Building cross-functional careers: How leaders develop the capability today’s organizations urgently need

Building cross-functional careers is becoming essential as organizations shift toward integrated, matrixed, and technology‑enabled operating models. Traditional siloed career paths no longer equip leaders to manage enterprise‑wide trade‑offs, coordinate across multiple teams, or execute in virtual and hybrid environments. This article explores why cross-functional careers matter, the capabilities they require, and what leaders must do to build and support them effectively.

Why is building cross-functional careers so important?

Most organizations are designed around functions, yet their most critical work increasingly happens across them. Individual functions are rarely able to develop, implement and run today’s complex products, services and processes.

Leaders in matrixed and cross-functional teams are expected to influence without authority, navigate competing priorities, and make decisions that optimize the whole business—not just their silo.

Individuals need to collaborate regularly with people from other functions and specialists form other areas of expertise.

However, many organizations still develop people within functions, not across them. The result:

• Slower decisions because leaders lack visibility and understanding of the complete value chain
• Misaligned priorities across functions and markets
• Fragmented accountability (“who owns what?”)
• Rising friction between specialists and generalists
• Talent pipelines built for yesterday’s linear careers, not today’s boundaryless work

These challenges directly undermine effective cross-functional team working—the core operating environment for many modern leaders.

Research shows that cross-functional competence is critical to digital transformation

What makes siloed careers hard to change?

Most leaders have traditionally grown up in specialist systems—finance, marketing, operations, HR—where success is measured in narrow functional metrics.

When they step into cross-functional or matrix roles, these mental models no longer apply. They’re expected to understand broader systems, manage enterprise trade-offs, and collaborate across boundaries without formal authority.

Why it persists

• Organizations still promote based on depth, not breadth.
• Functional incentives reward silo success.
• Talent systems manage careers vertically, not horizontally.
• Most leaders are never formally trained to operate across functions.

The functions have traditionally been responsible for career development and most specialist training. Inevitably the functions focus on their own needs.

What do effective cross-functional leaders do differently

• Build broad system understanding early (business models, value chain, customer impact).
• Develop collaboration, translation, and trade-off skills—not just technical expertise.
• Move laterally before moving upward.
• Learn to lead without authority and influence across functions.
• Build strong networks across the business, not just within the home function.
• Shape broad experiences within their teams through mobility, project work, and exposure.

What does “building cross-functional careers” really mean?

As we discuss moving from siloed specialists to integrated professionals capable of orchestrating work across functions we need to recognize that not everyone needs or wants to do this.

Building cross-functional careers is not about turning everyone into a generalist; it’s about developing broad capability alongside deep expertise.

Cross-functional careers develop through five broad stages

1. Start with deep expertise (I-shaped professional)

People begin by learning their function deeply—engineering, HR, marketing, operations. This is essential. It creates credibility and provides the “vertical” of the T-shaped profile.

2. Gain exposure through cross-functional projects (develop T-shaped expertise)

Project work exposes individuals to stakeholders from other functions. Early development often focuses on project management fundamentals:

• Planning
• Scheduling
• Risk management
• Stakeholder alignment
• Communication

These experiences begin expanding the horizontal bar of the T.

3. Learn the adjacent processes that influence your function

Enterprise thinking and visibility across processes (procurement ↔ planning ↔ logistics) drives integration.

Leaders need to understand:

• End-to-end workflows
• How their decisions affect other teams
• Trade-offs across the value chain
• Shared metrics and KPIs
• How workflow design shapes collaboration

4. Broaden further through rotations or lateral moves

My own career spanned several cross-boundary moves

• HR → Manufacturing
• Manufacturing → Planning
• Planning → Finance
• Functional role → Focus group leadership
• UK to European t Global roles

Only 8% of people make cross-functional moves annually, but these moves significantly expand career agility and enterprise capability.

These rotations don’t always have to be full time, you can learn a lot by joining a cross functional team or doing some shorter shadowing of other professionals you collaborate with.

5. Transition into “connecting roles” such as cross-functional or matrix leadership

These roles rely on:

• Leading without authority
• Translating between functions
• Managing interdependencies
• Coordinating across regions, business units, and specialist teams
• Making decisions in ambiguous environments

They are less about domain depth and more about orchestrating collective performance.

What shape is your career?

How does building cross-functional careers enable organizational success?

1. It creates leaders who can optimize enterprise value

Leaders with broad exposure understand downstream consequences. They avoid sub-optimizing for their own function.

2. It enables faster, clearer decision-making

Cross-functional leaders recognize patterns, anticipate risks, and align stakeholders faster.

3. It improves cross-functional collaboration

Use clearer language across professional cultures

• Create shared context quickly
• Translate functional jargon and mindsets quickly
• Integrate different specialists

4. It strengthens resilience and adaptability

Broad experience helps leaders shift gears quickly when priorities or structures change. It gives you a wider range of perspectives and techniques to use.

5. It builds stronger leadership pipelines for complex organizations

Generalist executives earn a 19% compensation premium in some studies—breadth pays at senior levels because coordination across complexity is the work.

What leadership behaviors build cross-functional careers effectively?

1. Build systems thinking early

Leaders need to see how processes, decisions, and incentives connect across the value chain. Use:

• Business simulations
• End-to-end workflow mapping
• Cross-functional problem-solving sessions

2. Develop contextual intelligence across functions

Leaders don’t need deep expertise in every function—they need functional literacy:

• Enough understanding to communicate effectively
• Awareness of other functions’ metrics and priorities
• Ability to translate between technical languages

3. Strengthen the “glue skills” of cross-functional collaboration

These include:

• Influence without authority
• Trust-building
• Conflict resolution
• Managing ambiguity
• Leading mixed teams of specialists and generalists

These are often underdeveloped because they’re not part of functional training programs. Explore training for cross-functional capability.

4. Create mobility and exposure opportunities

Practical ways leaders can develop their teams:

• Cross-functional projects
• Short-term rotations
• Shadowing in another function
• Enterprise-wide taskforces
• Integrator or liaison roles

5. Build a culture that values breadth—not just depth

Shift from “career ladders” to “career lattices.”
Reward enterprise contribution and collaboration—not just functional output.

6. Model cross-functional career behavior as a senior leader

Leaders who have worked across functions, geographies, or business units send a powerful message that breadth matters.

What specific barriers block cross-functional career development—and how can leaders remove them?

Barrier 1: Functional ownership of talent

Many organizations treat people as “belonging” to their home function.

Fix: Create shared ownership models between function heads, project sponsors, and talent leaders.

Barrier 2: Functional metrics that reward silo performance

Leaders optimize for what they’re measured on.

Fix: Align KPIs to enterprise outcomes—shared KPIs accelerate cross-functional behavior.

Barrier 3: Lack of clarity in matrixed environments

Ambiguous decision rights discourage people from broadening their influence.

Fix: Define roles, responsibilities, and decision boundaries clearly—especially in matrixed and cross-functional teams.

Barrier 4: Insufficient training for boundary-spanning skills

Organizations spend heavily on technical training, not on collaboration across functions.

Fix: Provide structured development in:

• Influence without authority
• Cross-functional negotiation
• Matrix management capability
•  Cross-functional teamwork

How do we turn this into a repeatable organizational capability?

Organizations that excel at developing cross-functional careers typically build:

1. A consistent competency framework

Define what cross-functional capability looks like at each level:

• Functional literacy
• Collaboration skills
• Systems thinking
• Enterprise decision-making
• Integrative leadership

Explore a structured cross-functional teams training path.

2. Structured mobility programs

With transparent pathways, clear durations, and defined learning goals.

3. Enterprise-wide learning infrastructure

Training that blends:

• Practical tools
• Simulations
• Case-based lessons
• Peer learning

4. Leadership accountability

Reward leaders who develop talent across functions—not just within their own.

5. Stronger integration between HR, L&D, and business units

This ensures cross-functional development isn’t left to chance.

This challenge is one component of effective building cross-functional careers. For an overview of how cross-functional teams operate and the leadership behaviors that enable them explore our complete guide.

What should a leader or L&D team do next?

If you’re looking to build stronger cross-functional capability across your leadership population, we can help you:

• Design a cross-functional leadership competency model
• Build and run  structured development pathways
• Strengthen collaboration, influence, and decision-making across functions
• Equip leaders for matrix, virtual, and hybrid environments
• Create mobility and exposure programs that reliably grow enterprise capability

Contact us to talk to one of our experts or explore our detailed guide to cross-functional teams.