Professional vs. Personal Conversations
Kim Hyshka (episode #24 of the Cool Collaborations podcast) challenges us to think about the difference in how personal and professional conversations happen, so that we can see what from each type of conversation can inform and improve the other. Here’s a few thoughts from my own experience.
What if we didn’t go back?
We spend a lot of time hoping that our collaborations will go back to in-person so that we can regain the experience of being together. But what if we chose to make digital more engaging than in-person? What would be possible?
Commitment Issues - Repost
Sometimes a collaborative project can come apart because the drive to collaborate wanes or the sponsorship supporting collaboration changes. Here’s four lessons that might help you avoid this problem.
NASA’s Centre of Excellence for Collaborative Innovation
In the first episode of the second season of the Cool Collaborations podcast, we start a conversation with Ryon Stewart and Christine Jenkins from NASA’s Centre of Excellence for Collaborative Innovation.
What’s a facilitator?
Sometimes it takes a while for the right idea to land. The idea of facilitation and facilitators often comes with specific ideas of what in involved. Even amongst professionals who are themselves facilitators, there are many different ways of describing it. It wasn’t until I finally became aware of Adam Kahane’s work and his recent book Facilitating Breakthrough that more clearly understood that facilitators help people removes the obstacles to their contribution, connection, and equity so they can move forward together.
Crowdsourcing Collaboration
Have you ever wondered if crowdsourcing was a form of collaboration? In this week’s post, we explore crowdsourcing and its links to collaboration.
The personal journey inside collaboration
Inspiration for new thoughts on collaboration can come from anywhere. Thanks to an episode of The Knowledge Project for spurring some of my thinking on relationships vs. transactions and the trust wager from minds of Jim Collins and Bill Lazier.
More roots to collaboration
Building from the last post on the human roots of collaboration, this post draws on input from readers to consider things like safety, vulnerability, purpose, social behaviour and language as roots of collaboration.
Human roots of collaboration
What are those fundamental bits of humanness that give us the ability to collaborate? Have you ever wondered? I present here a few musings on how empathy and creativity are likely two of the core bits of us humans that allow us to work creatively together to solve complex problems.
The Collaboration Ladder
Everyone comes to collaboration with a particular view as to how well it will work and whether it is worth the effort to interact with others. The Collaboration Ladder gives a structure to the difference kinds of collaboration, from Opponents through to Sparkplugs.
Is Collaboration Just a Buzzword? (repost)
The word collaboration shows up everywhere, but does the use of the word really align with the meaning and intent of collaboration? This repost brings back some of my thinking and descriptions of the key parts of collaboration.
The Trust Dynamic
Have you ever contemplated trust in collaboration? What is it and where does it come from? It turns out that trust is a pretty complicated thing, hinging on what has happened in the past, what is happening right now, and what we think might happen in the future. In the complex world of collaboration, trust is a critical element for success.
Collaboration and Leadership – A conversation with Stephani Roy McCallum
Listening again to Stephani Roy McCallum in Episode 1 of the Cool Collaborations podcast, there’s so much depth in this discussion about our individual leadership. Steph speaks of separating agreement and your relationship, having to learn how to have the hard conversations, and having the courage to show up as a whole person. So many lessons, not just for collaboration, but for life.
Sparkplugs! (repost)
We need more sparkplugs … those people willing to step out and be collaborative. In this repost, we visit a conversation I had with Anthony Boxshall and Max Hardy on Authentic Codesign and where we talk about what it takes to be a collaborative sparkplug.
Lessons from COSIA: A conversation with Gordon Lambert.
There is a lot to learn from the origins of Canada’s Oil Sands Innovation Alliance (COSIA). Gordon Lambert, my guest on the latest episode of the Cool Collaborations podcast shares some of how COSIA started and so much more.
What book do you give as a gift?
For almost every episode of the Cool Collaborations podcast, I ask guests for their suggestions of a book they would routinely recommend or give as a gift. It makes for a great list of resources.
Human instincts in collaboration. A conversation with Andrew O’Keeffe
Andrew O’Keeffe is my guest on the latest episode of the Cool Collaborations podcast. Andrew is the author of Hardwired Humans, Successful Leadership Using Human Instincts and we explore the connections between our human instincts and collaboration.
Chimpanzees Recruit the Best Collaborators (repost)
Another look at a post I put together to review an article on how chimpanzees collaboration. This repost seems appropriate given next week’s release of my podcast conversation with Andrew O’Keefe, author of Hardwired Humans, on human instincts and collaboration.
Listen-Learn-Lead. A conversation with Catrin Owen
Catrin Owen, Deputy City Manager of the City of Edmonton is my guest on episode #16 of the Cool Collaborations podcast. In our conversation, we cover some of what it takes to collaborate in a City of nearly a million people, the mindset that is the foundation of collaborative work, and some great stories of collaboration success in the City of Edmonton.
The Empathy Map
The empathy map is a fantastic tool for understanding the experience of a group or organization. Might it also be a tool to help ourselves be better collaborators and conversationalists?