Collaboration Jury Duty Style Part 2 (and Final)

In my previous post I mentioned that I was curious how this forced method of collaboration would go. It was truly one of the most challenging efforts I have experienced. When deliberations began, we the jury, for the first time could communicate with one another our thoughts. That is different than in a project team. Typically before the decisions have to be made there has been interaction and exchange of thoughts and ideas. When we first shared our thoughts we were split up the middle 6 to 6. That was shocking for us all. We all heard the same thing for 6 days straight, yet in the end, we were split. BUT that is not so unlike project teams I have been on. Solutions are not always black and white and more often than not, some discussion ensues. The forced element though was hard to take– here we were split and we had to make a decision before we could depart from one another. So the discussion went on; there was no agenda, no facilitator (which drove me crazy since I am a facilitator) and the conversation went from silly to heated to sidebars and back. We weren’t really collaborating most of the time we were trying, each of us, to prove our point. No Covey “win win” here (at least early in the day). BUT as time ticked on, we did start to listen and give a bit. Collaborating was happening out of necessity and by default! BUT it wasn’t to just get to the end. We all truly had the feeling that we all wanted to do the right thing and we were all committed to doing it right. AND that IS collaborative. The path we took to get there was not the best, but we did get there. Would I suggest the forced method–locking folks in a room to talk, eat, etc., until they came out as one voice???? Heck no, BUT we the jury did in the end collaborate, and remained on good terms through our frustration. I will remember that next time I am around a conference room table! Happy collaborating.

Collaboration– Jury Style

I have been sitting on a jury this week (and will probably next as well) and it has my mind turning on collaboration (again). I have held the belief of collaborating being a mindset and then you apply the tools rather than the other way around. Something “inside” a person must want to collaborate, have a willingness to collaborate and then it happens. Jury duty is “force collaboration” in a way. AND something that I am not a proponent of typically-forcing collaboration that is. Usually for upper management to try to “make” a team collaborate is unsuccessful. BUT this week, here I sit with 11 other people that I have very little in common with. We don’t work in the same industry or at the same company, we are not of the same political or church beliefs, we do not have a neighborhood in common or friends or family in common. YET in a few days we will be asked to put all that aside and we will be “forced” to collaborate. The only thing we will have in common is an objective or an end result. I am curious to see how much negotiating takes place and how much “digging in of one’s heels” takes place. The only thing in common that we have that brings us to this place is that we all live in the same county and we all got the “luck of the draw” this week. With such a variety of values and experiences I am going to be watching, and experiencing the most basic form of collaboration there is. Our jury system has been doing this for decades on end. 12 of us, listening to facts and figures, not talking during this process, but in the end we will share and reach a conclusion in a collaborative fashion. I for one am curious as to how this will play out, what I will learn from this and what I can pass on here and in my work. Until then, happy collaborating!