Does your organization have a philosophy or culture of group collaboration? How does your team interact? Do you have tools, software, and processes that support your philosophy? Or do they undermine your group’s synergy?
Collective Insight has a particular philosophy about group collaboration. We believe that organizations that actively reflect on their group interactions will develop stronger communities. Self-understanding will help design processes that tap your community’s collective intelligence — all the way down the level of software design.
Here we suggest two approaches to group collaboration: the Amsterdam Style and the Athens Style.
Markets: Amsterdam Style
Amsterdam is known for its extensive array of markets that encourage trade and commerce. Markets have a special power to coordinate transactions among large numbers of people in a decentralized way. Properly used, markets can solve problems, help make decisions, and involve a large community.
Amsterdam inspires the creation of markets. Possible uses include auctions, resource allocation, pricing, and negotiation. Efficient markets lower transaction costs, encourage trade, unlock value, and make everyone better off.
Markets traditionally are used for financial purposes, but they have a much broader usefulness. Anything of value can be coordinated with a market approach: resources, information, skills, goals, predictions, and risk-management. Want to encourage employees to share skills across departments? Want to incentivize team members to help steer the strategic direction of your organization? These sorts of problems are examples of how to apply markets more broadly.
Democracy: Athens Style
Athens is known as the birthplace of democracy: a highly participatory and inclusive form of government. Democracy brings in diverse voices and opinions in ways that other processes often cannot. Used appropriately, participatory techniques result in wise decisions, good accountability, and community buy-in.
Athens inspires deliberation. Styles of participation can range from informal to formal, textual to visual, casual to technical, and problem-focused to relationship-focused.
Want to provide a place for your community to debate an important issue? Want to keep the discussion on track and on topic? Want to smoothly integrate sub-groups into a group?
Group Coordination
We find these two philosophies to be very useful when it comes to thinking about group collaboration. Choices you make with technology and process have real effects on groups and their interactions.
Please contact us if you would like to engage in a conversation about how you want your online communities to interact.