Collaboration By Design

Collaboration by Design is an approach for enabling purposeful collaboration and speak-up cultures in organisations. It is a unique partnership between Optimice Pty Ltd and Changeworks Pty Ltd. Purposeful collaboration is coordinated social action toward a shared outcome or result. An organisation is an interdependent system of relationships, which has both a formal system and an informal culture. If the formal and informal are aligned in purpose and values, then leadership, as well as being a role, becomes an emergent and acknowledged property of the system. A leader can emerge in the moment as the person who puts forward the crucial suggestion that moves a stuck group forward, a person with a left-field idea for the future, or it can be a “go-to” person who is known as a source of specialist knowledge, or a trusted advisor, it can even be a customer with essential feedback that leads to a change in direction. A system and culture that enables this emergent leadership is a speak-up culture. It is a more responsive and able to adapt more quickly to the changing and challenging demands of the environment. This approach has been used to build healthy risk cultures, to improve cross-functional collaboration, wise decision making and networked leadership as well as promote change and innovation.