: Insights from the Chief Executive Officer Study, 2012

8. Managing virtual teams: Taking a more strategic approach. Economist Intelligence Unit, 2009

9. Working beyond borders: Insights from the IBM Global Human Resource Officer Study, 2010

10. The Global Talent Index Report: The Outlook to 2015. The Economist Intelligence Unit, 2011.

11. Leading through connections (see number 7)

12. The orchestra as mass collaboration. The Guardian, November 12, 2012

13. Your company is connected – but can it make and execute good decisions? Bain & Company, October 9, 2012

14. Managing to collaborate: The theory and practice of collaborative advantage. Chris Huxham and Siv Vangen, Oxford: Routledge, 2005

15. Home office life and its discontents. The New York Times, January 3, 2008

16. Future Work: How businesses can adapt and thrive in the new world of work. Alison Maitland and Peter Thomson, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011

17. Does working from home work? Evidence from a Chinese Study, Stanford University, 2013

18. How to manage virtual teams. MIT Sloan Management Review, July 2009

https://www.bcgperspectives.com/content/articles/globalization_growth_introducing_the_2013_bcg_global_challengers/

http://www.accenture.com/SiteCollectionDocuments/PDF/Accenture_From_Global_Connection_to_Global_Orchestration.pdf

http://www.emc.com/collateral/leadership/organisational-agility-230309.pdf

http://www.iveybusinessjournal.com/topics/leadership/the-collaboration-imperative

http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/mgi/research/technology_and_innovation/the_social_economy

http://www-935.ibm.com/services/us/en/c-suite/ceostudy2012/

http://graphics.eiu.com/upload/eb/NEC_Managing_virtual_teams_WEB.pdf

http://www-935.ibm.com/services/c-suite/chro/study/

http://www.managementthinking.eiu.com/sites/default/files/downloads/GTI%20FINAL%20REPORT%205.4.11.pdf

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012/nov/12/orchestra-mass-collaboration-music-toronto

http://www.bain.com/publications/articles/the-connected-enterprise.aspx

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/garden/03nooffice.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

http://www.stanford.edu/~nbloom/WFH.pdf

http://sloanreview.mit.edu/the-magazine/2009-summer/50412/how-to-manage-virtual-teams/

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The Borderless Workplace: The critical 4 capabilities for the new world of work

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Transcript of The Borderless Workplace: The critical 4 capabilities for the new world of work