Without the right underlying values, you can’t collaborate

Whenever we talk about collaboration we tend to talk about quite specific actions:

• Let’s put all these people in one room!
• Let’s hold regular knowledge sharing!  
• Let’s put this information online so everyone can use it!
• Let’s create team incentives!

Another audience question from our Open Studio - Collaborating for success was in relation to business as usual during the pandemic. While it wasn't always smooth sailing, we managed to learn a lot about our ways of working -- what worked, what didn't and what could be enhanced with some adjustments. 

Q: “I'd love to get some insight into how you've navigated collaborating during a COVID (remote working) world. Do you have any go-to digital tools for this? Did you find that you can emulate the experience in the same way as collaboration with tangible tools and methods?”

Following on from our latest article “When do you start collaborating”, this next one answers another question asked during our Open Studio - Collaborating for success. 

Q: “How do you manage collaboration among disparate skill levels and work styles, both at individual and interdepartmental or inter-institutional levels?”

We recently hosted an Open Studio panel discussion about effective collaboration, and received a few audience questions on the topic which were both interesting and chunky. While the team touched on them in the conversation, we had a lot more to say so we've turned our answers into a series of blog posts - here's the first one.

The side-effects of COVID

COVID messed up the events industry, but Nadine and Lisa at Something Digital gambled on being able to do some kind of hybrid in-person/remote event, and I think that gamble paid off because the anti-plague format actually worked really well.