The right effort at the right level Let’s look at 4 ways of working with others. Your understanding of what happens at each level can help you become a more valuable contributor to any project. From there you can build a checklist for any collaborative effort you engage in. 1. Networking When you exchange contact information with someone and express interest in an idea at an informal meeting, you are kicking off a…
Repairing connections in collaboration
When you work with others, you have expectations. Sometimes the connections on the great project tree seem damaged, dried up, brittle and fragmented. The project drags on. You have a deadline. How do you do your job? Questions open the door to deeper collaboration … or not This week, I wrote to a subject matter expert who was assigned as the main information…
Law 1. All writing in organizations is collaborative
It’s tempting to think of writing as a something one does alone. All writing is, to some extent, collaborative. Many book forewords tell the story of how people helped the author: editors, mentors, peers, wives or husbands, friends, kids—even the cat. The content still belongs to the author whose name appears on the cover. As Ray Bradbury…
The 10 laws of collaborative writing
How do you make sure you are collaborating effectively with your writing colleagues? Here are 10 laws to guide you: All writing in organizations is collaborative. Respect thy collaborators as thyself. Identify the writing mandate and agree on a process. Assess the requirements for the project (even when there’s no time). Agree on practices and tools, and…