There is a Kenyan proverb that says “Teeth that are together help each other in chewing food.” You know? That Kenyan proverb literally says it all, it literally says why collaboration is very important for change. Take yourself and other people as a single tooth and the food as the problems you want to solve. Imagine two humans eating a bowl of rice, human A decides to use a single tooth(working alone) and human B decides to use all the teeth (working together) in its mouth. Between these two humans, who do you think will finish that bowl of rice faster and with much satisfaction? Yup, you got it right! (if you picked human A, get out of here!???).
Far away from the Kenyan proverb but from my very experiences and the experiences of others, I will be sharing with you other reasons why collaboration is important for driving change and positive impact.
Here are 5 reasons why collaboration is important for change:
1.) Increased impact:
There is no doubt that working with people to solve a particular problem will increase the impact. Let’s say you are working on an advocacy project and you partner with other organisations/people for the purpose of that project you will tap into their audience and resources and they will also tap the same from you, this will increase your reach and definitely more actions and that is equal to more impact.
2.) More innovations and solutions:
I know your solutions are great and innovative but sharing them with others to collaborate on will bring in different perspectives, views and ideas into the solutions and you will be surprised how your solutions are looking better. Clive Staples Lewis, British writer and lay theologian once said “Two heads are better than one, not because either is infallible, but because they are unlikely to go wrong in the same direction.” Collaborating will push you to think differently and also easily get out issues you face in the journey of providing solutions.
3.) Increased network:
Working with other people on solutions for projects will increase your network as they are likely to introduce you to more people who are interested in solving that problem, this means there will be more hands providing solutions to the problem. And trust me, people you meet from such projects are the best.
4.) Skills-sharing:
Collaborating with people/organisations on projects will enable you share your skills and work with other people who are willing to share theirs too, this will enable you pick up one or two skills or even more that you are very likely to apply on other solutions for change.
5.) Gain trust and acceptance:
This is very important for people beginning their changemaking journey (but not limited to). Collaborating for change with other individuals/organisations will win you the trust of their audience who already trust them and will also make your audience trust them, the advantage of this is that their audience will support your solutions and your audience will support theirs too.
I am very sure you have seen reasons why collaborating is good for change. From the increased impact to the networking and more collaborating offers, If you want to see your actions/organisation grow quickly you should definitely take advantage of what collaborations offer.