There are a lot of different ways how to describe
collaboration. Everybody can say his or her own definition what is collaboration. There are advantages and disadvantages of collaboration, which are the figures to business people who are interested in collaboration. When you know all of pluses and minuses of collaboration it is easier to decide what to do next. From this process businessmen gain enhanced vision and perspective on how their core issues affect professional life and the awareness and skills to change the ways you interact with others.
Almost all businessmen want to know everything what is connected with collaboration because that knowledge can help then to reach the top of success. We have chosen this topic, because we are thinking that information from this work we will use in our future job.
Collaboration is a process used to reach goals that cannot be achieved by acting alone. It requires that participants: jointly develop and agree to a set of common goals and directions, share responsibility for obtaining those goals, and work together to achieve those goals, using the expertise of each collaborator. The outcome of such collaboration is more than simple communication or coordination, but shared vision and shared action resulting in cohesive family policy and practice.
ACME is leading manufacturer in the world of the digital equipments in health services. Our annual turnover is 45 billion euros, personnel 10 000 in twenty countries in four continents. Our company is growing very fast and all our personnel can’t manage with all orders that are why we are searching for new partners who can give us more personnel. With those people help we can do all orders and we will get bigger profit. A lot of new hospitals are opening in that countries were we don’t have our companies’ or partners that is why we are looking for partners in those countries.
Collaboration has been found to have immediate and long-term effects as well as direct and indirect effects (Iowa State University Extension, 1992). In other words, while some of the benefits may not be seen right away, it is possible that there will be some benefits that appear later. Some of the potential benefits from collaboration include:
| 1. Effective and efficient program delivery; |
2. Improved professional development; |
| 3. Improved communication, Improved communication (which leads to more consistent and reliable information to clients, an increased use of programs, more public support, better understanding of policy and legislative issues, better direction given to clients, and improved evaluation of programs); |
4. Elimination of duplication; |
| 5. Increased use of programs; |
6. Improved public image; |
| 7. Better needs assessment; |
8. Consistency of information; |
| 9. Increased availability of resources, (new staff, new knowledge, new equipment and facilities, and new services). |
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Despite these benefits, there are also many challenges and barriers that must be overcome when trying to collaborate with other groups. These include:
| 1. Turf protection and mistrust |
2. Decision-making processes |
| 3. Limited resources |
4. Dropping out |
| 5. Reduced participation |
6. Broad representation |
| 7. Communication |
8. Solid leadership |
| 9. Time commitment; Time Commitment-Groups should expect to spend a significant amount of time in the planning and implementation stages and understand that although the end result of collaboration is to become more efficient, a great deal of time is initially required to collaborate. |
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Here are some of the problems with collaborating:
1. Collaborations aren't very agile. When you can't make decisions quickly, you lose valuable opportunities-a serious liability in a fast-paced, fast-forward future.
2. Collaborations are time-consuming. As frequently practiced, collaborations require meetings, meetings, and more meetings. There are meetings to iron out what skills and attributes each partner brings to the table, meetings to politely tussle over turf issues, meetings to decide who does what, meetings to complain about collaboration "partners" that never come to the meeting!
3. And don't forget process, process, and process! Managers who come from the business sector are driven to distraction by the way nonprofits over-emphasize the process of collaboration. They often compare it to Nero fiddling while Rome burns.
4. Collaboration is based on consensus building. Work products based on consensus are rarely visionary or evolutionary. The usual result is a deal-based arrangement among collaborators. Seldom is it an actual change in service delivery. Without that transformational shift, you can't truly build for the future.
If company will collaborate with other company there can be changes in profit, labor, customers. Company must carefully choose people for collaboration, because from them depends it will be useful for company or not. For smoother collaboration:
| 1. Extend the power. |
2. Automate to collaborate. |
| 3. Enforce corporate policies. |
4. Delegate administration. |
| 5. Safely open the back door. |
6. Know the users. |
The best strategy for the future isn't collaboration as it is currently practiced but competitive intelligence knowing what other nonprofit organizations are doing.
This task is becoming easier as technology gives us access to vast amounts of hard data on nonprofit effectiveness. Funders have computerized a great deal of outcome-measurement information, gathered from grantee reports. The National Center for Charitable Statistics is also digitizing nonprofit data and making it widely available. ("Nonprofit Databases Herald New Frontier" on page 8.)
Here are a few ways this information can be useful to you in the future:
1. Improve your management practices by comparing your effectiveness with that of other nonprofit organizations. Outcome data can be your clearest signal that your strategies aren't working as well as those of other nonprofit managers.
2. Be aware of other organizations' capabilities in your mission area. Such knowledge is imperative for you to avoid duplicating services and provide more efficient referrals between organizations.
3. Emulate effective practices to make your organization more attractive to funders. In the future, the idea of nonprofits collaborating to seek a grant may no longer make sense. Instead, funders may choose a group of nonprofits on the basis of their track records. Rather than partnering with your usual cronies, you may find yourself drafted into the most dynamic assemblage of enterprising organizations you've ever imagined. That's the good part-if you can keep up with the rest. The bad part is that you may lose your chance to be part of this dynamic group if you don't apply diligent measurement practices. The emerging funding competition will favor results-oriented and results producing nonprofits.
4. Discover what gives other nonprofits the leading edge in their mission area. See if you can replicate or adapt what they're doing. Reinventing the wheel is a sinfully inefficient activity in an information rich future.
5. See if other organizations are doing what you do-better than you do it. If so, you may need to bail out of that service area. Far too many nonprofits fold up an ineffective program only when they can no longer attract funding for it. The best community stewardship for the future is to admit that something isn't working, cut the losses to yourselves and your funders, and get busy creating something dynamic that does work!
6. Identify ineffective organizations. Consider approaching their funding sources on behalf of your own, more energetic effort.
7. Use your intelligence-gathering capability to tweak your core programs or services to be the best in class. You may need to undergo some serious futuring exercises to discover approaching trends. You may also need to put some authentic anticipatory strategy in your strategic planning.
8. Learn to be truly competitive. Competitive intelligence is of no use unless you understand that it is a competition. Rather than bemoan the fact, remember that the beneficiaries of this competition are the people your organization was founded to serve. Competition and outcome management's clear appropriateness in the nonprofit sector is to help drive out inefficiency and ineffectiveness. Like you, your fellow nonprofits will benefit by evolving clearer missions and more robust, competent, and truly collaborative methods of fulfilling those missions. That evolution, in turn, benefits the co-evolving futures of everyone in your profession and in your community.
Possible changes
Profit
Collaboration for our company and others will be profitable not just right now or after 5 years, but after 10 or more years. It depends of plan. And that profit should be divided in so many parties as there are collaborative companies.
But of course companies might not get profit. There could be failure or even worst – bankrupt. There is no one who knows what kind of ‘’profit’’ companies could get of collaboration. But every company wants to have bigger profit as they have now, that’s why they are interesting in collaboration. And that’s why they are taking a risk.
Labor
Collaboration means more people: labor, customers. Labor is very important part of company. Because of them companies are ready and are able to work and give what customers want.
If company want to collaborate with company from other country, so there will be more difficult, but very interesting and useful to understand each others and to know what employers want from them and from their collaboration.
Customers
If there are collaborations so it doesn’t mean that there will be some changes in company’s inside, but there will be some changes outside. For example: customers. If you collaborate with more and more companies, so there will be more and more customers. If your company is collaborating with other company from other country, so it means that there will be different customers with different needs and orders. And customers are showing us that we need go and don’t stop. So changes of customers make some changes in company’s work.
Time to begin collaboration
Different people understand best time in different way. Some of them will think that best time is when you don’t have money and your company is near bankrupt. Others will try to collaborate when they want to be more known in other countries, because domestic business is not enough for them. Or there are some who will try to collaborate in their best time in business, because they don’t want to stop. Or there are some who are collaborating all the time. So, the companies should to decide inside about the best time.
The way to collaborate
There can be some ways in which companies can collaborate. The first way is ‘’direct’’ collaboration. That’s means that companies change their workers who are responsible for others company’s work and condition. They are always interesting about everything what’s going on in company’s inside and outside.
The second way is ‘’indirect’’ way. It means that companies don’t have to send their people. It’s enough to get information every month about company’s work by fax or e-mail.
Future
It’s hard to say about future. No one knows how everything will go. But companies should always think about successful business and try to realize it. After collaboration can happen two things: company will win or company will lose. But businessmen always are expecting that they will win, and that’s why they are looking for new opportunities and partners in business.
Conclusions
Collaboration is very important for every company. It is important to collaborate not only with others companies but also inside company. If there is good collaboration process the work efficiency will be better, because employees can speak with each other and to ask advice or to help each other.
The best collaboration will be when people who are responsible for that will know all basic information about it. They should know what are collaboration, its principles, advantages and disadvantages, and the way to collaborate. Of course those people should know more then here is written.
Collaboration is very hard process. It’s not happening just like that. People should work a lot days and nights. You can’t forget even small details, which you think it’s not important, every detail is important. You should try to anticipate every move and action. And when you’ll have a plan, so it will be better to seek it ant to reach the top of success. It’s very important to choose good partners, which won’t disappoint you. You should know them for longer time. You can’t start partnership with unknown person or company. Of course you should select a time for collaboration. It’s very important to know when you can start to collaborate. You can’t start it whenever you want or like it. You should think about time very serious and very deep. Because of it you can succeed or fail.
When you collaborate you should always be in touch with your collaborative companies stuff. You can choose how to do it. Maybe you need to have full information or it’s enough just to know that everything is going ok. It depends on you, how you will choose the way to collaborate.
When you will do everything what have you planed, you might succeed, but sometimes there are some problems, which we can’t solve and then we can fail. But all the time we should try to be the best and to work very well. And if we will do it we will succeed.
