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Facilitate Cross-Departmental Problem Solving

ALL TOO OFTEN, organizational issues are solved by one or two leaders who, in all likelihood, do not have to implement the decisions. This is often left to the front-line employee, which hurts motivation and does not develop leadership. Stop! Bring front-line team members along for the discussion. If you teach team members how to have these conversations with other departments, they will be more likely to solve issues on their own in the future. This develops an employee’s leadership capacity for problem solving outside his or her own arena.

Contact the director of the other department and request a brainstorming meeting. This should not be confrontational in nature—simply a meeting to help alleviate stress on both ends (recall Tip #4: Model Effective Confrontation). If the two directors and a few front-line team members are part of the solution, it is more likely that the results will stick. It also gets the team members to think like leaders. At the beginning, you and the other department leader could state the problem and turn it over to the team members to solve among themselves. This action fosters communication among different levels of the organization. Try this idea and you will be amazed at how well it can work. Your role in this approach is to facilitate. The front-line team members’ challenge is to problem solve—let them learn firsthand how difficult (and rewarding) this process can be.

If you’re a leader with several layers of management reporting to you, walk your talk. Executives are often the worst offenders of problem solving outside their spheres of influence. One example of this can been seen in the myriad times we have attended executive team meetings. Here’s the typical scenario. Let’s say there’s a marketing issue. It may be discussed on the executive team, but peripherally. What often happens is that, after a brief discussion, the problem is turned over to the marketing leader for further analysis “up and down” her chain of command. We’re not saying that this is ineffective. We are saying that more time must be spent within the executive team to get a sense of the divergent views from a variety of disciplines. Then it could be taken to others within the marketing system for further analysis. Or, if the analysis is made within the marketing area, the executive can then bring it to the table with the full executive team for a robust discussion of potential considerations that would be worth the marketing team’s attention.

These strategies help potential leaders understand that leadership is about understanding the needs of the organization from diverse perspectives. One hallmark of a good leader is the ability to transcend multiple viewpoints—this tip is a first step in being exposed to these perspectives.