In today’s global world, collaboration is a critical tool for new ideas and innovation.
Collaboration encourages scientists from one side of the world to partner in real time with scientists on the other end of the world. It allows a manufacturer or a consulting company in Bangalore to sell not just products, but high-end services in the United States. It enables Google—one of the darlings of the tech sector—to have its California employees work alongside thousands of co-workers at Google China on a single product.
This has occurred because today’s communication infrastructure has evolved to a level of sophistication that has impacted every industry. Information and communication technology platforms have evolved and been accelerated by the proliferation of high speed Internet and technological advancements.
These advancements have helped “flatten” the world, making widespread collaboration possible. Today, email, text messaging, video conferencing and instant messaging are standard teamwork tools. Social networking (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc.) is fast becoming a new innovative way that high performing teams are creating new value today.
There are examples of successful collaboration in various industries:
* Software: The open source community has leveraged worldwide collaboration to deliver innovative software that competes with software developed and owned by multi-billion dollar entities.
* Medicine: Collaboration enables a specialty brain surgeon in London to perform surgery on a dying child in Zaire, Africa.
* Academia: The most creative research and concepts—neuroscience, cybernetics, biomedical engineering—have come out of interdisciplinary research and collaboration between different fields of study.
Instead of the classic command-and-control model or one-person “hero” model, where teams depend on one individual for success, today’s winning teams are the ones that share information, communicate effectively, are location-independent and leverage the best collaboration tools.
Why? When a team’s composition and/or location is diverse, the richness of the team and its ability to develop innovative solutions is greatly enhanced.
In the same light, teams with multi-disciplinary talents are the most productive in the workplace. Teams with multi-cultural backgrounds have a creative edge. Teams with the best tools, technology and processes for sharing ideas are the most effective. These teams will consistently out perform their counterparts, who may even have a higher level of individual talent.
New business models are being created as a result of mass collaboration. For example, Google recently released a version of Google Maps that uses a new Web business model called “crowd sourcing.” Google invites mass collaboration from disparate users—in this case, allowing anyone on the Internet to correct the geo-location (latitude, longitude) of any address on their map—who gradually contribute to data aggregation or system improvement.
So, they are getting data entry work done for FREE! The same can be said of Wikipedia’s existence, which is another classic example of “crowd sourcing” and mass collaboration.
One of the newest tools that we use for collaboration is Twitter. Based on a remarkably simple idea, Twitter is a service for friends, family and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: “What are you doing?”
This social networking tool allows users to send updates or "tweets" (text-based posts up to 140 characters long) to theTwitter Web site via a multitude of methods (SMS, email, IM, phone, etc). Twitter allows us to carry out a private or group conversation over the Internet and mobile phones simultaneously, with seamless integration between team members using different systems.
Our sales team uses Twitter to maintain a group dialog all day long—a much more efficient solution than email, which might get lost or overlooked. Messages can be delivered via phone, text message, IM, email, orany transport mechanism supported—based on your choice or the person you “follow” on Twitter. (To follow Bunmi on Twitter click here.)
Twitter is just one example of how the flattening of the world can be used to our strategic advantage.
The days of phone communication (which can be disruptive) and email (plagued by information overload) are passing. With Twitter as part of your communication and collaboration platform, you determine how you want tobe reached; you respond at your own pace; you provide updates to people proactively. It’s quite easy—after all, you have to keep it under 140 characters!
In today’s world, you can’t afford to isolate yourself. Collaboration using Twitter, or tools such as Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) is the way that organizations, teams and companies will continue to innovate in the future.
Over the next few years, any team’s success will depend on its ability to embrace change, support an entrepreneurial discipline and willingness to adopt a culture of collaboration. This shift towards innovation through collaboration will have enormous ramifications for managers, customers, partners and employees.
Come along—it’s time to work together.