Crossing the Lines Between Lines
Crossing the Lines
Between Lines
Collaboration · Wausau Coated Products · Every Role. Every Day.
Pass itSay itArgue itGo first
Collaboration is not…
More meetings
A trust fall
A team-building game
It is choosing to cross the lines on purpose, every shift.
Check your handoffs.

Twelve moments. Tap how much each sounds like you, 1 to 5. About three minutes.

Pass itHand it over so the next person can run with it.
Say itSpeak up in the room. Make it easy for others.
Argue itDisagree about the work, not the person.
Go firstAdmit it first. Thank the bad news.
Workbook page 1. Circle your highest and lowest.

sambuemi.com/handoff

Tap it.

A listener hears only the taps of a famous song. Out of 10 songs, how many will they name? Show me with fingers.

Tappers predicted 5 out of 10. Listeners named 3 out of 120.
The tapper heard the whole song. You can't un-hear what you know.
$327 million. Two right teams.
One team sent the data in
pound-seconds
≠
The other team expected
newton-seconds
It arrived 170 km too low. Nobody blamed a person. The failure lived in the handoff.
The navigators saw it coming in low. They never pushed it up.
Across the floorDistance and layout.
Across shiftsThree shifts, five minutes of overlap.
Across functionsFloor vs. office.
Three questions at every handoff.
1What's not normal right now?
2What needs to happen next?
3Who do I call if something looks off? A name, not "someone."
Where could you use this? Think of a common problem at work. Fill in the three questions, then share with your partner. Workbook page 1.
3:00
tap to start
With a short handoff protocol
0%
fewer medical errors
0%
fewer preventable harms
(NEJM, 2014)

Then they say it back.

The navigators knew.

They saw it coming in low and never pushed it up. Why?

What am I making it cost them?
Turn and talk, 60 seconds. A time speaking up felt risky. No share-out.
cost nowawkward · wrong · labeled benefit latershared · delayed Thanks for telling me What am I missing? Here's what I did with it
Who's talking?

The best groups shared the talking. (Woolley et al., Science, 2010)

Tally game. Debate the best break-room snack. One person ticks every turn.
2:00
tap to start

A typical meeting: one or two voices.

Work or person?
Work
Person
Can you point at it?
Two techs disagree about whether the slitter blade needs changing before the next run.
Work. You can point at the blade.
A supervisor thinks a coworker is "just lazy" and doesn't pull their weight.
Person. Nothing on the table to point at.
QA and Production disagree about whether a borderline roll should ship.
Work. Check the roll.
Someone on nights feels the day shift "never listens to us."
Person. Underneath: what information isn't crossing the shift change?
Your real example. Work or person? If it's a person, what's the work question underneath?
What we already said we'd do.

This isn't a poster. This is us. Every Role. Every Day.

We Commit To
  • Say what we actually think about the work, not just what's easy to hear.
  • Share what the next shift, or the next function, actually needs to know.
  • Treat disagreement about the work as useful, not as a threat.
  • Say it in the room, not after, where the people who can act on it can hear it.
We Avoid
  • Letting a silo (physical, temporal, or functional) become an excuse not to pass something along.
  • Undermining a coworker or another team, especially where they can't hear it.
  • Turning a disagreement about the work into a judgment about the person.
  • Letting conflict go underground (artificial harmony or the parking lot) instead of getting resolved.

Every "avoid" is easy to justify in the moment.

Three traps stop real disagreement.
Cooperation is not collaboration"I stay out of your way."
Artificial harmonyNo pushback. No engagement.
Parking-lot disagreementSaid after, to the wrong people.
Real beats assigned. Real dissent widens thinking. Assigned dissent doesn't. (Nemeth, 2001)
Rewrite the exchange.

Neither line is wrong, exactly. That's what makes it worth rewording.

As it's said
"The slitter's cutting wide again on that run."
"Yea, it's been doing that for a while. Not much I can do about it from here."
A better way
"The slitter's cutting wide again on that run. Can we check the blade before the next roll?"
"Thanks for catching it. I'll get maintenance on it now. What did you see on the last roll?"
Now you try. Reword a comment that landed badly. Workbook page 2. Say it to your partner.
6:00
tap to start
Go first.

16 surgical teams, one new technology. The difference was the leader. (Edmondson, 2003)

Admit a mistake out loud this week.
Say thank you the next time someone brings you bad news.

People decide whether it's safe by watching what you do, not what you say.

Thank them first.

Partner A delivers the bad news. Partner B: thank them first, then ask what they need.

Spin for a scenario.
Thanking isn't agreeing. Swap roles. Then debate: is thanking first always right?
Your turn: any past feedback you could have improved on? One sentence.
Pass it. Say it. Argue it. Go first.
Pass it

What's not normal? What's next? Who do I call?

Say it

What am I making it cost them?

Argue it

Work or person?

Go first

Admit it. Thank the bad news.

Then do it again next shift. Workbook page 3 is yours to keep.

Who crossed a line for you?

Who passed you a good handoff, spoke up, argued fair, or went first?

Think. Pair. Share.

Thank them this week.

2:00
tap to start
Say it in the room.
If I have a disagreement in a meeting this week, I will say it in the meeting rather than after.

Sign it. Say it to someone before you leave this room. Workbook page 3.

The silos are real. Collaboration is choosing to cross them anyway, on purpose, every shift.

Thank you.
Pass itSay itArgue itGo first
Map: 60-minute session
?
8 tables
Keys
Build 4 · sealed frame · Oct 2
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