Stop asking us for money

Ok. We know you have to. But we (your customers) can give you much more than our money.

Some of the worlds leading organizations such as Google, Starbucks, Apple and Amazon are collaborating with customers to:

- create better products

- communicate more effectively

- provide better service and support

Organizations thriving today don’t see us only as customers anymore, but collaborators.

You + lots of other people

We help organizations achieve business objectives by working with people outside their organizations. It may not always be the right approach or the easiest, so we developed the OPTO framework to evaluate and build Colaboratories – environments where organizations can work with large groups of customers and partners.

The framework covers 4 main areas that we have found to be critical to making Mass Collaboration, work:

Outcomes – Do you want to create a new product? Or understand what people think of your current service? Do you want to ask for ideas?

People – Why are people participating – money? socializing? reputation? “making meaning”? How do you recruit people? How do you make sure everyone’s interests are aligned?

Tools – How do we select the tools?  Do stakeholders want to use the tools? What type of content might help communication? How can you support existing efforts?

Organization –  What are the rules of engagement with external collaborators and how do you maintain a safe, fun and productive environment? Who owns the outcomes – for example will you pay to own outright or will you share revenue?

We’ve observed, worked with and learned from some of the best across a variety of industries.

How can we work together?

If you think Mass Collaboration might work for your organization, but you’re not sure if we are the best people to work with, please take a look at our work or participate in one of our projects.

If you think we might be able to help, there are lots of ways to hire us, from a few hour work sessions to longer ongoing projects. And if you are a small company or just starting out, we like to support and fund early stage companies.

Finally, the complete OPTO framework is free to use and improve at www.colaboratorie.org (we believe this open approach, versus a proprietary framework, will make OPTO better, so we all benefit).