Everybody's Free (To Collaborate)

A rewrite of ‘Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)’ by Baz Luhrmann/Quindon Tarver......

Ladies and gentlemen of Australia in 2015 - work together.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, collaboration would be it.

The long term benefits of collaboration are irrefutable, the rest of my advice relates to this important aspect of any successful human endeavour.

I will dispense this advice, now.

Enjoy the power and beauty of collaboration – this is critical. You will not understand the power and beauty of collaboration until you really try it. But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how collaboration activated these possibilities.

It is not you versus the world like you imagine

Don't worry about the future, but worry that if we are not worried about collaboratively adapting to necessary changes now, we will be as effective as someone trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum.

The real problems in our life are best solved by empathetic collaboration and setting our goals in-line with the ethical requirements of our society because problems can blind-side us at 4pm on an idle Tuesday.

Do one thing every day to help someone in need

Sing

Don't squirrel away innovative ideas – share them amongst your peers through collaboration.

Don't put up with people who squirrel innovative ideas away.

Floss

Don't waste your time on collaboration controls. Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind. The race is long and in the end it's only with yourself.

Remember collaborative situations you've participated in - forget the non-collaborative ones. If you succeed in doing this tell me how.

Keep finding new ways to collaborate. Only use email if it is definitely required or useful.

Stretch

Don't feel guilty if you have to influence others so they collaborate. One of the fundamental reasons we have difficulty implementing change is because we are reluctant to hold others accountable. Collaboration can help significantly with this problem.

Get plenty of calcium

Be kind to every person you meet - you'd miss them if they were gone!

Maybe you'll take this advice on board, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll look to collaborate more, maybe you won't. Maybe a new technology will materialise a completely new profession and/or industry at some instant in the next 5 minutes. Whatever you do, don't constrain yourself to existing ways or resign yourself to mediocrity. Your choices are the best they can be if you collaboratively thought them through.

Enjoy collaboration. Use it every way you can. Don't be afraid of it or what other people think of it. It's the greatest means of achieving excellence you will ever have access to.

Laugh. Even in meetings where appropriate. Listen to others opinions even if you don't agree with them. Do not answer your mobile in the middle of a meeting it only makes you look stupid!

Brother and sister together we'll make it through

Someday our spirit will take you and guide you there

We know you've been hurting, but we've been waiting to be there for you

And we'll be there just helping you out, whenever we can

Collaborate with your superiors you never know when their experience will not be accessible. Be nice to your subordinates. They are the people whose hard work contributes to your profile and the people you must praise and reward into the future.

Understand that technological trends come and go and that only those that facilitate collaboration will hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps between traditional ways and new, more efficient methods because the more complex life gets the more we need to collaboratively simplify it.

Make a non-collaborative decision once, but learn that you made it without being fully uninformed. Live in a non-collaborative environment once, but leave before it makes you introverted

Travel

Accept certain irrefutable truths. Technology was only ever meant to empower people to do their job better than they could do it before. So if at any point in time a technology is seen to be a significant constraint for any part of our society, then the tail is wagging the dog and we must right the ship through strong leadership.

Be the change you want to see in society. The best leadership is entirely proactive and maintains a firm focus on achieving a well-defined vision. Management in the absence of leadership is most often entirely reactive and without the guidance of any vision.

Don't shut people out any longer that you have to otherwise the window for collaboration may close terminally.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the rubbish bin, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth.

But trust me about collaboration.

Brother and sister together we'll make it through [oh ho yeah]

Someday our spirit will take you and guide you there

We know you've been hurting, but we've been waiting to be there for you

And we'll be there just helping you out, whenever we can

Everybody’s free, oh yeah

Oh everybody’s free, oh yeah, to feel good

Oh to feel good