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The Collaborative Operating System teaching team have a slogan that they use that sums up nicely the need for this new approach: “Because the way we’re working is no longer working.” Wow, is that ever true. The time is ripe for spreading this new way of working, because businesses and organizations that attempt to bring the same old approaches to the new challenges we are facing will find themselves slipping farther and farther behind.
The Collaborative Operating System has been the gift that keeps on giving throughout my professional career. I completed my COS training four years ago, and I utilize the skills I learned in that incredible training session daily. I work with a wide range of clients, from technology start ups to healthcare providers. I have found with every client, in any situation, there are always opportunities to apply the COS to develop ownership and alignment, and together, achieve a goal. My COS background allows me to look at problems through a different lens, and offer a different perspective which ultimately results in a more effective training or solution. The impact of the COS training on my consulting practice cannot be quantified, it is one of the cornerstones of my success.0.jpg)
My organization invested in the Collaborative Operating System to improve our internal and external relationships while simultaneously increasing efficiency and productivity. The investment in terms of dollars and hours was substantial. The results were quite impressive. We were able to improve the culture through the language, exercise and strategies we learned from the collaborative operating system. While difficult to measure in specific terms the return on investment easily eclipsed a 5:1 ratio. We are quite pleased with the results!
The COS was a powerful career and life experience that changed the way I look at ownership, engagement, and commitment. I highly recommend COS to any person who wants to change their paradigm for engaging with and leading others.
I am now armed with a set of practical tools and templates to carry out my work more effectively, and collaboratively. Along with those tools I have an understanding of the psychology underlying the objectives of the COS, what the benefits of working collaboratively are, and what true collaboration offers to deliver when realized - in a work environment, but also in a social or family environment too.
Learning COS catapulted me to the next level, both in my thinking about how to solve difficult problems and in moving me forward in my career. As a young person and a female, I found myself working in the predominantly male-dominated field of utility energy policy, and I was trying to engage stakeholders to take on some of the world's most pressing problems. COS gave me the tools and confidence to earn the respect of my colleagues, engage in a difficult settlement process, and resolve 30 years of litigation between multiple parties. By engaging in a collaborative process, I was able to address not only the technical issues needing resolution, but also the very real human factors involved in letting go of an old way of thinking and adapting to our changing times.
Everything will be different now. Since everything we do is about solving problems this course has affected the way I look at everything. The change is very fundamental and that's why it's so important and difficult. It's not easy to have a paradigm shift but a truly worthwhile pursuit.
As a Human Resources executive, my experiences with Rachel and the COS are an invaluable part of the toolkit I use every day. I have known Rachel for over ten years, and during that time, her insightful leadership, constant encouragement and profound coaching have been instrumental in my personal and professional growth. Additionally, the fundamentals I learned in the COS provide the strategic and tactical backbone that has allowed me to create sustainable and measurable cultural change in the organizations I’ve served. Done well, it is truly a differentiator for any organization or leader. I would highly recommend both the content and the process to anyone desiring a truly better, and more effective, way of leading and living.
The COS has influenced so many aspects of my work both in process and content. It has revolutionized the way my research team works: collaboratively and more efficiently. I have also found that the core principles of the COS are relevant to grant writing and manuscript preparation. I highly recommend the COS course which not only gives you the content of the COS, but helps you engage and practice the principles.
In COS, I found a group of motivating people who operationalized core principles of what I have long believed are near-ideal ways of interacting in our personal lives and our community groups into a an integrated system that can function and scale up in the for-profit business domain. I was at first pleasantly surprised and somewhat skeptical. Working with the COS team, I emerged highly empowered and significantly less skeptical…and still surprised! Yet my surprise pales next to the surprise of family and colleagues at my newfound strength and ability to confront difficulty and to execute nonconventional solutions for complex problems.
Learning and applying the Collaborative Operating System has been game-changing for me. It has armed me with a simple and systematic approach to tackle any problem, and made me much more aware of what works and what doesn't in any collaborative endeavor. The beauty and power of COS is that its underlying principles are so simple, and broadly applicable to almost any situation.
COS is an ideal framework for engaging multiple stakeholders in complex problem solving. COS has irrevocably changed how I view and approach collaboration and teamwork. It is a language and way for all to engage in our work as empowered adults. I believe COS is a critical skill for anyone engaged in the facilitation and implementation of institutional change, especially in the areas of environmental and sustainability initiatives.
As a trial attorney for many years, who ultimately became a mediator, I was already aware that a truly workable solution to any problem has to be win-win. Nonetheless, I still spent lots of time in meetings that accomplished nothing, even when the people present really wanted to create a solution. Then along came Rachel and the Collaborative Operating System! As a result of using it with my many partners in and out of the court system, teams that historically spent most of their time opposing one another now work together to solve problems without even being asked. Hooray for COS!"
Increasingly, business, NGO, and government leaders are identifying collaboration as an imperative to successfully compete and solve problems in an ever more complex world. The problem is, no one knows how to reliably structure collaboration to achieve their desired outcomes. COS solves that problem handily. It works, it's replicable, and it's scalable. Most importantly, it is the future of how the world will work.
As an executive coach and consultant, I was skeptical about anything claiming to replace hierarchy in organizations, however I was pleasantly surprised with the depth, simplicity and elegance embedded in the Collaborative Operating System. I use the "Problem Solving Template" in every session with my coaching clients and every time I meet with a consulting client. I run my organization with COS and always conduct collaborative meetings with my clients and their customers. I've helped several clients deploy COS in their organizations and they are always struck by how simple and effective it is.
The Collaborative Operating System™ provides a foundational framework in which organizations effectively work on the right problems in a manner that engages stakeholder creativity to develop real solutions that make a difference. The COS ensures that all team members become part of the solution. The process is practical and enables implementation that drives meaningful results. I attended a COS seminar in '07 and use the leadership concepts and processes in my business almost daily. I recommended the COS and Seminar if you are seeking a way to make meaningful and positive change.
Having done strategic facilitation for 15+ years, taking the COS course was a bracing engagement with the best parts of our profession. It sets a very high standard for the potential of collaboration, and for me this was extremely valuable.
I have had the opportunity to take both the 12 week COS (Collaborative Operating System) course and the advanced facilitator's course with Liz and Mark. I have found it to be invaluable! Not only has it given me a collaborative facilitation tool that gives structure for a process that can engage the heart and mind of the team, I have used it to help my clients - and myself - with vision creation and strategic planning. There is also a wonderful community follow-up and forum that allows for continued growth and honing of skill. Liz and Mark are so very committed and helpful as well. I feel fortunate to be a part of the community and cannot be more enthusiastic about recommending this COS training. I give it my highest enthusiastic endorsement!
Rachel Conerly was introduced to me as I was assuming 'turnaround' responsibility for an organization in crisis. She had previously trained one of the organization's managers in the COS approach. I noticed how effective he was, by using some of the techniques, in helping his colleagues navigate the crisis. We invited Rachel to join us as a resource in an early transition conference call to offer process reflection. The COS framework develops a group's mentality and facility for tackling tough challenges: if people can be aided to clearly define and agree on the problems over which they wrestle, then they can establish a framework for working together with greater equanimity on developing the solutions. Some of the COS techniques were introduced into our manager's weekly group work activities. Rachel also worked with us to design and co-facilitate a culminating retreat with the board and managers to finalize the re-organization plan. The retreat was a great success, and with Rachel's engagement we also identified new issues for future work. Throughout her engagement, Rachel was intensive, responsive, generous, and an accessible fellow-traveler. We concluded our engagement with her with a sense of great progress and an awareness that she still had more to teach.
Jesus taught that the last should be first, and the first should be last; in the church we seek to listen for the guidance of the Holy Spirit; St. Paul taught that every person has an important part to play as a member of the Body of Christ. Those are some of our highest teachings, and sometimes it is a challenge to live out those teachings in the day-to-day workings of the church. The Collaborative Operating System Training gave me tools to help fulfill those teachings in a surprisingly productive way! More than one time during the course I thought to myself: this is how our community can be open to the movement of the Spirit! Since I completed the course, we have started been using the COS strategies across our community, from the way we engage newcomers to the meeting design of our church's governing board. I would encourage other clergy to be open to the rich gifts given through COS...and of course you can translate into churchy language as needed!NAVIGATE
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