Your cross-pollination game

Leaders often ask this question: "Have you thought about [insert idea or topic]?" It's our way of trying to create and add value to the work or thought process we're discussing together, making sure the team hasn't left any stone unturned, or inject new perspectives into the discussion.

This instigation, however, can be only be as effective as when leaders are deliberate and intentional about the ideas and topics they choose to suggest. Anyone can suggest more new or different things to consider—and depending on what stage of decision making you're in, simply throwing new things into the mix can, in fact, create distractions and unnecessary diversions. And look, I get it—leaders are people too, and we want to feel useful and helpful. To that end, I'd encourage all of us to think a bit more deeply and deliberately about a specific version of "have you thought about" question that can be incredibly powerful in any organization.

Next time you're in a conversation with your team, instead of just suggesting whether they've thought about some idea or topic, be more specific and try this: "have you thought about [insert idea or topic] in connection to what [insert team or teammate's name] is working on?"

By connecting the idea or topic to specific person or team's work, what you are doing is to help cultivate critical, individual habits that can become an important muscle for the entire organization. All businesses talk about connecting dots between ideas and people and how much more effective and powerful the sum of all things can become, but don't put the work in to create the every habits required to make it a part of your work. I'll be even more specific as to how you might go about practicing your part:

• Your job as a leader is to try as much as possible maintain a higher altitude of perspective, and longer timeline of possibilities. Everyday things will always bolt you down to the near-term incentives and decisions—and I'm not saying they aren't important, but you've got teams who are in charge of making those everyday decisions and running the business, as long as you've got a clear framework and articulation of shared goals and decision making.
• While maintaining this altitude of perspective and timeline of possibilities, you need to ask your leadership team to help inform and educate you about the components of the work that's going on in your organization. If possible, do this with cross-functional teams that are closely connected to your organization's ability to succeed and do work. In other words, have a general sense of who's working on what and why at an appropriate altitude and understanding, and make sure you refresh your knowledge on a regular basis. How you get this information can take many different forms, including 1:1s with your leadership team, weekly meetings, weekly emails or newsletters, whatever format of information sharing that you will actually read and digest and utilize.
• There's the people part of the work, and work part of the work product. Cultivate an understanding of who might already have established or resilient network of connections inside the company (because of the nature of their work, like product marketers, or because of their tenure) vs. those who might not (because of the nature of their work, like operational roles within specific functions, or because of their tenure). And apply that understanding to figure out which individuals or teams might be sitting on insights or work that can benefit many others around the organization, and conversely, who might need more help creating that initial connection. This is where that second half of the "have you thought about" question comes into play. It's not just about connecting ideas and topics, but connecting them specifically in the context or your people and teams. That's how you scale the idea and behavior of "connecting dots" by introducing and instigating the meeting of ideas through people around your organization.

This is especially critical for any business that's undergoing a shift in workforce and culture. What we often do is talk to people who fall into the "less connected" bucket of their organizations and point them to "more connected" people or teams who've been experts and anchors for the business, because of their work or tenure. That's only one side of the equation. Be sure to do it the other way around, i.e. suggest to your "more connected" teammates that they should seek out ideas and topics from teams or bodies of work that aren't yet as well connected or established, too. It takes both parties to create the kinds of resilient connections that result in healthy instigation of new ideas and meeting of the minds. But it certainly takes effort and intention—and your contribution as a leader, armed with some of the everyday practices and habits I've shared today, can come from upping the cross-pollination game across the business.