International Montessori Council

A colleague of mine recently pointed me toward a recent issue of Science Magazine which had three interesting articles that explore aspects of colaboration:

In Chimpanzees Recruit the Best Collaborators, Mellis, Hare and Tomasello say, “…recognizing when collaboration is necessary and determining who is the best collaborative partner are skills shared by both chimpanzees and humans, so such skills may have been present in their common ancestor before humans evolved their own complex forms of collaboration.”

In Who Are More Helpful, Humans or Chimpanzees?, Silk says “Humans, including infants, are more willing than closely-related chimpanzees to cooperate and behave altruistically and cooperatively, probably in part accounting for their evolutionary success. ”

In Altruistic Helping in Human Infants and Young Chimpanzees, Warneken and Tomasello say, “Human beings routinely help others to achieve their goals, even when the helper receives no immediate benefit and the person helped is a stranger. Such altruistic behaviors (toward non-kin) are extremely rare evolutionarily, with some theorists even proposing that they are uniquely human.”

What is collaboration?

I checked the collaboration entry in the Wikipedia and was surprised to read, “Although the word collaboration is widely used in many varying contexts such as education, science, art and business, very little research has been carried out to determine the properties of this process,” and “Currently there exists no unifying general theory of collaboration.” Wow! Couldn’t be!

Digging around a bit more I found this “No single theoretical perspective provides an adequate foundation for a general theory of collaboration…” in an abstract on “Collaborative Alliances: Moving from Practice to Theory” by Barabara Gray and Donna J. Wood in the Journal for Behavioral Science.

Of course, there are definitions for collaboration floating around. Here are three:

"Collaboration is a relational system in which two or more stakeholders pool together
resources in order to meet objectives that neither could meet individually." (Graham, J. R. & Barter, K. (1999). Collaboration: A social work practice method. Families in society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Services, 80, 6-13.).

“Collaboration is a mutually beneficial and well-defined relationship entered into by two or more organizations to achieve common goals. The relationship includes a commitment to: a definition of mutual relationships and goals; a jointly developed structure and shared responsibility; mutual authority and accountability for success; and sharing of resources and rewards.” (Mattessich, P. W. & Monsey, B. R. (1992). Collaboration: What makes it work: A review of research literature on factors influencing successful collaboration. St. Paul, MI: Amherst H. Wilder Foundation.).

“Collaboration occurs when a group of autonomous stakeholders of a problem domain engage in an interactive process, using shared rules, norms, and structures to act or decide on issues related to that domain.” (Wood, D. J. & Gray, B. (1991). Toward a comprehensive theory of collaboration. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 27(2), 139-162).

I asked some of my colleagues recently to suggest a real-life or folk-hero icon that expresses the essence of collaboration. I got all kinds of answers including, Ghandi (India), Hiawatha (Iroquois nations), William “Braveheart” Wallace (Scotland), King Ashoka (India), Nelson Mandela (South Africa), Joseph McCormick (USA), Bono (Ireland), Joseph Campbell (USA), and Bill Moyers (USA).

Then there was the familiar story of the difference between heaven and hell:

A man is granted a wish to see heaven and hell before he dies. In hell he sees a beautiful meadow and under a tree: a large table with all sorts of amazing good food and everyone seated around. When he gets closer he sees that no one is eating and everyone is starving - their elbows are locked and they can’t reach down to their plates. In heaven he sees the exact same scene, and when he gets closer the elbows are locked here too, but everyone is happy and eating - each person is feeding the one across from him… in heaven the people are feeding each other.

However, the clear winner by far - because so many people suggested it - is the story of Stone Soup, which goes something like this:

Once there was a great famine. People jealously hoarded whatever food they could find, hiding it from family, friends and neighbors. One day a wanderer came into the village, sold a few odds and ends, then began asking where he could stay for the night.

“There’s nothing to eat in the whole area,” he was told. “Better move on.”

“Oh, I have all the food I could eat, and more,” the wanderer said. “In fact, I was thinking of making some stone soup to share with everyone in this village.”

He pulled a huge iron cauldron from his wagon, filled it with water, and built a fire under it. Then, with great ceremony, he took an ordinary-looking stone from the ground, cleaned it carefully, and dropped it into the water.

By now, hearing the rumor of food, most everyone had come to the wanderer’s campsite. As he sniffed the “broth” and smacked his lips in anticipation, hunger began to overcome the villagers’ distrust.

“Ahh,” the wanderer said to himself loudly, “I do like a tasty stone soup. Of course, stone soup with potatoes. That’s hard to beat.”

Soon a villager approached hesitantly, holding a potato he’d retrieved from its hiding place under his bed, and added it to the pot. “Beautiful!” cried the peddler. “You know, I once had stone soup with a bit of beef as well, and it was fit for a king.”

The village butcher managed to find a bit of beef…and so it went, through onions, carrots, cabbage, turnips, kale, chicken, rosemary, thyme, pepper, corn, lamb, mushrooms, and so on, until there was the most incredible soup for everyone to share. It was a feast! And a real celebration followed, late into the night.

The next day the villagers offered the wanderer a great deal of money for his recipe, but he refused to sell — telling them they could do just as well on their own — and he left. From that time on, long after the famine had ended, everyone reminisced about the finest soup they’d ever had.

Now, when times became especially hard once again, everyone who was present, and those children who have been born since, gathered around and made a pot on their own.

I heard, once, a group of people made a pot even when times were good!

Seth Kahan is a writer, speaker and consultant. “My primary focus is high-stakes collaboration, helping leaders, executives and change agents work better together. My goal is to make real contributions to the ways professionals work together, especially when people from different disciplines and cultures collaborate to address world-class problems.” To learn more about my work, visit his website: http:www.SethKahan.com