Aleksi Neuvonen, medeoprichter DEMOS Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland

Collabopansion (noun): new educational paradigm aimed at liberating people from cognitive limitations created by working culture and professional identities of the industrial era. Its basic idea is that people need to grow greater trust in collaboration with others and thus expand their own capabilities. The paradigm emphasises the creation of new routines that gradually bring about changes in attitudes and beliefs. It is targeted towards people who are in the process of making a transition from traditional working life to a new working culture in the age of digital abundance and collaboration.

“It was neither one of the easiest nor most rewarding days of my life. Yet looking at it all from a distance I could see myself moving forward. Changing oneself is never easy. Yet I am lucky to have a good program and instructors that help me in a growing awareness of my own cognitive change, and to maintain commitment to action. Collabopansion is about dismantling your own internal boundaries towards growth and leaping towards extreme, collaboration-based productivity and impact. It entails maintaining a routine of doing things with other people and trusting them more than you would have in the past. It is shocking and frustrating during the first half a dozen assignments of your training, when collaboration with strangers falters. Yet with continuous reflections, repetitions and hints from instructors, one finds a path of learning. Now I see myself in transition towards a new sense of purpose and capabilities that I could not see myself possessing while still working in a traditional workplace.”