SELECTED WORK / 002 — LEADERSHIP & CHANGE
Better together, by design.
How an intentional approach to collaboration helped two teams become one.
01 / THE CHALLENGE
Two teams. One new reality.
Bringing two teams together on an organizational chart is one thing. Helping them actually work together is another.
At CNN, two editorial teams with different responsibilities, workflows, and areas of expertise were brought together as part of a larger organizational change.
The transition created some understandable challenges. Colleagues were adjusting to unfamiliar responsibilities. Some had lost direct reports or opportunities to coach others. Managers were navigating increased workloads. And people who had previously worked in separate groups were now expected to operate as one team.
There was plenty of talent in the room. But there wasn't yet a shared sense of how everyone could learn from one another.
I saw an opportunity to change that.
02 / THE APPROACH
A different way to bring people together.
Rather than approaching the integration as a purely operational challenge, I focused on the relationships and skills that would make the new structure successful.
I originated and led a peer-partnership initiative that paired colleagues from the two original teams. The pairings were intentional, not random: I considered individual strengths, experience, and areas where people wanted to grow, then connected colleagues whose skills complemented one another.
The partnerships were designed to give people a starting point, not a rigid script. Colleagues had flexibility in how they worked together, learned from one another, and built trust through shared experience.
The approach also created opportunities for experienced colleagues—including those who no longer had direct reports—to continue mentoring and coaching others. Instead of making managers responsible for every training need, we could distribute knowledge across the team and create more opportunities for people to contribute.
Making collaboration intentional.
Build relationships. Create opportunities for colleagues from different backgrounds to get to know one another's strengths.
Share expertise. Pair complementary skills with development opportunities so learning could happen directly between peers.
Create opportunities to lead. Give experienced colleagues meaningful ways to mentor and coach, regardless of formal reporting lines.
Reduce pressure on managers. Make training and support a shared responsibility rather than a bottleneck.
03 / THE FEEDBACK LOOP
Making the team part of the solution.
I didn't want the program to be something that happened to the team. I wanted colleagues to have a hand in shaping it.
Every month, I sent anonymous feedback forms asking participants to rate the program and offer suggestions for how to improve it. The responses gave me a regular way to assess how the partnerships were working and identify opportunities to refine the experience.
Just as importantly, inviting feedback made people feel more invested. The initiative became something the team could help shape, rather than simply a process they were asked to follow.
04 / THE IMPACT
Stronger connections. Shared ownership.
Monthly anonymous feedback forms asked participants to rate the program and recommend improvements. This provided a recurring source of structured feedback; the outcomes below are described qualitatively rather than attributed to unpublished survey scores.
- Stronger relationships between colleagues from previously separate groups.
- Improved morale as team members developed trust and a greater sense of connection.
- Broader skills through intentional knowledge-sharing and peer coaching.
- More opportunities for mentorship and leadership, including for colleagues whose management responsibilities had changed.
- Reduced burden on people managers as training and support became more collaborative.
- Greater investment in the program as colleagues were invited to help shape its development.
The most important outcome wasn't simply that people learned new skills. It was that colleagues began seeing one another as partners with something valuable to offer.
05 / THE TAKEAWAY
Better teams don't happen by accident.
Organizational change is often described in terms of structures, processes, and workflows. But the success of those changes ultimately depends on people.
This experience reinforced my belief that good leadership isn't always about creating a complicated new system. Sometimes it's about recognizing the strengths already in the room and finding a better way to connect them.
By combining intentional partnerships with a monthly feedback loop, we created opportunities for learning, trust, and shared ownership. People were more invested because they had a voice in how the program evolved.
It's a principle I carry into every leadership challenge: the best teams don't just work alongside one another. They make one another better.