What would be your guess to the most important factors that hinder or help a collaborative project?
For me, the first few thoughts that come to mind would include the ability to truly communicate, the capability to work from a place of accountability and respect and to always be based out of a place of complete transparency…not to mention trust that all active participants are involved for the betterment of the project.
The United States Cooperative Extension Program sponsors a journal, Journal of Extension (JOE). Included in their informative articles is a guide on which factors are productive to the creation of collaborative efforts. The information was formulated by experts in the field that studied which human characteristics and actions most affected our ability to work together.
They then gleaned from the results a self-evaluation tool that assists the forming of groups or teams into long-lasting cooperatives. Such factors as sustainability, political climate, history, connectedness, understanding the community and leadership, among others, are brought together to ascertain the probability of success.
