Being a Collaborator

Lately, I have been pondering on how I am both a competitor and a collaborator. In a strange and unrelated way, a post from LinkedIn helped me to clarify my thoughts.

At first glance, people might say that I am not a collaborator but that would be far from the truth.

As implicated in the original post, collaboration is great when people bring diverse yet complimentary skills together. In saying this, I do not believe in throwing people together to “collaborate” when the skill-set is not diverse and when it is not complimentary.

Also implicated in the original post, serving a market (or a client) is about growth and impact That’s competition at its finest.
I absolutely  abhor collaboration for the sake of collaboration (because some guru or power holder says collaboration is the way to do business without accounting for necessary intricacies and nuance).

Here is what ignites me instead… collaboration for growth and impact… collaborating as aligned, committed and morally responsive competitors… working together to achieve the big!!

Part of this conversation requires us to factor in social constructs… and there are many to consider. But as I get ready to get off my soapbox, I want to factor in the gendering of women. As a pattern, women are socialized to nurture, agree, receive, support and accommodate.

When collaboration mandates and locks women into this archetypal role, then there is no room for growth or impact. Because, there is no room for their independence,  stoicism, criticality,  assertiveness, or aggression… all qualities used in competition.

Admittedly, I do my best work when I’m able to drive. Because as a driver, I fight for the sweetspot between competition and collaboration. But when I’m not driving, I still try to push for the best of both worlds… it just takes longer.

This has been my wondering as of late and I’m so thankful for the original post.  While talking about business, it has helped me to understand the self.

Thanks Paramita for sharing! 💕