MIT Sloan Management Review Article on How to Lead Effective Cross-Functional Teams

Focusing on three central tasks can help leaders foster better collaboration with cross-functional teams.

Digital transformation is knocking down silos that have long separated functions within an organization. To succeed, adapt, and innovate at the pace of modern business, disparate units often need to be part of the same project from the beginning, ensuring that their needs are met without delaying the launch of a new initiative.

As MIT Sloan Management Review and Deloitte explored in Coming of Age Digitally, effective leaders must get people “to collaborate across boundaries” more than ever.

It’s a tough task. How do you manage a team when only some of its employees report to you? How do multiple managers share the responsibilities and challenges? If there’s a dispute, who has final say?