UsNow....Sustainabilists

Take the time to watch this 1.5 minute trailer if you haven't already. Great teaser into the power of the collaborative web to fundamentally transform governance. It is the same potential that is driving FAR's thesis exploration into how we can use the collaborative web for sustainability.

Have to tell you, I'm wishing we had a documentary film maker in our team (ahem Joel...).
Don Tapscott, Clay Shirky: if you're reading this, expect a call shortly from the FAR team.
And Val, if you like the teaser, maybe we can organize a meet-up and screen the documentary.

So now that we want to collaborate...

I'd like to share a quick snipet from a recent gchat:

me: collaboration makes it (the thesis process) slower- but hopefully stronger

Sarah: collaboration is a challenge and a jewel

Amen sister, Amen. Luckily we live in 2009- and the web has evolved some really nifty tools to aid us in our collaborative endeavors- ensuring things remain all shiny and jewel like. I'd consider collaborative thesis writing to be on the high end of the collaboration spectrum (high being the most collaboration imaginable, low being just providing feedback) which means we demand more of our collaboration tools. Over the past week FAR has probably explored every tool out there. We'd like to share our insights- and hopefully crowdsource some suggestions as well....

• Alice mentioned the nifty little tool zotero- which I am thoroughly in love with. However it really just helps me myself be organized- it doesn't have sharing capabilities. It's open source so it's improving all the time and sharing capabilities are on the way. But since none of us are quite nerdy enough to program in the capacities we need, we've turned to other resources for collaboration.
  

• Google. Although I share the skepticism of trusting google, or more accurately anyone, with all my personal information, I still love the tools they're putting out. A shared google calendar has been the frontline of our collaboration- setting meeting agendas, schedules the works. Follow that up with google documents so we can really co-create ideas together. This has been strengthened by the recent addition of google gears for offline work- a service we hope will expand. But there are limitations. Fei almost smashed her computer the hundredth time the document she was reading scrolled to the top because her fellow 'collaborators' were reading a different segment. Add that to the 'i'm sorry your most recent edit clashes with that of a shared collaborator' delete message- and we knew that while we loved google- we'd have to keep searching...
• Drop Box. Thank you drop box for both providing a back-up of all our documents and allowing us to easily pass and share resources/documents to work on without having to send e-mails. It's great- although the file management is getting out of control. How on earth are we supposed to stay up on all the changes and edits and additions being made by just the three of us? Especially without the tagging/sorting capabilities we've come to love in all our other on-line tools.
  
• Blog, blogs, blogs. So we have two blogs. This blog to solicit other people doing the work for us (thanks again...), and our private blog where we can post all our ideas and tag them- in a sense letting the tags organize our ideas into a thesis for us. This blog, kindly hosted for free by blogger, has access to all the great google gadgets so feels very familiar to us google fanatics. Our private blog is hosted by wordpress- which is open source so allows for thousands of people all over the world to improve it rather than just one company. And it has tag clouds, which FAR is pretty obsessed with.
  
• Twitter. We've just fallen in love with twitter. Every time one of us has a question- there is someone on twitter who has an answer. It's a smart, smart world out there and we love being able to tweet and access all that intelligence.
  

What else you got? I know there are quite a few other thesis groups out there going through intense collaborations... any tools we've missed? I've heard that evernote is amazing, and its tagging/searching capabilities seem pretty cutting edge. I'm definitely planning on using it for my personal life- however not sure about as a collaboration tool.

When collaboration zombies attack...

I know I should be sleeping, but too much black tea and far too relaxing a day, has me all itching and ready to burn internet rubber... So in my meandering, illogical (right brained) way, I came across this awesome project, whereby a lady by the name of Bryony has used the internet to make a ZOMBIE MOVIE with people writing, acting and making special-effects all over the world. She set up a kind of COIN: Collaborative, Innovation Network (not that she'd call it that), and probably could tell us plenty of stories about the challenges of working collaboratively over the internet.

Zombie movies...not necessarily sustainable, but Bryony with her why not attitude characteristic of us 'net gen' bunch, is giving us a great example of a creative application for COINs. Yes, you heard it here first. COINs are not just for Linux Designers. They're for amateur Zombie Movie directors too.

And before you ask, not all amateur Zombie Movie producers code Linux.

back to basics- do I even want to collaborate?

HELP!

Today we were lucky to have Stanley Nyoni, senior consultant at The Natural Step International spend some time chatting with FAR about our project.  Stanley wasted no time knocking us down a few notches, stumping us with ridiculously complicated questions like:

"What is Collaboration?"  

"Why is collaboration different than partnership?"

"How does collaboration help us?"

FAR collectively mumbled some excuses about needing to 'hit the books' and tried to scrap together some semblance of meaningful conversation- but we thought maybe you, our diligent blog readers, might have a better idea.  What do you think about collaboration- why should we do it?  So really what we're saying is- hey Val- what does collaboration mean to you?

In case you need a place to start, Stanley highlighted the skeleton of collaboration- the basics we are striving to elaborate on in our thesis and in the Brave New Collaboration wiki.  Thanks Stanley for a great talk, and helping us get back to basics.  Alright the skeleton of collaboration:

• Collaboration is a choice- so why would you make that choice?
  
• If we do chose to participate- it's likely based on the assumption that there is something to gain- some benefit to be derived...
  
• So how, once we engage collaboratively, do we ensure all those benefits are realized?
  
• And finally- maybe collaboration isn't a good thing.  Specifically, maybe collaboration using the web, isn't a good thing.  Maybe it violates our needs- rather than supporting our needs.  Obviously FAR scoffed at this ridiculous idea and promptly laughed Stanley right back to Stockholm, but we thought we'd do him justice and allow you readers to consider that angle as well.
  

All sounds pretty simple right?  We thought so too.  So just let us know what you think, and we'll plop it right on in to that little thesis paper.

What can WE do for you today?

I'm finding it difficult not to be an idealistic youth. I don't think I want to stop – we've been learning that holding vision is what will help us move forwards, that pragmatism and old ideas lead to incremental change, but that we can do better. I am from the Net Generation. The generation that thinks it can have anything, do everything, can have its cake and eat it.

I recently read in the economist that us Net Gen kids are a pain to employ. Selfish, divas and poor team players, that need masses of support. In my first job, you could definitely have got that impression from me, but the truth was, my whole office was on constant procrastination mode - surfing the web and delivering the bare minimum. Staff were unenthusiastic, projects were accomplished sloppily and when I asked for guidance to make sure I was doing the best job I could, the management answered a different question to the one I asked.

I'm curious: Do we Net Genners threaten the Biro Generation because we are raring to go? Because we want to go FASTER than old habits and systems will allow us? Whilst we're all bored and itching in the office do you see us as lazy and uncommitted?

As a member of the Net Generation, I have at my fingertips the collaborative knowledge of MILLIONS of people and if you can handle me properly, through me, they can work for you.
Its time for managers to learn how to make use of the Net Gen.

Our business systems are not geared up for the information age just as society is not geared up for the Net Generation. Like it or not, the Net Generation ARE the future and the information age is here NOW. Perhaps you, as a manager can learn to help me fulfil my potential which, with tools like the internet is getting bigger every millisecond because I don't only use my brain. I can collaborate using the internet and access thousands of other Brains – what can we do for you today?

Toyota wants your ideas...

http://www.toyotawhynot.com/#/home

By encouraging this exploration and sharing of ideas, will Toyota build itself a resource that can eventually provide a return on investment?

How do the participants of these collaborative concepts make money from their collaborating, begging the questions:

Does business just want their work done for free?

How will individuals 'earn' in the future?

How about a pay - per - collaborate site (a bit like pay per click?)

Another angle of web-collaboration we haven't gone in deep with yet...

xxx

How does twitter help us collaborate?

They call it informal collaboration.  I decided to investigate because my favorite podcast/blog just blogged about their tweeting community- and how all the tweeters in this planet money community are going to start meeting up.  More on this planet money community coming soon.... but for now this quick explanation (by Twitter itself) of just what need Twitter meets, what purpose they serve.

In response to Ed....

So thank you to Ed for sharing those thoughts- I couldn't agree more about the importance of exploring what collaboration truly is and bringing that into this project.  And I couldn't resist responding....

Our class really spent the first half of the program discovering the power and challenges of collaboration; which is what led me personally to this topic.  Our program has people from all different walks of life, from all over the globe, and all of our academic work is done collaboratively- with the thesis as the capstone of that work.  I came to Sweden to learn more about leadership and how to tackle our shared sustainability challenge, but the true Aha! moment came when I realized I was here to learn how to really collaborate- and the necessity of this to address the sustainability challenge.  I realized that in my past I'd done lots of group work, but very little meaningful collaboration where different minds come together and are empowered to create something greater than each individual involved.  I know one of the greatest experiences for me was working with three other individuals all from different continents, different ages and different levels of experience to develop a learning experience for our peers about Theory U.

I'm sure Alice and Fei can speak of similarly eye opening collaborations- and the three of us are really excited to put all our learning to practice on this project.  I'm excited about Brave New Collaboration because I think the web has the opportunity to change the way we share, learn and organize ourselves to allow collaboration that transcends barriers- but only if its developed intentionally to overcome those barriers.  As a group from all over the world, I think we have a better chance of really addressing those- but that's also why I think it will be so valuable to bring in Beyond Zero's experience in Africa and some of the unique barriers to that region.

One obvious barrier to the web's usefulness is the danger of information overload, particularly e-mail overload.  In our program it's clear that because we e-mail in english,  it is more time consuming for non-native english speakers to process e-mails; posing an unequal barrier to participation.  And then there are those of us who constantly fear the work e-mails coming in at all hours of the day, always staring at us when we sign in.....

At the same time, we don't want to lose those random thoughts and insights that are relevant to building shared knowledge, passion and understanding just because we're afraid of sending yet another e-mail, especially considering we are collaborating at a distance.  One strategy we're toying with is saving e-mail communication for logistical necessities- timely things needing response- and then post all other thoughts, commentary, insights to this blog people can check at their own convenience during set times.  We haven't used it much yet so no way to know if it will work.  Maybe over the next few weeks while we're waiting for our site to go up, all the 'facilitators' of this project (FAR, Menka, Ed and anyone else who is keen to take such a role) could share thoughts here- because I'm sure we'll all have many.  And then if we find it necessary to have a private means of communicating for the project facilitators, we could keep this on an unlinked part of our site.

Ok- more than enough from me.  I'm sorry brevity is not my strength- I promise I'll work on it...