Encourage people to self organize

I came across an interesting McKinsey conversation with Mr. Eric Schmidt, Google. Here’s an extract:

"One of the things that we've tried very hard to avoid at Google is the sort of divisional structure and the business unit structure that prevents collaboration across units. It’s difficult. So, I understand why people want to build business units, and have their presidents. But by doing that you cut down the informal ties that, in an open culture, drive so much collaboration. If people in the organization understand the values of the company, they should be able to self organize to work on the most interesting problems."

For more inputs on how to encourage self organization and collaboration across organizational borders, have a look at my July 29th posting.

What do you do to encourage people you work with to self organize and collaborate with other people across various borders?