Why Building a Collaborative Culture Within Your Organization Matters
Written by Amy Merritt Campbell
After years of supporting collaborative work across organizations, I've noticed a pattern: the leaders who are the best at building external partnerships often are those whose organizations have a strong culture of collaboration. The opposite is true; the organizations that are siloed and competitive have the hardest time playing well with others.
It makes sense, really. The same things that make collaboration work between organizations are the same things that make collaboration work within them. And yet, so often, we expect each other to show up in collective spaces, using muscles that we aren’t exercising inside our own organizations.
The Case For Collaborative Culture
There are a lot of reasons to invest in building a collaborative culture within your organization, but here are the ones I keep coming back to:
It strengthens belonging. Research on workplace health tells us that collaboration and psychologically safe teamwork are linked to deeper belonging, increased trust, better learning, and lower stress among employees. In a sector where burnout is real and retention is hard, that matters.
It clarifies roles and reduces competition. When your team is oriented toward shared goals (that is, when they can see how their individual contributions connect to the bigger picture) the internal competition that eats away at good organizational culture lessens over time. People understand why their work matters and how it fits, and they’re able to build trust with teammates who they trust are oriented towards the same north star.
It improves organizational effectiveness. This one might seem obvious, but it bears saying: building a culture that incorporates diverse perspectives strengthens decisions, improves projects, and produces better outcomes. When your culture is one that supports and encourages multiple viewpoints and skills, your work is better because of it.
So, Why Is It So Hard?
I wish I could give you a wise, nuanced, thoroughly researched answer to this question, but the truth is, it’s hard because it’s hard. As leaders, the work of slowing down, bringing people along, and holding space for the messy learning that collaboration requires is taxing.
Additionally, in the nonprofit sector especially, scarcity mindset runs deep. When resources feel tight, collaboration can feel like a luxury. If the nonprofit sector had a hierarchy of needs, collaboration (along with evaluation and learning, but that’s another blog post) is right at the top - something we do when all our other needs are being met. And often in this work, those basic needs are barely being met.
There's also the cognitive and emotional load. Building a real collaborative culture requires trust, and trust requires vulnerability, and vulnerability requires safety. Those things don't happen overnight, and they don't happen without sustained effort. Add to that the simple fact that collaboration takes time (for relationship-building, meetings, and the slower, messier process of getting alignment), and it's easy to see why it’s challenging to choose that path.
What We Can Do About It
Here are a few practices we've found to be meaningful, both from our work with clients and from what we try to do inside Elevate:
Get clear on the why, for everyone involved. Collaboration for collaboration's sake doesn't work. Before you ask your team to collaborate, be clear about what you're trying to achieve together and why that requires multiple people. That clarity should extend to each person's role: what do they bring, what are you asking of them, and how does their contribution matter? This is an ongoing practice, a conversation that you have to have regularly, and at Elevate, we're constantly doing our best to better clarify how we all are contributing, both to projects and to the organization as a whole.
Build teams intentionally. Staffing teams isn't just about capacity — it's about fit. (Almost) every project at Elevate is staffed with multiple team members, and we deliberately consider whose skills, knowledge, and even personality/approach best match what a given project needs.
Make space for getting to know each other as humans. Collaboration happens between people who trust each other, understand how each other works, and feel comfortable enough to disagree. We hold monthly, standing team-building sessions – sometimes a fun outing, sometimes working through assessments or having real conversations about how to work together more effectively. We also create regular space for learning and reflection, including sharing what we're each working on and what we're learning. Leaning into play, learning, and, yes, sometimes even hard conversations starts to put water in the proverbial pool, creating safety for us all to jump in together.
Remove the friction. Sometimes the barriers are practical. Is there technology in place (Slack, Teams, Asana) that makes communication easier and more transparent? Do you have standing meetings/touchpoints to ensure teams have space to work through issues together? Do your people know when they can expect to be together in person, where a lot of organic collaboration happens? This kind of thoughtful resourcing can create pathways for team members to lean into the collaborative culture you’re building.
Show up as a collaborative leader. This one is less a tactic and more a commitment. Creating a culture that supports trust, participation, and psychological safety is never one-and-done. As a leader, modeling the collaborative behaviors you want to see take root in your organization is a job you show up to every day, in every decision. It means slowing down and checking in with your team, asking for help when you need it, and being genuinely open to receiving help and feedback. It means being generous with gratitude, appreciation, and celebration, even (and especially) when things get hard. It means not swooping in to “save” a project because it isn’t being done the way you’d do it. And don't get me wrong, I’m not telling you this because I’m great at it - I’m telling you because it’s something I have to work extra hard to live into.
It's Worth It
Collaboration is hard. It's time-consuming. Some days it would genuinely be easier to just make the call on your own and move on. I know that feeling well.
But the organizations that have figured out how to build real collaborative cultures from the inside out — the ones where people trust each other, know each other's strengths, and feel safe enough to contribute fully — those are the organizations that can take on the hard stuff. And in this work, there's no shortage of hard stuff.
