Collaborative Leadership and Teamwork
The Apollo 13
Collaborative leaders facilitate teamwork and bring out the best in their team members often lifting them up to higher levels of creativity and performance. Sometimes they are able to generate extraordinary team efforts to find solutions to difficult problems at times of great stress and turmoil. Such collaborative teamwork produces high synergy results that are truly transformative in nature for both the individuals and the group.
One such example of collaborative leadership, which was a triumph of creativity and teamwork, was the Apollo 13 space mission. During this mission a near catastrophic event caused the aborting of the planned lunar landing and presented the complex challenge of finding a way to bring the crew of Apollo 13 safely back to earth. This was no easy task since the spacecraft was beyond the point of no return and an explosion had caused major problems with the supply of energy and oxygen to the main cabin.
The leadership at mission control had to work feverishly on these complex problems while keeping the crew aware of their progress and monitoring the changing status of the ship. At various points in this process mission leaders had to decide how much to involve the crew in the knowledge and resolution of the problems based on the “a need to know” and the fact that there was the possibility no solution could be found. Ultimately, it was decisions, which were made in collaboration with the crew, which helped to save their lives. Together they found ways to conserve oxygen and energy, remove dangerous levels of CO2, catapult the spacecraft around the moon and back to earth orbit, and finally to calibrate a safe re-entry into the earth’s atmosphere. And, at various points, the spacecraft was continuing to lose power and oxygen.
At one point in particular, oxygen levels were getting dangerously low because the system, which filtered out the carbon dioxide was not functioning properly. Turning this problem over to a team of engineers, they worked together to “create” a new filtering system made only of parts, which were to be found on the spacecraft. This effort required collaborative and creative thinking of the highest order, which resulted in a filtering system, which the crew was able to construct step by step from materials available on their ship. As significant as this was in saving the crew, it was only one of many collaborative achievements in this successful rescue effort. In each effort the leadership at Mission Control continued to encourage their team to “work the problem” and to be creative in their approach as only new thinking “out of the box” would be successful in bringing the Apollo crew home. Ultimately, their success was a testament to the fact that no accomplishment is impossible with the collaborative efforts and diverse contributions of individuals working together with the full confidence of leadership. Collaborative leadership and teamwork found a way. And, the Apollo crew found their way home.
Note: The above example is excerpted from the book, Collaborative Leadership and Global Transformation by Timothy Stagich, Ph.D.
Discussion Questions
- What are the elements of Collaborative Leadership that encourage creativity and facilitate teamwork?
- Why would a more traditional hierarchical approach to the Apollo 13 emergency have caused difficulty in solving the many complex problems they faced?
- Compare/contrast the Collaborative Approach used by the Leadership at Mission Control and the Hierarchical Approach to problem solving and teamwork.
- Why is “thinking outside the box” so necessary in emergencies and in resolving complex problems? How do Collaborative Leaders encourage this in teams?
- How do the elements of critical thinking and multiple perspectives contribute to the success of teams and how did they contribute to the safe return of Apollo 13?
