Section 19.3. Facilitating Emergent Collaboration

19.3. Facilitating Emergent Collaboration

The similarities among PACT, the World Trade Center recovery, and free and open source projects reveal several important patterns and lessons for facilitating emergent collaboration. I say facilitate, not create, because emergence implies an element of surprise and a lack of intention and control. Process and organization exist, but are not imposed. Patterns such as neutral territory create an environment that is permissive, not prescriptive, and participants who are action oriented thrive in these environments.

The defining characteristic of the World Trade Center recovery was that action trumped everything else. The problem was constantly changing, and thus, the process had to evolve as well. Asking for permission didn't make sense in this environment, because those on the ground understood the problem better than anyone holding traditional authority. City leaders recognized this and deliberately chose to rubber-stamp the process that emerged, instead of imposing a written plan that was clearly not suited to the problem. Similarly, PACT did not happen because the leaders of the different companies came together and decided to collaborate on a project. PACT happened because those who would most benefit from collaborationthe software developersbegan to trust each other and identified a common need. These same developers agreed on a representative governance model with a consensus-based decision-making approach. While not as freewheeling as the Trade Center recovery process, it still emphasized exploration by all of its members, and its leaders were especially proactive. The PACT process had to be slower and more deliberative by design, because the motivation to collaborate was nascent. Participants had to see collaboration work before they became comfortable with it, which meant that the process evolved slowly.

Another prerequisite for emergent collaboration is an emphasis on open, effective communication. Effective communication begins with shared language. When the PACT project began, different participants had different understandings of the same words, and communication was rendered ineffective. Before the PACT participants could even start thinking about software, they had to understand each other's world views and language. Shared language was not an issue with the World Trade Center recovery. Everyone had a vivid picture of what had happened, and what needed to be done. However, while the recovery effort was highly individualistic, coordination was imperative, and hence, those twice-daily meetings among all participants were critical. Banning recording devices encouraged participants to express their feelings openly. Good communication is the hallmark of the best free and open source projects. Anyone may participant in a forum, and core participants respond to questions quickly. Active projects often summarize online discussion on a regular basis so that others can follow high-volume discussions without being overwhelmed. Most importantly, there is a shared language among those who participate, some of which is embodied in the various free and open source licenses.

All of these elements are necessary for collaboration to emerge, but they are not sufficient. Culture is critical. The strong desire to collaborate among those who participated in the World Trade Center recovery was a direct result of its unique circumstances and scale. With PACT, the incentives and environment were not powerful enough to establish a culture of collaboration, and rightfully so. You cannot reasonably expect a software project to inspire the same emotion as an act of terror and the tragic loss of life. Instead, the instigators of PACT had to nurture that culture every step of the way, beginning by bringing the groups together to break bread and to discover commonalities for themselves. The seedlings of communitycamaraderie among those with shared interests and goalscatalyzed a culture of collaboration, and every instance of successful collaboration further reinforced that culture.

We have limited control over emergent collaboration, and we must adjust our expectations accordingly. However, the patterns we discover by examining stories such as PACT and the World Trade Center recovery help us understand how we can facilitate emergent collaboration. These stories were very different, yet their commonalities are striking, especially in light of what we already know about free and open source software development. Perhaps everything is not known, but we can learn much from knowing what is. The most important lesson is that the best way to understand collaboration is to collaborate.