Body: Teams can gain a significant competitive advantage over individual employees in any organization through the facilitation of trusting, open, and supportive relationships. This benefit helps foster collaboration within the organization. Trust is the basic and most common and “fundamental element of a winning team” (Kouzes and Posner, 2007, p.225). The literature suggests that “positive relationships help produce effective teams” (Lafasto & Larson, in Pierce & Newstrom (Eds.), 2008, p160). Successful cooperation will enable individuals on a team to accomplish much more than any single person could do alone. Promoting collaboration: the power of effective teamsIntroductionFor an organization to be efficient, and above all successful, it depends on the leader to institute an effective team strategy. and at the same time promote collaboration between them, each team and each individual of the teams. Hackman states: “Common knowledge suggests that teams outperform individuals” (Pierce & Newstrom, 2008, p.165). At the heart of this team building and collaboration are issues of trust and authenticity in the organization, as well as open, supportive actions and communication (LaFasto & Larson, in Pierce & Newstrom (Eds.) , 2002). The Power of Teams LaFasto and Larson (2002) note that teams are very different from each employee because each team member must not only work on their own goals and the team's objectives, but they must also collaborate with the other members of the team. For a team to be most effective, it depends on a collegial atmosphere similar to that created by Nike vice president and chief financial officer Don W. Blair, who says he "seeks to create the environment that builds organizational capacity to keep us competitive” (Knowledge @Wharton, 2005, p. The effectiveness of this collegial atmosphere is evident in much of the literature. Kouzes and Posner (2007) note that one of the most important ingredients of collaboration and cooperation is a "feeling or interdependence", a condition according to which each person knows that he can only succeed if everyone else succeeds, or at least that he can only succeed if he coordinates his efforts . effortsö (p. 233) Extraordinary things can be accomplished when people rely on each other. Teams help inspire a “sense of mutual dependence” (Kouzes & Posner, 2007, p.233). is a state in which people can rely on each other and each knows that they need the other to succeed. Facilitating collaborationKouzes and Posner (2007), “You can’t do it alone” is the mantra of exemplary leaders – and for good reason..