2010: The Year of Collaboration

Posted by: Curt Peoples, President, Peoples & Company Communications, Toronto

Business concepts go in and out of fashion, but sometimes a concept we have offhandedly used for years rises above the rest to encapsulate just what is happening (or needs to happen) now.

In 2010, collaboration is the concept that has emerged to describe what organizations need.

Like teamwork, collaboration is an activity where people or organizations work together to achieve common goals. But collaboration is something more. Fruitful collaboration requires everyone to fully appreciate and build on each others’ strengths. It involves multiple players making decisions in order to maximize their returns.

Those involved in creative, collaborative activities will tell you success starts with a shared chemistry, positive intent and collective acceptance. Collaborators share a desire to meet a high bar of excellence.

The session I am facilitating on Monday at the PCMA Education Conference is a peer-to-peer session. We will kick it off with a look at the mindset and skills that great collaborators employ. You’ll get the chance to share experiences with others in the session — focusing on ways to creatively collaborate with clients, suppliers and business partners. The goal is to give you new ideas that you can use in your business.

Here are the details:

Monday, June 14, 2010
10:30 p.m. - 11:45 p.m.
Collaborate to Achieve Greater Success
For meeting professionals to succeed, meet goals and thrive they need to embrace the concept of collaboration

• Discover collaboration techniques to achieve goals and positively impact your bottom line
• Leverage collaboration for co-location of events, costs, logistics, and crowdsourcing
• Leverage sponsorships to build a collaborative culture that will lead to long-term planner and supplier relationships

An extra note: One aspect of great collaboration is giving useful advice with no expectation of getting anything in return. In this spirit, I recommend three Montreal restaurants that you might not find on your own.

• Griffintown Café – Canada’s National Post lists the Griffintown Café as one of the top ten casual dining restaurants in Montreal.
• Le Pied de Cochon – The food is inventive, the staff is cool and the wine list is amazing.
• Joe Beef – This one is for foodies. There are only 30 seats in this cozy restaurant of renowned Montreal chef, David McMillan.

Enjoy! I hope I’ll meet you Montreal.

Curt