9 Happy Collaboration Behaviours

I was recently involved in a project — outside of work — where the group dynamic became quite negative. It happens. During a debate about one aspect of the project, a number of people on that team became a bit defensive, and at the end of the day they no longer wanted to work together at all. It made me stop and wonder what had gone wrong. Disagreement and debate happens every day on my team at HubSpot, yet we maintain a positive energy and continue to love working together.

What was my team at HubSpot doing right that this other team was doing wrong?

I started to identify the approaches that my team on the product team at HubSpot take when making decisions and quickly realized that these approaches have also applied to successful cross-team collaboration on projects. Often when some of these elements were missing, the cross-team collaboration was more difficult or even came to a standstill.

Every product team in HubSpot has what we call a triad. This is the collaborative relationship between a Product Manager, Designer and Technical Lead. Our triad organically fell into this pattern working together, but we have also had to finesse our diplomacy skills in order to build good relationships with other teams and keep projects moving forward.

Here are my nine tips for successful collaboration:

1. Show you care.

Each team member needs to know the others care about their happiness and well-being, both in our professional and personal lives. In our triad, we always start our weekly planning meetings by enquiring about and discussing what’s going on in our lives outside of work. The cross-team projects that have been smoothest have been when both teams have taken time to try and get to know each other, either over zoom or in person.

2. Welcome disagreement.

We find that challenging each other respectfully makes us consider things we hadn’t thought of before and leads to a better result.

I recently shared a design with my Product Manager, who felt that the system should behave in a different way. We spent about an hour debating these two approaches, running though every scenario they impacted. There were moments in the conversation I felt frustrated that I was being challenged but in the end I started to see the other approach was going to work better and I was completely on board with switching direction.

3. Value divergent opinions.

“Diplomats recognize that it’s almost as important to people to feel heard as to win their case.”

— The School of Life, Alain de Botton

In cross-team projects, I’ve found that it is so important to take time to hear, consider, and explore everyone’s ideas. If one team tries to impose their idea on another team, there are two likely outcomes. Either they will be met with resistance and the project won’t move forward, or the other team will feel forced to do something they didn’t decide for themselves and will resentfully drag their feet through it.

4. Don’t take it (or say it) personally.

Nobody in the room takes it personally when people disagree with them, as the critique is about the topic, not the individual’s ability.

When I studied design in college, every Friday I had to present my work to my class and be critiqued by my tutors and peers. I found these sessions difficult. I had put so much heart, effort, and thought into the designs, and I found it upsetting that they were being publicly torn apart. I interpreted the negative feedback as a reflection of my skills and potential as a designer.

As these sessions went on, I started to realise that my work was getting better. It occured to me that everyone in the room wanted the same thing as I did — to create the best possible user experience. I started seeing the sessions as a learning opportunity and by changing my mindset it became easier to accept feedback. I no longer attached any personal feelings to my designs or the feedback they received.

5. Admit ignorance.

Everyone feels comfortable admitting that they don’t know something. No one judges another person for not knowing. Showing that you don’t know is considered a strength, as it allows others to help you find the answers—and as a result, your knowledge and skills will grow.

I was recently a mentor in HubSpot’s associate UX programme, and the designer I was working with needed help improving a visual design. I was struggling to verbalise what was and wasn’t working in the design, and I couldn’t give her the help she needed. This was hard to admit because as a mentor I felt that I should have all the answers. I shared with her that visual design is one of my weaker skills and sought help from a very talented visual designer at HubSpot. By being able to admit my weakness, she and I were able to grow in this area together.

6. Invite feedback.

There’s an openness to new ideas and approaches on my team, and even if it makes us feel uncomfortable or scared, we’re willing to give things a try. We have an attitude that we can always adjust if an approach isn’t working out. There is no rigidness in our plans. We seek and receive feedback.

Our team went through multiple different methods of planning, prioritizing, and tracking the progress of our work. We used a variety of tools and approaches. Every time a person on the team aired their frustrations about the process not being effective, the rest of us listened carefully and agreed to make changes. Eventually, we found a model that works well for us. As a result, we have become very efficient—but we only got there by being open to change and to trying new ideas.

7. Fail and move on.

There’s no blame attached to a person who championed an idea that didn’t work out. The person who championed the idea generally has the humility to admit that it wasn’t a success, and can take ownership and accountability rather than denying and persevering with a failed approach to protect their ego.

8. Ask for help.

Everyone knows they can ask for help if they’re carrying a heavy load. Help will be given to those who ask for it.

When my workload is heavy, my Product Manager often steps in and helps drive decisions on smaller UX problems in our product, freeing up my time to focus on higher priority initiatives. When I’m able to admit that I can’t do it all and trusting in another person to help me, everyone wins. Our customers see improvements in our product more quickly, our engineering team is unblocked on work they need to execute on, and the business gets to bring high value projects to market faster due to UX having focused time to deliver.

9. Don’t stay in your lane.

Everyone has a role or responsibility that they’re accountable for, but everyone on the team is involved in the decision making for that role. For example, my role is design, but everyone in the team is involved in making design decisions. We don’t confine the use of research to researchers, or the consideration of business opportunities to product managers, or technical aspects to engineers, either.We make choices together, as a team, as to how the product will work best for the customer and what might be the best direction to take.

If you’re having difficulty collaborating with your team, or collaborating across several teams, setting these approaches as ground rules could help improve a triad dynamic or cross-team endeavour. It’s certainly helped our team through some tight spots.