The Edge

Response — Collaboration (October 14)

The smartest thing I may have read all semester was the comment that individuals creating products and “coming together” at the end isn’t necessarily collaboration.  I think it points to something that may or may not have been written about, but that is extremely important if we’re really to mine the values and mitigate the problems of collaboration:  we’re steeped ideologically in a culture that values individual achievement.  (That is, the idea that individual authors develop ideas is seen as the natural order of things, even though it isn’t.)

What does this mean?  Quite frankly, that conflict almost has to be an inherent part of any collaborative effort.  Comfort with a “collaborative” process just might be a signal that what we’re doing is “getting together” in a way that is NOT collaborative at all.