Culture in North America has largely been controlled by the values of the corporations that create and deliver news, television, and films. Those values are packaged with such skill that unless you have other value-influencers in your life, you may believe that they are your own.
Collaboration, cooperation, and community rarely get the level of honor in the media that they deserve. They create efficiencies that greatly benefit the user and make a lot ‘sense’, but they don’t make a lot of dollars for corporate America. So you rarely, if ever, hear anything about the “miracle benefits” of working together. None-the-less, the incredible value, worth and efficiencies of community and collaboration still exist in spite of being marginalized by the media.
For example, if 10 people bought a farm and divided the land among themselves, the price for their individual lot would be a fraction of what a lot would cost them if they bought it on their own.
Likewise, if three city dwelling friends who only needed a car occasionally shared one, they would enjoy the benefits of having abundant use of a car at a fraction of the cost of individual ownership, or car rentals.
If a family grew its own food in the backyard of one member’s home and each family worked a few hours in the upkeep and harvesting, they could all cut their grocery bill by 60-90%.
I think you get the idea about how these values could be applied to a multitude of challenges and situations. Collaboration, cooperation, and community are powerful tools in solving problems and creating efficiencies that could not be achieved any other way.
So one might ask: “If collaboration is so good, why aren’t more people doing it?”
To be continued……
Comments: Is there a problem or need you are facing or have faced that you could use or have used collaboration, cooperation or community to overcome??
© Copyright 2014-15, Paul K. Weigel – All rights reserved.