Collaborative Overload: Strategies for Effective Leadership

This report examines the concept of collaborative overload in modern organizations, focusing on its impact on employee behavior, resource management, and leadership strategies. The report analyzes the article 'Collaborative Overload' by Cross, Rebele, and Grant, as well as 'Algorithms need managers, too' by Luca, Kleinberg, and Mullainathan, to explore the challenges of teamwork, the importance of resource allocation, and the role of managers in retaining employees. It discusses the types of resources needed by employees, the reasons why top collaborators may become disengaged, and the strategies managers can employ to mitigate these issues. The report highlights the significance of redistributing resources, restructuring organizations, and fostering positive employee behavior, including rewarding helpfulness and recognizing contributions to maintain a healthy workplace culture and improve organizational productivity and innovation. The report emphasizes the importance of managers in maintaining the knowledge flow and balancing individual accomplishment with collaborative contributions.

Running head: COLLABORATIVE OVERLOAD
COLLABORATIVE OVERLOAD
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1COLLABORATIVE OVERLOAD
Collaboration has become of the chief mottos of the modern organizations. Due to
globalization the structure of the organizations has changed a lot so also the behavior and
psychology of the employees. In the article ‘Collaborative Overload’ by Cross, Rebele and
Grant, has describe the idea of collaboration in the organization and its effect on the
production of the organization. Collaboration is basically the idea of successful team work.
As the companies have started to become extremely global as well as cross-cultural, the
structure and style of management have started to be change a lot. The connectivity is
growing so also the dependency on the technology is also growing.
In the article ‘Algorithms need managers, too’ Luca, Kleinberg and Mullainathan
have discussed this issue of employee termination and using technology in their places. The
chief idea of this article is that the mangers have the key controlling power who maintain the
flow of resources in the organization so that the employees can work effectively. Similarly,
they are the chief driving force who are responsible for controlling the function and
utilization of the computerized algorithms also. There are different positive as well as
negative effects of using algorithms in predicting the future of the business. Over dependency
on the algorithms can lead the business to complete destruction. Hence the management
should be careful in managing the human employees as well as the algorithms.
What are the resources can be found in the organization?
The article ‘Collaborative Overload’ discusses that the employees in the organization
need high amount of resources. These resources are to be used in accomplishing their tasks
efficiently. For this reason, the managers arrange for meetings, workshops and seminar so
that the employees learn from the available resources and then build a pool of resources of
their own. As mentioned before the managers encourage the employees to indulge in team
works. This is because the team work helps to provide opportunities for sharing personal

2COLLABORATIVE OVERLOAD
knowledge with others thus gain more knowledge about one particular subject. in this
collaboration process, the employees come across three types of sources. These resources are
to be passed on by the collaborators to the subordinate employees or the non-experienced or
unskilled. There are people of an organization, who know various methods of doing a
complicated task as they possess more knowledge as well as skills than the others in the
organizations. These are the factors which differentiate the better and useful employees than
the commoners. The three types of resources that the employees need to accomplish a task
are basically informational, social and persona. The first two resources are quite different
from the third in respect to their efficiency and relevancy. The informational resources are
related with the knowledge and skills which the employees acquire through expertise. After
that they can easily pass it on to others. Social resources are associated with the individual’s
awareness, access and the position in networks. Both of these resources can be shared in a
single exchange.
These resources are used to help the colleagues in teams. The employees share these
types of resources quite easily because their sharing do not hamper or deplete the supply of
the resources. On the contrary, the personal resources are quite complicated. The
collaborators acquire this type of resources by spending a lot of effort as well as time. In
addition to this, these resources cannot be replenished easily by the employees as they are
rare and time consuming. Therefore, the top collaborators who maintain the flow of
knowledge in the workspace do not intend to share these personal resources with others quite
easily and “each request to participate in or approve decisions for a project
leaves less available for that person’s own work” (Cross, Rebele and Grant
2016).
Why do the top collaborators seem to be disengaged?

3COLLABORATIVE OVERLOAD
The employees who possess more resources become the top collaborators of the
companies. These people however many intend to help others or do not. The employees who
are willing to help others are only consist of 3%to 5% of the total number of employees in an
organization. This is because the employees who request for help have defaults demand of
personal resources and these employees do not intend to share their hard earned personal
resources. In this process of requesting help from the collaborators, there can be some
unethical aspects. The employees who seek information may have access to the online
sources or libraries to know what they intend to know. This will take much less time but they
intentionally request for help from these collaborators. This take much time as well as effort
to make them understand the whole process.
These are the reason why these collaborators who have ample knowledge about the
subject and can perform diversity of tasks, cannot complete their own tasks within given
time. Therefore, the professional career and ambition get hampered. These employees help
others to do a job but their efforts remain hidden under the success of others. They do not get
proper exposure in the organizations hence do not get rewards and acknowledgements. For
this particular reason these collaborators get frustrated with their jobs and think to leave the
organization. In order to get the exposure and reputation these employees tray to change their
companies where they think they will be honored. They remain in demand always but
become disengaged with the organization. These employees ultimately leave their
organizations but take with them the most valuable resources like experiences, information,
networks and knowledge.
What should the managers do to retain employees?
The managers are the actual responsible persons to retain their workforce in place
securely. These to collaborators of the organization are the most valuable human assets. This

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is due to the fact that no task of the organizations can be happed without direct intervention
of these employees as they are the most resources persons. These collaborators remain as the
bottleneck of the organizations and put pressure in the smooth flow of functions of the
companies. This is the reason why the managers need to understand some very important
aspects and take initiatives according to them
Redistribution of resources: due to the knowledge gap among the employees, all the issues of
employee turnover and dissatisfaction emerge. This is the reason why the authors of this
article have suggested the managers to identify the demand or crisis area. This can be done
through employee feedbacks, and other tools which check the request percentage in the
organization. Through these tools and programs, the management gain knowledge about what
type of resources are demanded by the employees and how these can be overcome. As the
informational and social resources remain available in the workplace, these can be easily
accessed by the employees. This do not need much time or effort hence the managers need to
make them obtainable by all types of employees. This will reduce the pressure of the
collaborators in the organization and they can concentrate on their own tasks. This reduce the
factor of discrimination also. As the women employees of the organization seem to be more
collaborative than the make employees. therefore, helping others become mandatory for these
women. Therefore, they cannot balance these tasks and fail to achieve their targets in the
organization.
Restructure organization: by restructuring the organizations, the managers can motivate the
collaborators by promoting them into a higher designation from where they belong. The
employees feel motivated through recognition. Therefore, the managers can give them
responsibilities only to help others. Hence these employees will be providing various styles of
resources to the common employees but will never take part in the production of the
companies directly. This will help the common employees in one hand and reduce the

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pressure of the collaborators on the other. These people therefore will be satisfied with their
responsibilities and never think of leaving the organizations in future. In addition to this,
these collaborators can help in building a workforce who will replace these collaborators.
Therefore, the company will be losing nothing, while these top collaborators leave the
companies.
Employee behavior: one of the major aspects that mandates the collaborators to help others
without any question is that they do not have permission to say no to their subordinate
employees. The managers of the organization must allow these collaborators to maintain a
negative approach so that other employees check alternative ways to complete the tasks. “It’s
also worth suggesting that when they do invest personal resources, it be in value-added
activities that they find energizing rather than exhausting” (Cross, Rebele and Grant 2016).
The mangers can permit these employees to filter the requests. Therefore, these collaborators
can save their time as well as efforts and serve only the original help seekers.
Can rewarding help to retain employees?
The authors of this article have discussed the issues that emerge from the
collaborative approach of the organizations. As mentioned before, the chief reason of the
employee turnover is unavailability of resources and lack of recognition and rewards. It is
obvious from the discussion that the highly resourced employees have experience, skill and
knowledge for leading teams. Therefore, their expectation from the companies are also very
high. Due to this, most of the employees feel detached from the core business of the
companies. The authors of this article therefore have suggested that the mangers must try to
motivate these employees through rewards and recognition. In many cases the big companies
often lose talents due to lack of rewarding policies in the organization. Hence the managers

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must recognize the efficiency of these collaborators so that they feel attached to their
companies and remain loyal.
Therefore, it can be concluded that the mangers are responsible persons who have
power to maintain the knowledge flow of the organization. This is because collaboration is
answer to many business challenges of the world. For reducing employee turnover due to
knowledge gap, team managers need to check every details and facts of the workplace and
mitigate them efficiently. There are various tools and methods through which the managers
can get the feedbacks from the employees and then take proper initiatives. The mangers
need to have appropriate balance between individual accomplishment and
collaborative contribution. Through arranging for proper collaboration and knowledge
sharing, the managers will be able to maintain a healthy workplace culture and increase the
productivity and innovation of the organizations. The modern business leaders will
be able to cater the importance of managing teamwork considerately as
well as provide the important resources compulsory to do it effectively.

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References:
Cross, R., Rebele, R. and Grant, A., 2016. Collaborative overload. Harvard Business
Review, 94(1), p.16.
Luca, M., Kleinberg, J. and Mullainathan, S., 2016. Algorithms need managers, too. Harvard
business review, 94(1), p.20.