Growing Greenup Leadership Strategies – Do You Encourage Competition or Collaboration?

Growing Greenup

Leadership Strategies – Do You Encourage Competition or Collaboration?

Anne Stephens

For The Ashland Beacon

Have you ever been part of a leadership program? I have to admit, I love this stuff. I enjoy personality assessments and strength/weakness scales. People are so very different, and I find it fascinating! Leadership, to me, is recognizing our own tendencies so that we can put them to use effectively. Once we can do this, we can learn how to help others do the same. Equally important is recognizing weaknesses, which leads to opportunities to improve and/or rely on someone else who can fill the gap.

In a professional setting, these skills can make all the difference when you are leading a group of people who need to successfully work together as a committee or team. Taking the competition out of collaboration is a leadership skill that is difficult but rewarding when the success of the collaboration becomes apparent. Keeping it going is another skill that never loses its importance.

Blueprint Kentucky is a leadership and community development hub at the University of Kentucky. I love working with them and Dan Kahl, the author of the article I am sharing this week. As always, if you are interested in more materials on this topic or any other that I have shared in this column, please reach out to me! I’m easy to find – contact information is always at the end of the Growing Greenup column. 

POWER PLAYS AND PARTNERSHIPS: RETHINKING LEADERSHIP ASSUMPTIONS

By Daniel Kahl, PhD., Associate Director, Blueprint Kentucky Associate Professor, Department of Community and Leadership Development (CLD)

Everyone loves to win. But to have winners, there need to be losers, right? Not necessarily. However, our assumptions on winning may shape our leadership behaviors. Understanding outcomes as win/lose is typical with competition. Competition is so familiar to many of us that it is a default perspective from which we approach the world. Competition dominates many aspects of our lives - among businesses, in athletics, and even shaping how we relate to our siblings, neighbors, or coworkers.

Competition is a great motivator and can drive change. But seeing everything as competition can also influence our assumptions about who we can trust and how to best respond in a world of limited resources. Alternatively, working closely with partners in highly collaborative efforts may be necessary to achieve a desired result.

Collaboration is an approach that moves beyond communication and cooperation to seek a shared win between participants. High levels of collaboration require deep trust, shared power, and constant communication. How we approach collaboration differs from how we approach competition. Our assumptions on winning outcomes can define our working relationships and even shape the approaches we use as leaders.

For example:

COMMUNICATION – Debate presumes someone will dominate and win an argument, whereas dialogue seeks to reach a foundation of common understanding.

NEGOTIATION – Distributive negotiation seeks to gain at the expense of the other party, where integrative negotiation uses tactics that seek mutually beneficial outcomes.

DECISION MAKING – Voting is a win/lose decision making process (typically determined by majority), while consensus processes are designed to find solutions agreeable to all parties.

ASSERTION OF POWER – Traditional command and control methods of leadership assert that power is fixed and tightly held. Shared power approaches like collaborative leadership are characterized by the belief that sharing power with others expands power for everyone. How we define who wins or what constitutes winning is an important consideration for leadership.

Certainly, there are both costs and benefits that are associated with competition vs. collaboration, but there are also levels of winning that range from individual wins to organizational wins, and even victories for the entire community. When leading, remember that the shared fundamental assumptions of the rules of the game will influence group process and outcomes.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

Take a moment to consider your own assumptions about competitive or collaborative relationships and how those assumptions may influence leadership relationships:

What is an example of a competitive leadership relationship you have experienced?

How did the competitive relationship come about?

How did you feel about the outcome/s?

What is an example of a collaborative leadership relationship you have been in?

How did that collaborative relationship come about?

How did you feel about the outcome/s?

KENTUCKY COMMUNITY LEADERSHIP PROGRAMS NETWORK DISCUSSION QUESTIONS CONTINUED:

Think about the issues in your community over the last few years that have led to disagreement or disputes:

What leadership approach – competition or collaboration - did community leaders seem to use when addressing this dispute? Why do you think they chose this leadership approach rather than the alternative? What are situations where a competitive approach may work better as a leadership strategy? What are situations where a collaborative approach may work better than a competitive strategy?

WANT TO KNOW MORE?

In “The Collaboration Spectrum Revisited” (Weaver, 2021) expresses a range of ways to describe working relationships, ranging from competition to integration. Recognizing that relationships will vary by project and intended outcomes, Weaver emphasizes the importance of being intentional about identifying the most appropriate working relationship early in the project. Defining the working relationship and methods of working together can have impacts on shared investment and longer-term outcome sustainability.

Many community or social issues are larger and more complicated than any one entity can address by themselves. When aligning multiple organizations from across the community, the approach of “Collective Impact” (Kania & Kramer, 2011) provides a tested working framework for supporting collaborative efforts.

For more information, contact Anne Stephens, Agent for Community Arts and Development in Greenup County. 606.836.0201 anne.stephens@uky.edu 35 Wurtland Avenue, Wurtland, KY 41144 The Martin-Gatton College of Agriculture, Food and Environment is an Equal Opportunity Organization with respect to education and employment and authorization to provide research, education information and other services only to individuals and institutions that function without regard to economic or social status and will not discriminate on the basis of race, color, ethnic origin, national origin, creed, religion, political belief, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, marital status, genetic information, age, veteran status, physical or mental disability or reprisal or retaliation for prior civil rights activity. University of Kentucky, Kentucky State University, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and Kentucky Counties, Cooperating.