Geir Stene

Collaboration used to be”hype”. Nowadays it’s social media and the iPad/ Kindle e-readers. The speed of innovation is increasing.  It’s getting harder and harder to divide these topics. In my eyes they are interconnected, and will become even more woven together. How will this change us?

We have moved from a closed in collaboration (software for use only within the organization, document sharing and workflow) towards a more open and including form of collaboration, where Twitter now seems to be in the forefront of the development. The best forms of collaborative activities are those who appear from nowhere, that aren’t planned, in short are anarchistic in their form. That doesn’t mean that they are purposeless, it means that the collaborative need develops from an individual (or small group) that has a motif for finding answers and solutions quickly. The most effective way to get there is to search for other people that might have the answer,a part of an answer or/ and a benefit from participating with you to solve a topic. Because of the relational interaction, collaboration starts to develop. The blending of collaboration and community (social media) happened in the process, because it’s the most effective way to get to the goal.

What we see is that this kind of mindsets can be used generic. It will enable far better ways of knowledge management, collaboration, innovation, product development, project management and so forth. Furthermore it will be put into effect within all kinds of businesses, from education, media business, commercials and nonprofit organizations, production of renewable energy, car production and so forth, all will very soon see the connective collaboration and community as one arena of relational co- existence, where things aren’t as pre- planned as we used to do things. New technology, new tools and the semantic web will be forces that drive this development, or is it the other way around? I don’t think it matters, but I do think that it is what’s happening around us is as we speak.

I’ve spoken of Charles Leadbeater before. I won’t stop doing so, because what he’s been speaking about (innovation and mass creativity) is one of the things we see happens around us in an increasing speed. So I’d advise you to have a look at his homepage HERE. Seen from a different perspective I would highly advise you to look at Kevin Kelly from Wired magazine, a very interesting speech he had in 2008 that can be found at Youtube HERE. Kevin Kelly explains what the web really is in a philosophical way, and where it’s heading (web 3.0). In my eyes both are speaking of something that is going on, not about some distant future, which might happen. We are afraid, afraid of the value that disappeared; now everything is “free” on the web, how to make revenue? Newspaper people are asking this several times a day. Publishers fight the development of “free” Educational institutions are, and corporations are afraid that their competitive advantage is gone if you share all knowledge. I think it’s wrong, I think it’s missing the point of what this leads to.  I do like the postulate Kevin make in the speech “the value is beyond “free” Kevin Kelly argues that the web is, and will even more become something – not “out there” but something that embody us, that we are inside of. What is of value change, and I believe that holding on to what used to be “of value” no longer is a good idea. The change is, as you might guess – tremendous for all of us.

I found the blog of Umar Haque (Director of the Havas Media Lab and founder of  Bubblegeneration) and the posting in Harward Business review  “Twitter’s Ten Rules For Radical Innovators”  and discover that it seems to be a guideline worth while reading for all of us. It just migt give us some hints of how to focus of finding value, and making a living by changing what, why and how we do business into the future.  I suggest you read it for yourself, but here are the bullet points:

• Ideals beat strategies
• Open beats closed
• Connection beats transaction
• Simplicity beats complexity
• Neighborhoods beat networks
• Circuits beat channels
• Laziness beats business
• Public beats private
• Messy beats clean
• Good beats evil