What is collaboration?

Collaboration is not something you do alone, but with at least two people. You try to determine a common goal as a team and make good agreements about it. In order to make the agreements and to be able to fulfill them, trust within the team is important. Employers consider collaboration an important competency, so it is important to work on this.

Working method online collaboration

For the most part, you can continue to collaborate online in the same way that it would have gone offline. Roles, processes and other agreements can remain unchanged. However, there are other points of attention when you start working together online. We explain those points below:

• Building trust ensures smooth collaboration. This is easier when you talk face-to-face. It is therefore important to work on the bond between you and your colleague(s).
• We were pretty much all used to going to the office, but now this is on the decline. We work from home more often, so we see each other less. Make sure you keep seeing each other regularly through video calls. It comes close to the face-to-face experience and delivers more than a phone call.
• Online tools are becoming increasingly important. Choose an online tool that best supports you in your work and that of your colleagues. In this way everyone is satisfied and everyone can share what they want.
• The Friday afternoon drink, the joint lunch or the conversation at the coffee corner is a thing of the past. These are important informal moments that ensure that the bond is well preserved. Enter a creative form here if you often see each other online. Organize for example. an online drink, an online bingo or quiz.
• If no proper agreements are made by teams, this can turn out to be even more difficult online. You can talk to each other at the office or ask a quick question. There is social control here. Certain uncertainties about work surface quickly and are easier to resolve. Online requires quite a bit of effort. You have to email, text or call more often. This takes time, so you can get annoyed faster if you don’t get a response from your colleague.