The Road to Collaboration: The Brementown Musicians
Collaboration is a word we hear a lot today. We are supposed to collaborate.
What does this really mean? Is collaboration like friendship or marriage?
Who are the best organizations to collaborate with and what should we ask
of them?
How do we become good partners ourselves?
This seem like tough and timely questions but I would argue that we know a
lot more about collaborate than we think….
After all we know the story of the most famous and successful collaboration
of all time…..
SLIDE1: title page all animals
It started out simply enough, as they often do, with a problem.
SLIDE 2: donkey crying
Poor donkey had not kept himself relevant enough for his work
environment. He had neglected his opportunities for retooling himself and
now found that he was not capable of taking on new responsibilities required
by his job. In short, he was a victim of downsizing. What to do?
SLIDE 3: donkey standing looking up
The donkey, after a short self-assessment of his talent as a trumpet player,
went in search of new opportunities that could use his talent.
SLIDE 4: dog crying
Along the way he found someone with a common problem and a talent that
could supplement the donkey’s own talent for music.
SLIDE 5: dog and donkey together
Note please, that the donkey was forward thinking enough not to only
consider partnering with another donkey.
He bravely links with an animal unlike himself but with a common goal and
a useful skill.
These are important pieces of the collaborative process. One must be
willing to look outside the realm of the familiar.
Commonality must be in the goal not the institution -- er animal.
SLIDE 6: cat crying
While forming the collaboration between them, the donkey and the dog
come upon yet another animal with a similar issue.
SLIDE 7: Cat, dog, and donkey together
This is a common result of collaboration. Once the common goal is clearly
understood, one discovers others who have the same mission but bring
different skills to the mission -- “night singing.” It is always encouraging to
discover we are not alone.
So our clever animals have set in place the crucial elements of collaboration.
They have identified a problem. Assessed their skills. Linked with others
outside their realm with a common mission and relevant skills.
They have also established clear responsibilities from the start. The donkey
will play the trumpet, the dog will drum and the cat will sing.
SLIDE 8 : Rooster on Donkey’s back
The fourth member of their collaboration comes to them due to the fact that
he has applied his skills ineffectively and his work is not appreciated. The
skills he does have make him a natural partner in the other animals already
established collaboration.
SLIDE 9: Animals in tree
Once all the members of the collaboration are identified, the common goals
established and the roles each member will play are clear, it is important to
conduct regular meetings in which options and projects are discussed.
SLIDE 10: Donkey looking in lit window
In this case the animals discover their short-term goal – shelter from the
night air—and proceed, together, or collaboratively towards this goal.
SLIDE 11: dark outline of all animals together
The best thing about collaborations is that when one is faced with an
obstacle that gets in the way of the goal
SLIDE 12: Robbers in window
– In this case, a house full of robbers—the partners in the collaboration are
in it together. Talents and resources are pooled to best resolve the problem.
SLIDE 13: Repeat of eleventh slide of dark outline of all animals together
Here we see the separate animals, knowing what each can bring to the
problem, collaborate physically and quiet literally to defeat the robbers.
With a well-established infrastructure of their collaboration “they plunged
through the window amidst a clatter of broken glass.”
SLIDE 14: Animals at the table
In the best of collaborations all parties share equally the work, the planning
and then of course,
SLIDE 15: dog with hotdog
The reward.
SLIDE 16: animals in the house
When collaboration is success in short term, all parties must consider
whether is make sense, as it did in this case, to continue with an ongoing
collaboration that remains beneficial to all parties concerned.
SLIDE 17: cat, dog and donkey feet with robber
On going collaborations are not without their glitches. The unexpected can
happen.
But as was the case with our animal friends, the well established roles and
positive relationship that had developed as a result of their collaboration
allowed them to resolve conflicts.
All parties agreed that this was a most successful collaboration capable of
meeting short-term goals and providing long term benefits.
In is important to keep in mind that sometimes the goals we think we want to
achieve change over time as the collaborations develop.
SLIDE 18 : Animals sleeping in beds
As in this case, what started as a desire to retool their skills to market
themselves more effectively in a new work environment became a creation
of a mutually beneficial organization content to work together for more
modest goals.