How long have you been keeping your business to yourself? You know, you manage your business the traditional way, keep your matters entirely away from the curious eyes of competitors, and the idea of engaging other organizations in certain collaboration initiatives hardly crossed your mind.
Perhaps you have been collaborating with many other businesses on separate projects long before you come across fancy terms like collaborative economy, collaborative consumption, and sharing economy, all of which try to define or capture the essence of the ongoing economic arrangement.
Either way, business owners must understand and appreciate that collaboration is fast becoming a hot ladder to creating milestones that can propel your business to success. In fact, it is predicted to happen more prominently this year as we see more young people investing in start-ups and willing to work with others. For existing business, collaboration can be maximized to improve their social media management program this year, as Fleire Castro, owner of Third Team Media, emphasized in her blog post.
Collaboration can motivate you to set your differences aside and focus on a common goal. It can come in many different forms—not just between marketing departments but also between partners, other organizations, and even customers. Always remember, though, due to our differences in cultures, experiences, and ideas, no two collaborative initiatives are the same.
Take your phone, for example. Whatever model it is, there was a highly collaborative process involved within the company, which brought together the expertise and ideas of team leaders, designers, software developers, engineers, marketing staff, and suppliers, among others, in producing a technological solution that is unique and different from the others in the market.
From this picture, we can see how collaboration can empower employees to work together. By doing so, employees can nourish your business operations with expertise, feedback, and solutions as well as pinpoint unique and relevant problems that can further improve your product and customer service, rather than just you racking your brains out. Are you seeing already where the dots go? In the process of empowering workers, collaboration offers them a more connected working environment where their ideas and efforts are valued, making them one happy less-stressed community.
Let’s put in some statistics. More marketing (74 percent) and IT (71 percent) leaders, who are collaborating more, indicate that they are “more effective”, produce stronger or more compelling marketing messages, gain faster speed to market, greater product or service adoption and fewer defects in products and services. This was based on a September 2013 two-part study on social business, which was worked together on by Oracle, Leader Networks, and Social Media Today.
We have seen this collaborative economy happening even at a local level but beyond internal systems. Take for instance, The Outlets at Pueblo Verde, one of Third Team Media’s clients, recently opened in Cebu. Third Team Media successfully collaborated with influencers and communities to help generate content for the client.
With consumers constantly looking for life-changing solutions, it is time to be creative and courageous. Empower your employees. Embrace the spirit of working together. Then, like many other businesses, see the positive impact collaboration can do not just to your business but also to the community you serve.

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