Collaboration Isn’t About Getting Along: What One Team’s Story Reveals About Failing Systems

Collaboration sounds like a given in modern organizations. We say we value it. We hire for it. We even list it on our websites and walls. But in practice? Collaboration often fails quietly… not because people aren’t willing, but because the system isn’t built to support it.

I’ve seen it firsthand. In one organization, teams were competent and well-intentioned. Managers were trusted, and departments operated smoothly on their own. Yet, initiatives stalled. Communication misfired. Trust eroded.

The culprit wasn’t motivation or talent. It was a deeper issue:

They hadn’t unlearned the habits and structures that make real collaboration possible.

Here’s what that transformation looked like, and what it made possible.

Collaboration fails when the system isn’t built to support it.

A few years ago, I worked with a mid-size organization in the healthcare space that reached out to me with a strange problem. On paper, they were thriving: Each department was meeting its KPIs (for the most part). Quarterly reports looked solid. People were professional, kind, and eager to support the mission.

But under the surface, something wasn’t clicking.

I first noticed it during a cross-departmental leadership session. Each team lead spoke passionately about their goals, but no one could articulate how their work connected with other departments.

The finance lead shared that her team kept getting last-minute requests that derailed their timelines.
The communications director admitted she often heard about new initiatives after they’d launched.
The HR manager said her team was being looped into people problems only when they escalated.

When I asked who was responsible for integrating across functions, there was a long silence. Then someone said, “I guess… whoever has the most time that week?”

That was the crux of the issue. 

There was no intentional design behind collaboration. No structure. No system.

Everyone wanted to work better together, but they’d defaulted to DIY solutions and unspoken assumptions. One leader would cc five people “just in case,” while another held weekly huddles that half the team didn’t attend because it “wasn’t their meeting.” Each team had their own tools, their own processes, their own language.

No wonder things stalled.

> When initiatives dragged, no one knew where the holdup was, only that something got missed. 

> When decisions were delayed, people quietly made their own, leading to duplicated work and frustrated teams.

> When accountability slipped, it wasn’t about laziness; it was about misalignment.

They weren’t failing because they didn’t care. They were failing because they didn’t have a shared framework for collaboration. There was no structured way to define roles (think RACI). No agreed-upon feedback loops. No system to support the how of working together, just the what of their individual goals.

They were collaborative in spirit, but not in practice.

That’s the danger of conflating collaboration with congeniality. When systems don’t support shared ownership, even high-trust cultures can become breeding grounds for burnout, inefficiency, and disengagement.

So what needs to be unlearned?

Creating a culture of collaboration required more than a few new tools; it demanded an unlearning of the leadership norms that had quietly shaped how this organization operated for years.

→ We started with the Lone-Wolf Myth.

Many of the managers we worked with had earned their roles by being the go-to person: The fixer. The one who stayed late, cleaned up the details, and made sure nothing fell through the cracks. It was hardwired into their identity.

In our first training session, I asked:

“What do you think your team says about you when you’re not in the room?”

A long pause followed…

One manager finally answered: “Probably that I work hard. That I get it done. That I don’t need anyone.” We unpacked that – gently – because underneath the pride was something else: Isolation. Fatigue. A growing resentment that no one else was stepping up… all while unconsciously signaling that no one needed to.

That’s where we had to start: Unlearning that doing it all makes you a better leader. And replacing that with a new belief: Leadership is creating space for others to lead.

Our work together was already starting to create meaningful shifts (Does this sound familiar? Let’s have a chat. Even something as seemingly simple as an Unlearning workshop will create meaningful shifts in your company culture). 

→ Then came the Perfectionist Paradigm.

Even as we introduced shared ownership frameworks, we noticed a pattern: managers would say they were delegating, but then quietly redo the work behind the scenes. One said:

“It’s just faster if I do it. And honestly, I want it done right.”

Here’s the cost of that mindset: Every time you redo someone’s work, you reinforce that they can’t be trusted. Over time, they stop trying. They stop initiating. They start playing small.

So we worked on coaching the process, not correcting the product. We normalized imperfect first drafts. We created checkpoints where feedback could happen earlier, and we reminded leaders: the goal isn’t polish, it’s participation.

→ Finally, we addressed the Ad-Hoc Trap.

This organization had no formal collaboration systems. If you wanted input from another team, you either knew someone… or you didn’t. If a project involved multiple departments, it was “figured out” in real time, usually over email chains or side chats.

There was goodwill, but no guardrails.

So we brought in a light-touch version of RACI. We kept it simple: Who owns what? Who needs to be informed? Who’s being looped in too late? We built checklists for kickoffs. We created templates for decision logs. We walked through real examples of where accountability had previously slipped, and mapped out how it would be caught next time.

We didn’t stop there.

We paired these structural changes with real conversations about what was missing from the emotional infrastructure:
✅ Psychological safety to challenge assumptions
✅ Permission to ask questions without feeling incompetent
✅ Time in meetings dedicated to alignment, not just updates

The truth is that collaboration isn’t just a mindset shift. It’s an operational one.

When we rebuild collaboration with intention—from the beliefs we hold to the systems we use—it becomes more than a buzzword. It becomes a performance strategy. 

As this team learned, it becomes the difference between a culture of competence and a culture of collective brilliance.

Here’s the shift I’ve seen in real time:

After implementing these changes with that same mid-size public sector client, we didn’t just check a box; we watched a ripple effect unfold.

It started with one pilot team. We introduced a collaborative framework that was simple but powerful. Every project was mapped using a shared ownership model: clearly defining who was responsible, who was accountable, who needed to be consulted, and who simply needed to be informed. (Yes, it’s based on the RACI model—but we adapted it to feel more human, less bureaucratic.)

Each manager was trained to facilitate, not fix. Their 1:1s shifted from status updates to shared problem-solving. Instead of absorbing issues and promising to “take care of it,” they began asking:

“Who else should be part of this decision?”
“Where do you need more clarity before you move forward?”
“What would it look like for you to lead this?”

The first few weeks were uncomfortable. Old habits don’t vanish overnight.
Over time, something remarkable happened: One team lead who’d previously worked late every night—reviewing slide decks, rewriting reports, double-checking every deliverable—emailed me to say:

“For the first time in my career, I’m not the bottleneck. My team is stepping up, and I’m learning to let them.”

Meanwhile, an analyst who’d barely spoken during early strategy sessions began offering critical insights that shifted how two departments allocated resources for the quarter.

Another team initiated their own biweekly cross-functional sync—without being told to—just because “it made our jobs easier.”

And meetings?
          They got shorter.
          Sharper.
          More effective.

People came in prepared because they knew their role.
Decisions got made faster because expectations were aligned.
Follow-through improved because accountability wasn’t assumed—it was owned.

But here’s the most important part:

None of this happened because the people changed.
It happened because how they worked together finally did.

That shift—from individual effort to collective alignment—is where true collaboration lives.

When Systems Change, So Does Leadership

The results weren’t instant, but they were lasting.

Collaboration stopped being a buzzword and started becoming a lived experience:

• Shared goals became truly shared.
• Teams challenged each other with curiosity, not defensiveness.
• Managers let go of the need to prove and stepped into the role of facilitator.

And it all started with unlearning.

➤ Unlearning that asking for help is weakness.
➤ Unlearning that speed matters more than shared understanding.
➤ Unlearning that good teams “just figure it out.”

If your team is talented but stuck, ask yourself:

Have we built a system where collaboration can truly thrive? Or are we just hoping goodwill will carry us through?

Let’s build something better, together.

📅 Want to explore what this could look like in your organization?

Let’s make it real.

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