Collaborative Leadership

One of the main themes discussed at our event in February was ‘Collective Leadership’ and how it underpins the other challenges by setting up a culture that empowers the employee.
In this newsletter, we explore the concept a bit further and provide two case studies. If you are interested by this topic, please contact us for a discussion of what collective leadership could look like in your organisation.

Collective leadership is non-hierarchical and collaborative, and it requires heightened awareness throughout the whole organization. This means that everyone has a voice and takes responsibility for the success of the team and organization, not just for their own jobs. The responsibility shifts from being centered on a few individuals in formal positions of authority to being cross-organizational.

According to the Human Capital Institute, fully engaged employees return up to 120 per cent of their salary in value.

Why collective leadership is the way forward

Cisco is one of the largest technology companies in the world with revenues of more than $40 billion. But as other market players matured, the company’s growth began to decline. In response, Cisco decided to move from a traditional top-down leadership structure to a collaborative model built on a series of boards and councils.   Annmarie Neal, the chief talent officer at the time, explains that it wasn’t an easy transition but eventually competition for power and resources was replaced by shared responsibility for success. Cisco’s new leadership initiative, C-LEAD (collaborate, learn, execute, accelerate, disrupt), focused on innovation and shifting from developing “superstars” to “super-teams”. The company claims to have saved millions of dollars and generated billions in new business as a result.

Ardanta, the third largest insurance group in the Netherlands, was a firm with a command and control leadership style. Following the global financial crisis in 2008, the firm confronted huge challenges including mistrust of the financial sector and growing competition. In response, the CEO decided to implement a collective leadership program from mid 2010 to 2011. As result, Ardanta shifted from being a firm with employees working in silos with a low sense of responsibility and little interest in innovation, to one with an empowered workforce with self-confidence and a sense of worth that takes ownership and responsibility for decisions, leading to a positive impact on the company’s business outcomes. By 2013, productivity increased by 35 per cent, recruitment reduced by 20 per cent, and within two months two new sales channels accounted for 13 per cent of total sales in a highly competitive and saturated market.