Tools

IndustryWeek, which provides excellent targeted content to the manufacturing sector, is featuring The Culture of Collaboration book this week. Besides the author Q&A that appears on its web site, IndustryWeek is pushing the content to more than 30,000 email newsletter subscribers. I appreciate IndustryWeek’s interest in the book and the topic.

The Q&A gave me an opportunity to hit on some of the book’s central themes including the shift to real-time collaboration and the move away from the pass-along approach to work and decision-making. IndustryWeek asked me about Six Sigma’s role in collaboration and how to build trust among multicultural collaborators. And I used The Dow Chemical Company as an example of how Six Sigma has enhanced the collaborative culture. I also described how Dow uses tools to extend—rather than create—its collaborative culture.

Dow uses over 300 collaborative rooms called iRooms. These rooms link Dow people in forty-three countries via an IP network carrying video, voice and data. The iRooms provide a range of capabilities including Polycom videoconferencing, audio conferencing, shared digital whiteboard and application sharing. But the point I make in the Q&A—and in the book—is that an organization’s culture must become collaborative before tools can make a big difference.

The IndustryWeek Q&A also describes how BMW and Boeing build trust among multicultural collaborators.