The Tribe Report 9. The Collaboration Issue | Page 19

COLLABORATING ON A WHOLE NEW LEVEL
Sure, it sounds easy enough to throw an issue out there
for your company’s employee population to try to solve.
But it’s another thing entirely to have the wherewithal
to receive, read, process and rank submissions while
allowing only the most useful ideas to survive.

for their participation and positive contributions. Many of
these platforms include game mechanics, virtual currency
and other reward functions that place increased value
on better ideas. After all, there are few problems that
wouldn’t benefit from the thoughts of many versus the
thoughts of the siloed few.

Technology helps. Software applications like SpigitEngage,
HYPE, Qmarkets, Imaginatik, Brightidea and Badgeville can
facilitate collaboration and ideation among employees.
These crowdsourcing tools are used to generate and
rank ideas for new products, new businesses, improved
processes and just about any other strategic issue where
the best idea wins.

HOW INTERNAL COMMUNICATION CAN HELP
While there are less expensive options, the annual licenses
and fees for some of these platforms can run north of $1
million. That hasn’t stopped many larger and Fortune 500
companies from jumping in with both feet. There is an
inherent value in connecting employees, especially in the
ideation process.

Ideas are collected and ranked using algorithms based
on popularity or predefined parameters. Theoretically,
the best ideas win and are implemented to the cheers
of management and company shareholders. By the time
an idea rises to the top, it’s been vetted by a range of
employees from various disciplines and with different
types of expertise, so leadership can be more confident
that this idea could indeed be a winner.

But just like a well-intentioned company intranet can fall
flat from a lack of employee traffic, the only way these
programs can succeed is through awareness. For the
ideation software to become truly collaborative you need
to reach the right people. That could be anyone in the
company and not necessarily someone who specializes
in the area of the issue at hand. Internal communication
channels are necessary to create that buzz and awareness
that will encourage and excite employees to join in.

ENSURING YOU GET THE RIGHT IDEAS
It’s important to note that plugging collaboration software
into your company’s intranet doesn’t mean that your
collaboration issues are suddenly over. True collaboration
can only happen when fostered by a company’s culture,
and finding best practices with these tools requires much
deliberation and focus on specific problems or issues that
need solving. The more robust of these solutions require
significant technology and process integration.
That being said, with a bit of creativity, it’s possible that
introducing such a dynamic process to employee groups
could help drive this culture. By giving employees a
destination, you’re leveling the playing field by allowing
everyone to start off in the same place.
At their core, these tools are simply social applications
that aid in connectivity and communication. However, the
fun begins when employees are recognized and rewarded

While these ideation/collaboration platforms are not
technically considered “internal communications” tools,
the two complement each other perfectly, and they can
foster tons of great ways to engage employees while
solving company issues.

TAKEAWAYS
+ Asking for employee ideas is a strategy that falls
flat without an accompanying plan for how to
process those ideas.
+ Rewards and recognition are important elements in
that plan to keep employees engaged.
+ The success of collaborative software requires building
the necessary employee engagement to drive traffic.

FALL 2014 | 19