A balancing act all leaders must grapple with is the short-term benefit of moving fast with minimal drag from a personally curated “Team Yes,” versus the long-term satisfaction that comes from building a diverse team that will simultaneously challenge, support, and push the boundaries of your current state positions and thinking.

We learn and grow as humans when we look at a challenge through multiple lenses and take onboard information from multiple perspectives. To me, this is true freedom - the ability to learn from our mistakes, test and expand our capabilities through experiences and education, pursue individual happiness and self-actualization, and meaningfully contribute to society with our unique gifts and talents.

The real magic happens when you empower and engage managers and individual contributors from multiple departments to do the heavy lifting. What a great way to get colleagues who would normally not interact with one another working together toward a common goal. Once team members see what they can accomplish together for the United Way, just imagine what they can do together to build your business! Oh, and running a campaign also has the knock on effect of introducing your colleagues to the personal benefits of philanthropy and giving back to the community! Win-win.

As a global society, let’s use the Holiday Season to reflect on how we approach interactions with our fellow cosmic travelers. When alignment is a challenge and viewpoints don’t seamlessly calibrate, seek first to understand—not immediately jump to tearing others down who don’t share our opinions or worldview.

If more of us seek to understand, we will continue to make progress toward a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive future state.

Without purposeful care and attention, teams splinter into silos that promote internal competition and prevent the information sharing that’s necessary to encourage collaboration. Silos and affinity groups will always exist within your business—especially as it scales and grows. However, it’s essential to create an environment where silos fulfill their purpose of necessary specialization but don’t become fiefdoms ruled by minor nobles who promote idiosyncratic ways of working and unproductive subcultures.

So is ambition dead? The answer depends on one’s perspective. If your definition of ambition bends more toward blind ambition to climb a ladder at any cost and show a “boss” that you’re willing to do whatever it takes to get ahead, then I say that this type of ambition is on the way out and should peacefully fade away.