The One Week | One Tool project shows that time and resource constraints really can be made to work in a project’s favor. Twelve strangers who committed to seven days of all hack, no yack, and very little sleep made some great tools (Serendip-o-matic, Anthologize). Creating severe constraints can foster both collaboration and creativity.  Tom Scheinfeldt pointed out three key lessons for successful collaborations: 1) embrace serendipity 2) let go and 3) collaboration is shared doing.

DH barn raising projects are inspiring, but they are artificial laboratories of collaboration. How many of the lessons will be useful outside of an intense, boot camp style workshop? I agree that collaboration is shared doing, but I started to wonder when Scheinfeldt pointed out that time constraints can mean sacrificing shared decision making.  My workplace culture focuses on consensus building, so I found it both slightly shocking and secretly delightful (those staff meetings are long!) when Scheinfeldt said “Moving on will mend hurt feelings more than talking about it.”

What about collaboration for the rest of us? Very few people have the luxury of attending a week long workshop. The real world has plenty of constraints (time, money, jobs, families, multiple competing projects, laundry etc.). What are best ways to use these constraints to promote collaboration and creativity? Maybe it’s less about crash programs and more about intelligent adaptation to existing conditions? Starting a business (designing the right product for the right market) or gardening (choosing the best plant to thrive in a particular location) could be useful examples for thinking about the best ways to use what we have to build something together.