Collaboration is the joining of forces (individual or organisational) for the purpose of achieving a shared objective.  It can and should happen within teams, departments, cross-departmentally, within organisations and between organisations.

Collaboration is so ingrained in the way we work nowadays that we rarely notice that we’re collaborating. Tools like Slack and Trello make it easier than ever to work together on projects. They allow teams to seamlessly share knowledge, even when working remotely and when we’re not on top of our game (which we can’t be 100% of the time) we could all use a helping hand.

The Premier League’s top goal scorers thrive when they have a good assist, Dolce would have been nothing without Gabbana, and Ben without Jerry is a thought I never want to have again ????

There are so many benefits to collaborating of which I’ve expanded on just a handful below.

Benefits of collaborating

Strengthens relationships

Collaboration removes the ‘them’ vs ‘us’ mentality that siloed or regional teams often have and it helps create one unified workforce that becomes a driver for your business to achieving a common goal.

Enhances your team

Trusted partners act as an extension to your team and vice versa, you will act as an extension to theirs. For smaller organisations especially, this can prove extremely useful when stacking up against larger organisations on pitches and increases the value you provide to your clients.

Improves learning

By encouraging collaboration you create a workplace centred around learning and development which in turn allows your team to learn from each other’s mistakes as well as their own.

Increases efficiency

I strongly believe in working smarter not harder so if someone has done it before and can teach you in a few minutes what would take hours to learn yourself then that sharing of knowledge isn’t just encouraged but essential to the growth of your organisation.

Expands opportunities

Think about music collaborations. Working with another artist opens doors for both parties. It widens your fan base by tapping into the other artist’s fans. From a business perspective, working with businesses that provide complementary services to yours means you both have a trusted source of pre-qualified leads.

Finally, we want to say a massive THANK YOU to the amazing businesses and freelancers we have the pleasure of collaborating with on a regular basis:

Nebula Labs – Native app development

50:50 Future – Diversity & Inclusion experts

CUBED – Business strategists

Lucy Kyriakidou – Illustrator

Jade Gillham – Digital Marketing Freelancer

Nicole Dixon – Pattern and Textiles illustrator