How do you balance team autonomy with the need for collaboration?

I believe that autonomy should be employed as a strategy primarily when collaborative efforts falter or when a team is hindered by internal issues and fails to progress.

This is something which translates so well from my international sport background into business. Individuals need agreed frameworks (tactics in sport), and mutually agreed goals (strategies + plays), and expectations regarding output (work rate). Within this framework, players/employees should have complete freedom to innovate, express themselves, be creative, so long as their actions don't counter or hinder the teams objectives. The best performers in sales, management and sports, know the boundaries inside out, so they can work out how to push them.

Autonomy is earned with experience and the proven ability to effectively communicate up and down within your organization. When wielded by the right person, it is a great way to mitigate bureaucracy and time loss within your project. Being slow to trust is one of the most crippling behaviors a leader can have; so taking time to define boundaries, calls to action and milestones with your trusted team member as a means to empower certain activation and decision making can greatly limit redundancies in your process. Once empowered to operate within their proven skill set; Team Communication across channels becomes more about accomplishment than about assignments and doubt. Trust the people you’ve hired 💪🏽

Leaders can act as a catalyst to promote a culture where autonomy and collaboration are valued Promote cohesiveness by instilling confidence in your team Have well defined goals and charter of duties Rendering constructive feedback Tackle indifferences wisely by listening actively and speaking candidly Be transparent and honest to earn trust of your team members Autonomy is important to bring clarity and sense of responsibility but collaboration is indispensable in every organisation irrespective of nature , task and mission it serves and creates a magical environment where great results can be achieved and success become manifold Moreover collaboration and cordial relations keep us happy and make world a better place to live

Clarity of destination is the only way to generate forward movement. 'Does it make the boat go faster?' (I recommend this book!). A clear objective allows for freedom of expression, creativity, and flair, so long as it is moving you and the team toward the goal. A lack of definition of this goal allows room for wasted effort, irrelevant activity and a lack of team purpose.