• CEO’s Becoming Collaborative

    The word collaboration appeared nowhere in the excellent page-one story by Alan Murray headlined "After the Revolt, Creating a New CEO" (subscription required) in this past weekend’s edition of The Wall Street Journal. However, collaboration certainly plays in the background.

    The gist of the story is that the new crop of CEO’s running some of the world’s largest companies are less powerful, less arrogant, and more humble.  One example the story cites is Jim McNerney, CEO of Boeing who is “quick to point out the limits of his own power.” The story quotes McNerney as saying “I’m just one of eleven [board members] with a point of view.”

    Boeing is among the companies featured in The Culture of Collaboration book. The chapter on collaborative leadership discusses how organizations that create value through collaboration often develop and promote less autocratic and more responsive executives. This reinforces collaborative culture. Examples include Toyota, The Dow Chemical Company and the Mayo Clinic.

    Mayo regularly rotates its leaders including the CEO, who must keep practicing medicine while leading the organization. This keeps the CEO in touch with the trenches and collaborating with other doctors. Mayo, which was founded on principles of collaboration, has deftly integrated collaborative tools including videoconferencing, web conferencing and innovative messaging into its operations.

    Effective leadership has always required collaboration, but now collaborative leadership is in vogue.

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  • Pinger for Collaboration?

    It seems like everybody is talking about collaboration, especially at technology conferences. At the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco on April 17, Google CEO Eric Schmidt proclaimed that “collaboration is the killer app for the way communities work.” 

    I spent two days last week at the Dow Jones VentureWire Wireless Innovations conference in Redwood Shores, California. The conference format is that startup CEO’s present to venture capitalists in breakout sessions of 25 minutes or less. During presentations and spontaneous corridor conversations, the word collaboration came up repeatedly.

    One startup presenting at the conference is Pinger, which is optimized for asynchronous mobile-to-mobile communication and perhaps collaboration. In The Culture of Collaboration book, I define crossover tools as communication tools that can be used to foster a Culture of Collaboration. Pinger fits this description and delivers a new type of voice messaging. The company is funded by Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield and Byers. Described as “text messaging for your voice,” Pinger lets users send a voice message by dialing a special number, saying the recipient’s name, and recording a message. Hang up, and the message is sent. Recipients get notification of the Pinger via text message. To hear the message, the recipient can use the phone’s auto-dial function. To reply, just hit “1.” Pinger’s web interface allows management of inbox and contacts.

    The service is particularly handy for driving. Unlike text messaging, Pinger conveys voice tone and therefore provides more insight into intent and mood. Also, Pinger is easier than using a tiny QWERTY keyboard especially when driving! And it may even be a cure for Blackberry thumb! So why not leave voice mail instead of sending a Pinger? Voice mail often involves time-consuming, complex voice prompts. Also, you may be interrupting the recipient who may answer the phone.

    Pinger turns voice messaging into an efficient communication medium. How we use the medium determines whether we’re truly collaborating. Sending a Pinger with orders for a subordinate subverts collaborative culture, but sending a Pinger with a brainstorm relating to an ongoing project enhances the Culture of Collaboration.

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  • Collaboration, Mergers and Acquisitions

    The acid test for collaboration is mergers and acquisitions. Getting two organizations with different cultures to work well together while tying the knot presents significant challenges. The key is to instill collaborative culture. As I noted in my April 12 post, which you can view here, the lack of collaboration has likely derailed such mergers as Daimler-Benz and Chrysler.

    The lead story in today’s Wall Street Journal by Ellen Byron tackles Procter & Gamble’s $57 billion acquisition of Gillette, which I cover in The Culture of Collaboration book. The gist of the story, which requires registration to view here, is that combining the oral care units of P&G and Gillette involved particular complexity. Gillette’s Oral-B unit preferred meetings, while P&G’s Crest team liked memos. While P&G/Crest deliberated more, Gillette/Oral-B made relatively quick decisions.

    Both meetings and memos have limitations in merging two geographically-dispersed organizations. Meetings require scheduling and travel. Memos are one-way, asynchronous and anti-collaborative. The most effective tools for integrating two companies are often real-time tools including instant messaging, web conferencing and videoconferencing. Presence brings these tools to life by showing which colleagues are available and by enabling instant connections through text, voice and video.

    Ironically, I describe in the book how P&G and Gillette used presence-enabled tools extensively while managing the merger. The desire for spontaneous decision-making and problem-resolution drove the use of the tools. However, the tools took hold because P&G extended its highly-collaborative culture to the Gillette team, which was generally receptive. Judging from the Wall Street Journal story, there may have been pockets of anti-collaborative behavior during and after the merger. However, the broader story, which The Wall Street Journal article did not address, is that the P&G and Gillette merger is succeeding because of collaboration.

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  • Instant Messaging Changing Workplace Dynamics

    Behavior once considered a faux pas at best and professional suicide at worst is now considered collaborative. As business adopts instant messaging and other forms of real-time, spontaneous collaboration, workplace dynamics are changing. In forward-thinking organizations, instant messaging or even a spontaneous video chat with your boss’s boss or somebody several levels down the organization chart is becoming acceptable.

    By 2010, 90% of people with business email accounts will have IT-controlled IM accounts, according to Gartner. Also, Gartner reports that the enterprise IM market is growing at 20% per year through 2009. IM is more effective than email in making remote workers feel more connected. Remote workers include telecommuters, road warriors, and people working from small branch offices and outsourced workspace. By 2010, more than 40 million people in the United States will work remotely or from home, according to JALA International, which analyzes data on telecommuting. Currently, almost a third of managers work at home at least part of the time, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

    To feel more connected, geographically-dispersed team members are choosing real-time, spontaneous tools like IM. Secure, corporate-sanctioned IM is beginning to eclipse email in many workplaces. With IM at their fingertips, people are checking whether colleagues at all levels of the organization are available. New capabilities allow real time on the fly connections with a single click from a spreadsheet, document or database (see my March 7 post). Rather than wait for a scheduled call or meeting, people are instead collaborating spontaneously.

    Real-time collaboration is wreaking havoc on hierarchy and is challenging the status quo. Therefore, as I point out in The Culture of Collaboration book, organizational culture must catch up with new ways of working. However, tools extend and enhance—rather than create—culture.

    Let me know how IM is impacting workplace dynamics within your organization. Feel free to post a comment or send me email at evan@thecultureofcollaboration.com

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  • Collaboration Issues at DaimlerChrysler?

    When mergers sour, many factors play a role. In The Culture of Collaboration book, I describe how anticipating, acknowledging and addressing cultural differences are key success factors in mergers. I also discuss how collaboration can bridge cultures, break down barriers and reduce the impact of silos. Against this backdrop, the book covers what went right with Procter & Gamble and Gillette and what went wrong with AOL and Time Warner.

    Now DaimlerChrysler seeks a buyer for Chrysler, and the bids are a fraction of the $36 billion Daimler-Benz paid for Chrysler nine years ago. This merger was clearly a disaster. What went wrong? Tuesday National Public Radio broadcast an excellent story by Frank Langfitt on its flagship newscast, All Things Considered. You can listen to the story here.

    In a nutshell, Langfitt reports that the companies had almost nothing in common. Barriers included language and culture. Daimler was a German company known for luxury brands and Chrysler was a scrappy, price-conscious Detroit carmaker that nearly went bankrupt in the 1980’s. Mercedes engineers had limited interest in the cost-per-unit of components and resisted sharing parts for use in Chrysler-branded vehicles for fear of diluting brand value. In contrast, Ford Motor Company—as I describe in the book—shares parts across Volvo, Ford Europe and Mazda.

    DaimlerChrysler uses collaborative tools, both real-time and asynchronous. The company has standardized on the IBM Lotus suite including Sametime instant messaging. Nevertheless, collaboration has been inadequate to break down barriers and ensure a successful merger. Why? It takes more than collaborative tools to collaborate! As I point out in the book, tools extend and enhance—rather than create—collaborative culture.

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  • Instant Messaging Links TV with PC

    Gaming and business collaboration share many elements. Both link geographically-dispersed people in social networks. The business trend towards real-time, spontaneous collaboration has its roots in consumer instant messaging. It’s easier to integrate tools into our work styles that we already use in our lifestyles.  IM, which is currently becoming an IT-sanctioned enterprise tool, is taking off in workplaces because we are comfortable text chatting with family and friends.

    Microsoft, which is focused on both business and consumer collaboration, is enhancing social networks by bringing Windows Live Messenger to Xbox 360 game consoles. This announcement flings open the door so that Xbox users can interact with PC-based IM users, further linking the PC and TV platforms. Also, Windows Live Messenger users will see at a glance whether their friends have gamertags and therefore whether they’re available for gaming.

    Windows Live Messenger, the largest IM community, includes over 260 million active accounts. Xbox users can already engage in text messaging plus voice and video chat within the Xbox community. Later this year, published reports suggest that Microsoft will offer voice interaction between Xbox and PC-based Live Messenger users. This parallels the Microsoft Business Division’s moves (see my March 7 post) to enable text, voice and video chat from Microsoft Office and other applications.

    Ultimately, the relationships gamers develop may carry over into the workplace. Teenagers who bond because of common interests and form social networks using text, voice and video chat may nurture these relationships for years. Today’s consumer collaboration is tomorrow’s business collaboration.

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  • Collaborative Leadership

    Matt Villano’s excellent column headlined “Want Recognition? Share the Limelight” in Sunday’s New York Times business section tackles the “I” vs. “we” dilemma in the workplace. Use “I” to describe success, and you’re a selfish narcissist, to paraphrase the column. Use “we” and you get less credit than you may deserve.

    Nevertheless, “I” has no place in a collaborative culture. Few successes are the work of one person. Unfortunately, too many organizations embrace star cultures in which people are rewarded for competing with colleagues. We can create much greater value through collaboration than through internal competition. Fortunately for the bottom line, star cultures are becoming passé.

    And there’s a clear link between tools and culture. Presence is the ability of a person or device to connect with others and to display levels of availability. IM buddy lists introduced us to the concept. Now we can connect with colleagues and business partners directly from spreadsheets, documents and line-of-business systems. We can begin with text chat and, when appropriate, escalate into voice or video interaction.

    As we extend collaborative culture through presence-enabled tools, we are becoming more “we” oriented. In The Culture of Collaboration book, I describe the collaborative culture at the Mayo Clinic. Mayo extensively uses collaborative tools including videoconferencing and web conferencing to extend—rather than create—its collaborative culture. And Dr. Glenn Forbes, CEO of the Mayo Clinic’s Rochester, Minnesota campus tells me that at Mayo people are very uncomfortable using the word “I.”

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  • Collaboration Across Time Zones

    The blogosphere is abuzz with comments about The Daily Telegraph’s editorial that we should eliminate time zones in favor of a single “Global Time.”

    Since the Telegraph is a British newspaper, Global Time means Greenwich Mean Time. The argument in favor of Global Time is that it’s simple and that New Yorkers will get used to the alarm clock going off at what is currently 11 p.m. EDT.

    While a single time zone could solve some problems, it would undoubtedly create other issues—like choosing the time zone that would become Global Time. Another issue is that highly-collaborative companies leverage mirror zones (see my March 16 post) for 24-hour product and service design and development. Shifting to a single time zone would compromise that business model.

    The discussion about time zones points up an issue that plagues many organizations. I have worked with global companies that expect the rest of the world to adopt headquarters-driven, real-time collaboration schedules. This means team members in Paris must collaborate at night with a Seattle headquarters or a team in Tokyo must conference at 5 a.m. with headquarters in New York where it’s 4 p.m. The result is that people in other regions feel abused by the home office and can even interpret such practices as cultural insensitivity.

    The most collaborative companies reject headquarters-driven schedules. In The Culture of Collaboration book, I describe how collaborative organizations solve time zone problems by rotating convenience among regions. This has particular relevance for scheduled videoconferences and web conferences. The convenience of spontaneous encounters should also rotate based on common sense. If one collaborator or group of collaborators stays up late one week, their counterparts across the ocean may sacrifice convenience the next week. Collaborative leaders must consider work styles and lifestyles of global team members when scheduling interactions or collaborating spontaneously.

    It’s time to BREAK OUT of a headquarters-driven collaboration schedule and mindset so that global teams can create greater value.   

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  • Venture Capitalists Investing in Enterprise Collaboration

    I spent Tuesday and part of Wednesday at the Dow Jones VentureWire WebVentures conference in San Mateo, California—and collaboration was top of mind for just about everybody attending.

    The format of the conference is that CEO’s of startups present to venture capitalists in shotgun-style break-out sessions. This means they have 25 minutes to deliver their message and motivate their audience. VC’s who have either passed up enterprise collaboration investments or folded too soon have renewed interest in the space in light of Cisco’s acquisition of WebEx (see my March 16 post). One VC peppered me with questions about Cisco’s motives as we waited for a presentation to begin. Here are some of the collaboration products/services/companies that caught my eye:

    UK-based Trampoline Systems,which just completed a $ 5.8 million financing round, empowers employees to leverage relationships through its SONAR product. SONAR analyzes data in systems including email servers, contact databases and document archives and then maps collaboration and communication patterns and social networks. CEO Charles Armstrong, an ethnographer, is trying to make enterprises more like villages, which often collaborate more effectively than organizations do. By revealing collaboration and communication patterns and the key themes people are interacting about, SONAR makes it easy to find and connect with colleagues who have a relationship to a topic. Breaking down barriers and creating value is what Trampoline is all about.

    Qwaq, which I blogged in detail about on March 13, is gaining traction and there was great interest in the company from VC’s at the conference. Also, Fortune 100 enterprises were seeking out CEO Greg Nuyens out in hopes of beta testing Qwaq Forums, the company’s immersive 3D collaboration product. What’s compelling about Qwaq from an investment perspective is the deep talent of the team in highly-scalable, distributed systems and the disruptive nature of the product.

    Genius, which has secured $10 million series B financing, is a company founded and run by people with real-time collaboration backgrounds. CEO David Thompson was chief marketing officer of WebEx. VP of Marketing Felicity Wohltman ran marketing for the Breeze product (now Adobe Acrobat Connect) at Macromedia and also worked in marketing at WebEx. The Genius platform provides real-time data to sales and marketing people on the behavior patterns of specific customers and prospects on corporate web sites. Among other features, a salesperson can invite the customer to participate in text chat. The genius of Genius is that it bridges the gap between marketing and sales.

    Clarizen, which has closed $7 million series A financing, combines project management with collaboration in an on-demand, web-based service. CEO Avinoam Nowogrodski is used to marrying collaboration with other applications. He previously founded SmarTeam, which combined product lifecycle management (PLM) with web-based collaboration. Dassault Systemes bought Smarteam. In The Culture of Collaboration book, I wrote about how Boeing and Toyota use Dassault Systemes tools for near 24-hour global product development.

    Serial Entrepreneur Jerry Kaplan is bringing collaboration to online gaming through a company called Winster, which has secured $1.5 million series A financing. The business model is pay-per-play games targeted at middle-aged women. To earn prizes, players collaborate by trading game pieces. As they help each other win games, players chat and develop relationships. Winster is about creating value through collaboration through a beautifully simple interface and business model. In the book, I wrote about realigning organizational recognition and reward systems around collaboration. Jerry has certainly done this in the consumer space.

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  • Virtual Enterprise Applies The Culture of Collaboration

    I am delighted to see that the principles covered in The Culture of Collaboration book are taking hold.

    Not a day goes by without somebody telling me how the book is helping his or her career, transforming a team or, in some cases, an enterprise. From an author’s perspective, it’s exciting and rewarding to see how organizations are creating value through the 10 Cultural Elements of Collaboration and the other principles that I wrote about in the book.

    This brings me to Wilson F. Engel III, Ph.D. Dr. Engel has posted a detailed review of the book on Epinions.com in which he describes how he and his colleagues read The Culture of Collaboration and successfully applied the principles to their global virtual enterprise.  According to Dr. Engel’s review, "In effect, we used every principle in Rosen’s book—which was required reading for our group—and the principles WORK!"

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