Building strong alliances

Lincoln built strong alliances even with his adversaries. He made many of them members of his cabinet. He also forged alliances with his subordinates by empowering them to take action and tried to avoid the appearance of micro managing situations. Do you feel these principles will work in IT. Have you had both positive and negative experiences when aligning yourself with adversaries? Are there methods that you have used to be hands on without appearing to micro manage situations?