By Robert E. Quinn
Venkat Ramaswamy is the Hallman Fellow of Electronic Business and Professor of Marketing at the Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, and colleague of mine http://www.bus.umich.edu/facultybios/FacultyBio.asp?id=000119750. During one of our chats he spoke animatedly of his work. An hour later he had hardly stopped to take a breath! His enthusiasm was catching, and I wanted to know more. He is interested in something called co-creation. To create is to invent, make, or establish something new. To co-create is to invent, make, or establish something new by engaging with others; it is the process of creating together.
Co-creation has been going on since the beginning of time, yet this idea has not only taken on greater importance today, it has also taken on new meaning. With the world-wide web and social media, people around the world are more linked than ever before. They are less passive and more active participants in influencing what is going on. The Arab Spring provides a recent example. Entire governments were overthrown by common people who were technologically linked. To the shock of those in power, the people engaged in the co-creation of new governments.
Groups and organizations can take advantage of co-creation. But they must understand the key elements.
First, in co-creation two or more people come together in a relationship that is meaningful and inclusive. A meaningful conversation is one that has a higher purpose, the topic matters to the people, it concerns something they value. An inclusive conversation is one in which everyone who cares is able to participate and express what they feel. All stakeholders are involved. In designing a new product, for example, a company would also include their customers.
Second, co-creation is the experience of channeling human potential towards the expansion of value. The key question is, “What do we most value, and how do we make it better?” In discussing this question people have an experience. They tend to attach positive meaning to the experience. Creating together links people into a group or community with a higher purpose. The people feel like they are part of a meaningful whole that is becoming enriched.
Third, co-creation is human-centric. At the heart of the effort is a focus on human well-being. It is also about imagining new kinds of experiences that are designed to create value for everyone involved, so everyone gets more value.
An example is a company in India that is in the agricultural business. They realized that to increase their own financial position, they needed to lift the economic performance of the entire system of which they were a part. This included the farmers in India. So they built an extended and very imaginative system for assisting farmers. The farmer then began to join with the company in co-creating change. The farmers make commitments to the good of their local communities and they committed part of their income to their communities. Their crops improved, brought higher prices, and their incomes increased. The company and the farmers were all better off, everyone had more.
Fourth, co-creation means establishing platforms or mechanisms of engagement. Environments and processes are established so people can engage.
Fifth, co-creation includes transparency, access, dialogue, and reflexivity. Motives are made very clear, information and other tools are readily available, people can express their agreement and their dissent, and what is learned is feedback into the system to further the learning process and the creation of value.
Venkat travels the world helping organizations and governments co-create better products, process, and structures. As he does, he learns more about the process of co-creation and uses it to more effectively co-create. In doing all this he puts people into the growth mindset. In the process he gets better and so does everyone else.