Developing a Collaborate Out Mindset — Join us for this experimental programme

We are so exciting to be launching our fist open programme. We are doing this now as we want to take more control over the work we do and generate some income to give us the freedom to do the work we love and know makes a difference. By being part of this programme you are not only developing yourself, your organisation and place but also helping others to access the resources we have.

As a Community Interest Company we invest any surplus back into our communities. You can read more about us as an organisation at teh end of this article but in short we are all about ‘Creating simple, surprising and social spaces for social innovation and change’.

What’s it all about?

This programme will bring together a group of people virtually via Zoom to explore how they can adopt a different approach to collaboration. The programme is based around the 11 Principles of Collaborating Out Loud that set out a radically different approach to collaborating within teams, organisations, systems and places.

What will we do?

Each week we will work together to explore a number of the Principles. Giving you practical tools and techniques to figure out how you can work with these principles every day to collaborate out loud on the challenges you face and co-produce and develop new solutions to them.

Why are we doing this?

Since our first Collaborate Out Loud Gathering in November 2016 and the creation of Collaborate Out Loud Community Interest Company in July 2017 we have been working in spaces across the north to learn how these principles work in practice and how they help people to do and be different. We now feel the time is right to bring this learning together an offer this programme.

What learning methods will be used?

The programme will be run virtually via zoom and each week we will create a space that is made up of time for individual reflection, group discussion and collaboration and experimentation. We will utilise a variety of tech solutions like Google Jamboard, Mural and FunRetro to help us to do this.

What will I get at the end of it?

At the end of the programme we want you to go away:

• With a solid understanding of the Collaborate Out Loud Principles
• With a play box of tools and approaches to make them real
• With the confidence to collaborate differently

Key dates

Each space will be two hours and has been scheduled in the middle of the day to avoid school pick ups etc. this means sessions will run from 12:30–14:30 on:

• Friday 26th February 2021
• Friday 5th March 2021
• Friday 12th March 2021
• Friday 19th March 2021
• Friday 26th March 2021
• Friday 9th April 2021

How much does the programme cost?

The programme fee is £295 per person and includes:

• 6 curated spaces (online workshops)
• An electronic copy of our workbook and canvas
• Access to the COL Circle Guides to support your learning
• Ongoing support through the COL Community

Early bird offer

For bookings completed by the 31st December we are offering an early bird price of £229 per person

We want to make our programmes accessible to as many people as possible and to help to do this we will offer a free place to the someone from the voluntary and community sector for every 8 places sold. We will use our networks and social media to promote these free places in the new year.

If you would like to attend and are unable to afford the fees above then please get in touch with us via hello@collaborateoutloud.org

How do I secure my place?

To secure a place on this programme simply complete the course registration form and tell us how you want to pay for the place. Once we have received payment, we will confirm your place.

About collaborate Out Loud CIC

Collaborate Out Loud CIC (COL) is a small social enterprise based in Bury, Greater Manchester. We are all about ‘creating surprising, simple and social spaces for social change and innovation’. We work with communities and public services to create spaces where diverse voices can shape the future of a place together.

COL is led by us, Claire Haigh and Kevin Wyke, its two Co-Founders, we developed the idea of COL in 2016 after our experiences of, working within, and with, public services. Our experiences left us feeling that public services were not appreciating communities and working with them in constructive ways, ignoring diverse community voices, not sharing power and having a lack of understanding and empathy of what could actually help communities.

We felt there was a need to approach this in a different way. How could we embrace new ways of working to create more inclusive and transparent conversations, using radically different ways of bringing whole communities together and or communities and systems together with the wider systems in an empowering and democratic way, to find solutions that were imagined, created and owned by the communities that actually worked. As opposed to professionals making assumptions an imposing services and solutions that didn’t work and hadn’t come from the communities that know what is needed.