Collaborative Intelligence

I am revisiting a topic that I wrote on in July regarding Collaborative Intelligence.  Today on WWPYCBW, Michael gives some great thoughts on collaboration and it made me think again on CQ or Collaborative Intelligence.  Realizing that others have something to contribute and that you have information worth sharing and ideas that need exploring with others is collaboration.  Even if you don’t have the latest technology, you can collaborate.  Using the “we don’t have xxxxx tool” so we can’t collaborate is just  a poor excuse.  Collaborating is a human skillset. Sure the tools can help (immensly!) but they cannot help if the culture and the collaborative nature of the humans involved is not present.  Picking up the phone, sending a letter (yep there is still the written note), attending or participating in a panel discussion, meeting for coffee if you are in close proximity, etc. open up the communications channels and open up for the sharing of ideas, feelings and knowledge.  Understanding that your thoughts and ideas get better when you share them and you add to them other’s inputs, is what collaboration is all about.  So whether you are chatting with a collegue, tweaking a document that your team is working on in SharePoint, adding to a wiki for a knowledge base or reading blogs and writing blogs, etc., you are increasing the CQ in your life and in the life of your team.  Happy collaborating today!

Collaborative Intelligence-CQ

I have been reading alot about Collaborative Intelligence lately, specifically on Getting Clever Together– i love the concept and it makes total sense to me.  Collaborating starts from the inside and then moves outward.  As I have said in other blog entries, forced collaboration may work but not in the true spirit of what collaboration is.  Collaborative Intelligence or CQ is a “measure” of a teams ability to collaborate.  There are things that can be done to “up” this quotient and to get the team to trust, communicate and truly collaborate together.  Most of us are familiar with IQ or Intelligence Quotient or EQ which is emotional intelligence.  Little to nothing can be done with IQ; some awareness of our EQ can assist us in managing this but CQ is a target that is moving and can be improved (or killed!).  I love CQ because by creating an atmosphere of collaboration, by creating situations that cause teams to communicate and trust each other and just plain get to know each other you can increase their ability to collaborate.  That means smoother projects, more creativity, better exchange of information and just flat out a happier work force or project team. 

This also hits my hot button on facilitation.  As a Certified Professional Facilitator, CQ encompasses everything that I believe about working with teams.  As a facilitator I create an atomsphere of collaboration by creating safety, a process and consensus.  These facets all work together, each an important piece of the puzzle.  AND amazingly the people in the room naturally begin to collaborate and they even LIKE IT!  They will leave the work session happy and with a feeling of accomplishment–unlike anything they have experienced without facilitation.  Talk about “upping” your Collaborative Intelligence Quotient! 

For more on CQ check out the blog referenced above.  For more on Facilitation check out the International Association of Facilitators website or my website.  Happy Collaborating!