How important is collaboration to you in 2014? If more than last year, then next year will be even more so. If not that much, then next year will be a struggle. But let me put my crystal ball away and rephrase the above. A major study by the HR industry in the UK recently revealed a major trend in the way HR executives are thinking about the future of business; the resilience of workers will be a paramount factor. A strong feature of a resilient workforce is the capacity to collaborate and that is not a new discovery. Therefore, I suggest that anyone who plans to create something and be relevant in the workplace regardless of their current position should learn more about collaboration. This week’s selection is the usual a mix of reading, but includes some articles from which I was also able to learn something new. In particular I like the piece from the Optimice company blog site, which goes into lovely detail about the way we can better design workspaces for collaboration. The company’s blog is an absolute trove of similar articles so I recommend it strongly. I also liked the overview of ‘historic collaborations’ which Bloomberg published and I think it’s a rich source of micro-lessons. As you can see, there are plenty of people who are ‘natural born sharers’, all you need to is indulge and make yourself more attractive to your colleagues, bosses or partners and your collaboration value goes up.

Historic Collaborations

Brothers Take Flight
Wilbur and Orville Wright
The Wright Co.
Dayton, Ohio
Founded 1892

From Coco Chanel and Pierre Wertheimer to Larry Page and Sergey Brin, some of the world’s most effective business partnerships in recent history have resulted in companies with products and services that pioneered new industries and business models. For a look at the results of 11 such pairings, flip through this slide show…READ ON

Who would you like to sit near at work?

Sounds a simple enough question, but likely to provoke a mix of emotions that strikes at the heart of the social and business dichotomy. On one hand we like to sit with people that we can get on with; people that potentially share our interests, both inside and outside of work. But also they might be people that are different enough from us to challenge and stretch us without descending into acrimony. On the other hand we might put our ‘business’ hat on and consider our current role…READ ON

Business Collaboration Advice From The World’s Top Social CIO

I recently had the privilege to interview one of the most collaborative and social CIOs in the world, Oliver Bussmann, Group CIO of UBS. UBS is the biggest bank in Switzerland, operating in more than 50 countries with about 63,500 employees globally. UBS is considered the world’s largest manager of private wealth assets. Bussmann, who has almost 25 years of experience in the business of IT, responsible for managing an 8,000 employee IT organization, has been named by numerous publications as the top social CIO in the world. It should come as no surprise to you that I met Mr. Bussmann through social collaboration and I have learned so much from him…READ ON

How local collaboration can help your small business grow

When the economic crisis hit, small businesses in Britain and United States banded together to survive and compete. But here in Australia, why should we wait for a crisis to enjoy the advantages of collaboration? For many small businesses, it’s only by joining forces that you can achieve economies of scale and have a voice that’s loud enough to be heard over the big guys. There is a kaleidoscope of ways you can work with local businesses. At one end of the scale, businesses are running whole marketing campaigns together. At the other end, they’re swapping ideas and promoting each other’s brands to expand their own reach. Here are five inspiring reasons to collaborate with your business neighbours:..READ ON

Australian Collaboration for Accelerator Science

Accelerator science is both a discipline in its own right within modern physics and provides highly powerful tools for discovery and innovation in many other fields of scientific research. As such, it holds a distinguished position in enabling and shaping the modern world from the discovery and study of the atomic properties of materials, to biomedical research and the treatment of illnesses, unravelling environmental processes and finally to the fundamental understanding of how the Universe was created. Throughout its history Australia has participated in and made key contributions to the field of accelerator science, including the invention of the synchrotron acceleration principle. To maintain and develop state-of-the-art accelerator-based facilities in Australia, the Australian Collaboration for Accelerator Science (ACAS) has been established…READ ON

Expand Your Collaboration ‘Footprint’

For most enterprises, successful online collaboration requires massive behavior change across the company. In thinking about how to get many people each to change a little, I borrowed a technique from those who wrestle with a similar predicament: addressing climate change. We can take many actions to slow climate change, but most of them require millions of people to change their behavior in a coordinated way. So how do you get people out of the “What can I do? I’m just one person” mode of thinking? One small step each person can take is to track his carbon footprint. The goal, of course, is to make your own footprint as small as possible; there are even calculators to help you do it…READ ON

Innovation Or Production? Authentic Leaders Choose “Both”

If there is a recurring, consistent question that pops up in all innovation conversations, it’s one that goes something like this: “I am tasked with producing results against very specific measures. At the same time, I’m being encouraged to innovate, to be a creative risk-taker. Is it possible to do both, to have both a Rainforest (innovation) world and a plantation (production) world, at the same time?”…READ ON

…and now for something completely different…

44 Simple Daily Activities To Enjoy Your Work

Here are 44 Simple Daily Activities To Enjoy Your Work created by OfficeVibe to help keep the motivation high and add some fun back in your work day!

…Source: http://www.coolinfographics.com/blog/2014/4/4/44-simple-daily-activities-to-enjoy-your-work.html