Every day, billions of us talk about things we want to be different. Politics and politicians. Money and the economy. Jobs and wages. Immigration and integration. Housing, crime, war, healthcare, education, business, technology, climate, our communities, our families and our futures. We discuss, debate, question, complain, argue, campaign, worry and sometimes suffer – while extraordinary amounts of human energy are consumed talking about what is wrong, what could be better and what somebody should do about it.

At the same time, the world contains extraordinary knowledge, experience, creativity, relationships, capabilities and resources. Somewhere, somebody may understand a problem another person is struggling with, may have solved it before, know somebody who can help or possess a missing capability. Thousands or millions of people may independently care about exactly the same thing without knowing who else does. And sometimes nobody has the answer: assumptions need challenging, people need making aware, things need stopping and entirely new realities need creating.

Perhaps the opportunity isn’t for humanity to talk more. It is to become much better at bringing people and capabilities together around what we want to make happen.

We call that Intelligent Collaboration.

Intelligent Collaboration is the foundation of Ideas-Shared. It describes both how the whole system works and the mindset through which individuals, informal groups and organisations participate within it.

At its simplest:

Ideas-Shared + Members + Activities = Outcomes

Ideas-Shared provides the philosophy, methodology, participation infrastructure and tools. Members bring personal, professional and societal ambitions together with their perspectives, knowledge, experience, relationships, capabilities and resources. Activities turn these into purposeful action. Outcomes are what ultimately matter.

But infrastructure alone changes nothing. Intelligent Collaboration also depends upon how individuals, informal groups and organisations choose to participate.

It means being prepared to challenge assumptions, share knowledge, listen to different perspectives, question constructively, recognise useful contributions and look beyond disagreement towards what can actually be achieved.

Agreement is not required. Individuals, groups and organisations can have different beliefs, interests, responsibilities and priorities while still contributing intelligently around ambitions that matter.

This combination of shared infrastructure and collaborative mindset creates the conditions for people and organisations worldwide to challenge assumptions, make others aware, stop what needs stopping and co-create new realities.

It enables individuals to retain their personal sovereignty, informal groups to organise around shared interests, and organisations to contribute their capabilities and resources — independently or together, and in whatever configuration an ambition requires.

The principle can operate at any scale: between multiple people, across communities, within and between organisations, across sectors and institutions, or around societal challenges that cross geographic and organisational boundaries.

The purpose is not collaboration for its own sake. It is to organise distributed human and organisational capability more intelligently so that worthwhile ambitions have a greater chance of becoming meaningful outcomes.

And those outcomes can reach far beyond those participating today. Every generation inherits the consequences of what previous generations chose to improve, tolerate, create or leave unresolved.

We cannot decide what future generations should value or what ambitions they should pursue.

But through Intelligent Collaboration, we can improve what we do today and leave behind tomorrow – whilst strengthening our collective ability to shape what comes next.