Constructive Collaboration

Driving performance in teams, organizations and partnerships

Collaboration well done — whether at the individual, team or enterprise level —sparks creative problem solving and powers value creation. In this intense, interactive program, you’ll learn the why, what and how of collaboration in the workplace — the strategic rationale, design requirements and critical insights necessary for success in both internal initiatives and across companies and cultures in joint ventures, mergers and alliances.

You’ll explore personal collaboration styles, behaviors and approaches for working with business partners, colleagues, competitors and customers. From a team perspective, you’ll examine the multiple interests and perspectives that challenge effective collaboration in departmental and interdepartmental initiatives.


Incentives available for groups and teams of four or more attending open enrollment programs. Learn more


Information Session

Learn more about Constructive Collaboration with this half-hour long information session.

 

Who Should Attend

  • Mid-level to senior executives, Federal Government managers who coordinate activities among multiple constituencies, or who serve in key cross-functional roles
  • Individuals seeking to enhance collaboration with business partners, clients and peers
  • Team leaders and others who drive business development, manage joint ventures, oversee postmerger or acquisition integration, or manage channel partner performance

Download Past Participant Profile

Key Benefits

  • Hone your collaboration skills
  • Assess and value collaboration and then articulate and sell that value to clients, partners and stakeholders
  • Construct a personal development plan for continuous improvement
  • Identify and create value through analysis of stakeholders’ perspectives and interests
  • Design collaborative structures to maximize constructive conflict and minimize destructive conflict

Program Content

Designing Collaboration

  • Learn how collaboration drives value in complex organizations
  • Understand the challenges of instilling of collaboration as a key management competency
  • Design distributed teamwork: distance teamwork, trust and communication
  • Encourage creative conflict that fuels productivity, while minimizing conflict that interferes with it

Collaborative Decision-Making

  • Understand the strategy, structure and behavior of collaboration
  • Manage multifunctional, multi-incentive teams for high performance
  • Understand challenges in collaboration: communication, clarity and stress
  • Learn tools to resolve conflict and improve decision-making

Collaborating across Diverse Teams, Companies and Cultures

  • Build coalitions for healthy organizations
  • Create smart collaborative alliances
  • Learn about networks as bridges and barriers to collaboration
  • Develop a personal collaboration action plan

Faculty

Leigh Thompson - Academic Director; J. Jay Gerber Professor of Dispute Resolution & Organizations; Professor of Management & Organizations

Brayden King - Academic Director; Max McGraw Chair in Management and the Environment; Professor of Management & Organizations; Senior Associate Dean, Strategy and Academics

Tanya Menon - Associate Professor at Fisher College of Business, Ohio State University

Loran Nordgren - Professor of Management and Organizations

What Participants Say

“In addition to having outstanding faculty, the reading material, applied learning, and the diversity of the participants all contributed to a rich experience.”
Director, Office of Change Management, Northwestern University

“Excellent faculty and choice of exercises to gain experience collaborating between individuals, teams, departments and organizations. [I] was able to implement the learning immediately into my work.”
Assistant Director, Human resources, Chicago Cubs, Greater Chicago Area

“The tools I [took with me from Constructive Collaboration] have been among the most useful of all of my executive education [programs]. Unhealthy alliances that were draining profitability from my company have fallen apart. The workplace culture has improved; new collaborations have been established that are culminating with the addition of a [multi] million dollar managed services agreement [that] represents an amount of growth that was simply not possible while I was struggling to deal with the coalition of professional adversaries I had encountered. Thank you for the tools the [program] provided, which allowed me to more effectively understand what I was dealing with and how to form good collaborations of my own to counter it.”
CEO, Cornerstone Project

Leigh Thompson / Academic Director

Personal Consultation

Please contact us to schedule an advising session

2025 Sessions

March 10-14, 2025

Start: March 10 at 8:00 AM

End: March 14 at 12:00 PM


Format: Live Virtual Program



Accepting registrations through March 4

$6,500

September 22-26, 2025

Start: September 22 at 8:00 AM

End: September 26 at 12:00 PM


Format: Live Virtual Program



Accepting registrations through September 16

$6,500

Kellogg School of Management

James L. Allen Center
2169 Campus Drive, Evanston, IL 60208
Directions
847.467.6018