Beyond Collaboration Overload: How to Work Smarter, Get Ahead, and Restore Your Well-Being

by Rob Cross

Named the Best Management Book of 2021 by strategy+business

Named one of "this month's top titles" in the Financial Times in September 2021

Named to the longlist for the 2021 Outstanding Works of Literature (OWL) Award in the Management & Culture category

A plan for conquering collaborative overload to drive performance and innovation, reduce burnout, and enhance well-being.

Most organizations have created always-on work contexts that are burning people out and hurting performance rather than delivering productivity, innovation and engagement. Collaborative work consumes 85% of employees' time and is drifting earlier into the morning, later into the night, and deeper into the weekend.

The dilemma is that we all need to collaborate more to create effective organizations and vibrant careers for ourselves. But conventional wisdom on teamwork and collaboration has created too much of the wrong kind of collaboration, which hurts our performance, health and overall well-being.

In Beyond Collaboration Overload, Babson professor Rob Cross solves this paradox by showing how top performers who thrive at work collaborate in a more purposeful way that makes them 18-24% more efficient than their peers. Good collaborators are distinguished by the efficiency and intentionality of their collaboration—not the size of their network or the length of their workday.

Through landmark research with more than 300 organizations, in-depth stories, and tools, Beyond Collaboration Overload will coach you to reclaim close to a day a week when

Identify and challenge beliefs that lead you to collaborate too quicklyImpose structure in your work to prevent unproductive collaborationAlter behaviors to create more efficient collaboration

It then outlines how successful people invest this reclaimed time

Cultivate a broad network—not a big one—for innovation and scaleEnergize others—a strong predictor of high performanceConnect with others to reduce micro-stressors and enhance physical and mental well-being

Cross' framework provides relief from the definitive problem of our age—dysfunctional collaboration at the expense of our performance, health and overall well-being.

Genres: Business, Management, Nonfiction, Professional Development, Self Help, Personal Development, Leadership

212 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 14, 2021

Reviews

[Ell · Rating 5 out of 5]

After a decade working for myself, I am returning to the office setting in a mid-sized organization. I suspect my biggest challenge will be getting collaboration right. I know from a decade of working with clients that the right ideas regarding collaboration positively influences achievement and morale. I also know from my decade working with clients that workforce collaboration is often misguided and can lead to team dysfunction.

Harvard Business Review has always been a go-to reference for me that has never let me down. So, when I saw Beyond Collaboration Overload How to Work Smarter, Get Ahead, and Restore Your Well-Being, I just knew I had to read it to get practical insight and best practices to guide me along my new career journey.

In Beyond Collaboration Overload, Babson professor Rob Cross reviews research from more than 300 organizations to distinguish productive beliefs, behaviors and procedures from misguided practices which negatively impact employee morale and team objectives. I gained insight which will hopefully allow me to avoid what Carson calls, “dysfunctional collaboration at the expense of our performance, health and overall well-being.”

I highly recommend this book to managers, leaders, consultants, human resource professionals, and anyone who must regularly work in a team environment.

[Kym Hamer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found two thirds of this quite insightful and an interesting take on the collaboration phenomenon sweeping through our culture. However, the last couple of chapters undermined this with a discussion on purpose which was neither new and pretty much chock full of stuff I'd read everywhere else - nor especially insightful. So a bit disappointing in the end but the actual discussion on collaboration makes this worh reading. 4 stars.

[Austin Wang · Rating 5 out of 5]

actually a good business book for once

[Elizabeth Harrin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beyond Collaboration Overload by Rob Cross is the book that will change how you think about working with others.
Everyone expects us to collaborate, all the time. Team structures are flatter; teams are self-managing. Being good at collaborating is just part of the job. Except no one teaches how to do it well.
This book is not a guide to how to collaborate efficiently. It’s a book about how to collaborate less. But more intentionally. It talks about how to know when it’s your choice to make a decision, and when you don’t need to involve anyone else.
The book presents a research study by Connected Commons, a business consortium of over 70 leading organizations, and it shows that stress, burnout and disengagement happen because of too much collaboration. Yes, you read that right. You’re performing less well because you’re collaborating too much.
It makes sense. Teams wait until everyone has had their say before making a decision, which slows down project work. We collaborate too quickly, before people have had a chance to reflect on the data. The collaboration effort itself is unproductive, because often the individuals involved haven’t had any training on how to facilitate well.
The book provides strategies for reclaiming your collaboration time and making it more relevant and productive by Building a network and real connections and energizing others.
It includes tests and exercises (“coaching breaks”) for you to reflect on your collaboration experiences and build better ones in the future by becoming more aware of ways of working and preferences.
The book takes a fairly neurotypical view of collaboration experiences, but it does at least recognize that personal productivity is only half the problem: the faster we work, the more tasks come back to us when other people have finished their part.
Beyond Collaboration Overload is a good read for anyone who feels that their team engagements are a massive time suck and that they are constantly the bottleneck in getting things done. If you are feeling like all the conversations and micro-engagements with your colleagues are weighing you down, then this book will give you permission to change the way you work.

[David Fredh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beyond Collaboration Overload" by Rob Cross (2021) is a practical guide to tackling the modern workplace issue of excessive collaboration, which often leads to burnout, reduced innovation, and inefficiency. Drawing from extensive research and interviews with high performers, Cross argues that while collaboration is essential, overload stems from both external factors (like endless meetings and tools) and internal triggers (such as overcommitting for a sense of accomplishment). High achievers reclaim 18-24% of their time by structuring work, managing biases, and focusing on purposeful interactions, then reinvesting that time in diverse networks, energizing others, and boosting well-being.

A few key quotes:

- "We basically see that people who collaborate well get back 18 percent to 24 percent of their time."

“Success doesn’t come from one elegant solution. It comes from being dogmatically persistent on three or four practices that can have the greatest impact for you.”

“The volume, pace, and diversity of micro-stresses have exploded as our lives are more inter-connected and always ‘on’ through technology."

[Phil Simon]

Disclaimer: Cross' publisher sent me a copy gratis and he appeared on my pod.

There are oodles of books on the future of work and collaboration. Hell, I even wrote one of them. I particularly enjoyed Cross' approach. His is not merely a regurgitation of the research. Rather, he advances a bold model of how we can collaborate better while concurrently telling stories. As a result, he leaves the reader with plenty of tips on how to save valuable time.

I for one will be recommending the text to others because we're not returning to a pre-Covid world of work.

[Tracy Brower · Rating 1 out of 5]

R tree here was one chapter I liked which was the way of collaboration overload. Other than that this is a how to manual with too many case studies. It reads like a long long long list of stuff and stuff and more stuff—ways to be more efficient and to take things off the plate. All fine but just much too tactical without enough substance and with way too much minutia and tons of repetition.

[Greta Stahl]

This book is super helpful for anyone working in a high collaboration office environment. It offers tons of useful ideas and tips for getting back time and investing it in meaningful relationships that drive energy and wellbeing. Definitely recommend.

[Sabina Peskin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Highlights
Collaboration overload: behaviors and beliefs behind.
Networking: short/medium/long term and different roles of interactions in projects.

Lowlights
As usual, more labels that I believe are necessary.

[Racer_rajesh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful book. It is worth reading and implementing the tips mentioned. Unconsciously I have been doing some of the things mentioned in the book from last year and could now correlate on the new found free time, My next challenge is to see; how this new found time can be utilized.

[Jose Zazueta · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not a super engaging type of writing, a bit slow in some parts, took me longer than usual to finish, but some of the content is so valuable and actionable in my opinion that I just can't afford not having it on my "5-star" books section.

[Troy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Research-based solutions, inspired some good ideas for me that have been helpful. And because it is well-organized, it is very skimmable; you really could just read the end-of-chapter summaries and get most if not all of what you might want from it.

[Theodore Kinni · Rating 5 out of 5]

With 85% of employee time spent in collaborative activities, collaboration overload is a big and growing problem. Here are research-derived solutions from the leading expert on the topic

[Linda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good work advice!

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

loved the first half. The data points were on point and i have already used a few of them in conversation. wonderful idea, things to think about, and ideas to use!

[K · Rating 4 out of 5]

sound advice for introspection and positive change. Focused more on larger organizations but the tactics described can be useful on a smaller scale as well

[Erica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Practical and sensible advise. The evidence-based approach provides solutions, tips and tricks that are very useful to better manage relationships and buy back time.

[AnnieM · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been following Rob Cross' work for awhile - particularly his work on networks using Organizational Network Analysis to identify who are the key connectors and influencers in organizations who drive the work and energize others (and not surprisingly very different from who has power and influence on the organization chart!) His work has helped my organizations look at how we collaborate but also how we optimize our talent. As organizations increasingly say that collaboration is a critical value and success factor for business today, we are facing too much collaboration. Cross' book is a timely addition to his research and is an effective blend of stories about Leaders (who are similar to people I work with), his extensive research on networks, as well as practical tips for individuals called "Coaching Breaks."

I highly recommend this break for leaders, teams and individuals. There are great tips about reducing overload as well as how to maximize purpose in our lives. This is a book I will keep in my library to help me and others!

[Brad · Rating 3 out of 5]

AoM podcast 1/26/22

Pretty good book about the problem of collaboration overload (being pulled into too many meetings, emails, messages, etc) and some solutions for how to fix it and then what to do with some of the extra time you hopefully get back. Like many business books, perhaps 20-30% longer than it needed to be.

In short: try to say "no" more, make meetings shorter, pick up the phone sooner instead of so many back and forth messages ("email begets email"), try not going to certain meetings or not responding to some emails and see if you're missed. Focus on what matters to you, build cross-silo networks and connect people early.

Potentially worth revisiting in the future, particularly the end-of-chapter summaries.

Rating: G? didn't recall anything objectionable.