From Transactional to Transformational: Rethinking Collaboration Across Teams

We talk about collaboration a lot. It's in every mission statement, every leadership retreat, every job description. But if we're honest, much of what we call "collaboration" is just coordination: people sharing calendars, chiming in on Slack threads, and checking boxes together without ever really aligning in purpose or connection.

The truth is, real collaboration, the kind that leads to innovation, trust, and transformational change, requires more than process. It requires people. And it requires us to get uncomfortable enough to rethink how we relate to one another across teams, silos, and roles.

Transactional Collaboration is Safe But Shallow

In many organizations, cross-functional teamwork is often limited to what I refer to as "transactional collaboration." You do your part, I do mine, and we meet to ensure everything fits together. It's efficient, polite, and safe. But it doesn't stretch us. It doesn't challenge our assumptions or invite us to co-create something better than what any one team could have done alone.

Harvard Business Review describes this as "coordination over collaboration," where we align actions but not perspectives, values, or shared ownership. According to a 2022 report by Deloitte, 83% of organizations admit to being siloed to some degree, and that fragmentation hinders innovation and engagement.

Transformational Collaboration Is Rooted in Relationships

Transformational collaboration begins with relationships, not just roles.

It asks:

• Do we trust each other enough to disagree and stay in dialogue?

• Are we willing to be influenced, not just heard?

• Are we co-authoring the solution, or just complying with each other's checklists?

When people feel seen, respected, and included, they contribute more deeply. Research from Dr. Amy Edmondson at Harvard highlights the importance of psychological safety, which is the shared belief that it's safe to take risks and be vulnerable at work. Teams with high psychological safety are more likely to speak up, learn from mistakes, and engage in the kind of honest conversations that collaboration requires.

Collaboration Isn't Just a Skill. It's a System.

We often frame collaboration as a soft skill (I call "soft skills" "success skills"), but it's also a systemic choice. The way we design our organizations either enables or inhibits genuine partnership. Are we rewarding silos or shared success? Are we carving out time for reflection and co-creation, or are we moving so fast we can't even pause long enough to listen?

In my work with clients, I've seen that the strongest cross-team partnerships often begin not in formal meetings, but in informal relationships—the hallway conversations. The times you reach out before there's a problem, not just after one. That's where empathy grows. Empathy, according to a study by Catalyst, is the most critical leadership skill for driving engagement and innovation, particularly across diverse teams.

Making the Shift: From Surface to Substance

If you're a leader looking to shift your team (or your whole organization) from transactional to transformational collaboration, here are a few starting points:

1.     Name the Shared Why: Start every joint project by anchoring in purpose. What are we trying to accomplish, and why does it matter? Anchoring with purpose creates alignment beyond the task list and builds commitment rooted in meaning.

2.     Slow Down to Speed Up: Yes, collaboration takes time. But slowing down to build trust, clarify expectations, and check for alignment early will save countless hours (and headaches) down the line. A McKinsey study found that teams that invest upfront in role clarity and trust building are significantly more likely to deliver high performance.

3.     Normalize Productive Disagreement: Real collaboration includes conflict. It's how we grow. The goal is not to avoid friction, but to manage it well. Set norms for respectful disagreement, ask for different perspectives, and model curiosity over certainty.

4.     Invest in Cross-Team Relationships: Leaders: Make space for your people to build genuine relationships across the organization. Create opportunities for shadowing, storytelling, or shared learning across departments. Relationships are the foundation of all collaboration, and they don't happen by accident.

5.     Measure What Matters: If collaboration is important, measure it. Don't just track outputs. Track shared decision-making, cross-functional wins, and employee perceptions of inclusion and trust. What gets measured gets prioritized.

Final Thought

Collaboration isn't about getting along. It's about getting aligned. It's about being brave enough to move past the surface, build trust across differences, and co-create something better together.

We don't need more status meetings. We need more courageous connections. That's where the real work begins.