Let The Next Adventure Begin – The With Whom (#CAWW)

And, finally, the last blog post of the series of entries where I’ve been detailing what I would be doing from here onwards, as I begin my next adventure as an independent chief emergineer. Earlier on in the week I blogged about the why, then the what and now I guess it’s a good time to talk about the with whom, as part of that mantra of “use systems too boost your odds, passion to get energy and luck to change the game“. In short, the system of we! That’s why it’s a great pleasure and true honour for me to announce I’m now part, as a charter member, of the Change Agents Worldwide network with a simple and rather clear mission: change the way we work!

That’s right! In a now more than ever hyperconnected, networked and complex systems driven working environment I pretty soon came to the conclusion, as I went solo and independent, that my odds to make a bigger difference out there would have been more notorious by being part of a network of rather talented, passionate, engaged, inspiring and rather thought-provoking knowledge (Web) workers, with whom, if anything, you sense you aren’t anymore the smartest person in the room, the network is.

And being able to tap into that unprecedented brain power to share ideas openly, to learn from one another, to collaborate by sharing your knowledge in a rather open and transparent manner, to innovate, to co-create, to continue walking the talk on redefining the workplace of the future and, for that matter, the future of work, I felt it was just too much of an enticing opportunity to ignore that I haven’t just been capable of getting rid of from my mind over the course of the last few weeks. Of course, without a single doubt, I had to join Change Agents Worldwide (@chagww).

I know, I know. At this point in time I am pretty certain most of you folks out there would be wondering what Change Agents Worldwide are all about, after all, right? Well, here’s one of the elevator pitches we are using I quite enjoy as it describes, pretty nicely, what we are all about:

@chrisheuer @rhappe think of us as a collaborative sharing economy model for consulting services (sans the “firm” structure). cc: @jowyang

— Susan Scrupski (@SusanScrupski) January 14, 2014

Remember when I just mentioned above being part of a network of folks who walk the talk, leading by example, on redefining the workplace of the future? Well, that’d be it, in all of its splendour. Perhaps this other definition may help some more as well. A bit more wordy though, but worth while sharing across:

“We built our network based on the principles driving the evolving Web. We believe in transparency, sharing, collaboration, authenticity, and trust. Operationally, we function as a cooperative. Value is realised by every node in the network. As the network grows, the benefits to our client grow exponentially”.

You can probably notice how excited I am for being part of such an amazing network of incredibly knowledgeable and generous people all around. To me, though, the beauty and mind-boggling privilege of joining #CAWW is something bigger, more massive than whatever I could have anticipated for. From here onwards I’m going to be working together AND networking with … friends, in the true sense of the word “friends”. That’s right, plenty of the folks from the #CAWW network are people who I already know for over 10 years, way before Social Networking for Business or Social Business were the new buzzwords. The breath and extensive knowledge they all have got around areas like Knowledge Management, Collaboration, Learning, SNA, ONA, Org. Change, Org. Design,  Management / Leadership Consultancy, Corporate Communications, Digital Workplace Transformation, Social Computing, Social Business, Social Learning, and a rather long etc. of skills, experiences and knowhow make me feel like my learning curve all of a sudden has gone sky through the roof!

Life(-long learning) in perpetual beta FTW!!

And the excitement gets bigger and bigger, by the minute, when, early next week, I’ll be meeting up about a dozen of them, face to face, in Paris, at the Enterprise 2.0 Summit. Check out the overall agenda for Day One and Day Two (Along with the Masterclass Workshops) to get a quick glimpse of the massive brain share that will be taking place over the course of the next few days with everyone involved in Social Business flocking to what’s, by far, one of the best events in Europe around this very same topic… It’s going to be a fun event, I can tell you!

I bet at this point in time you may be wondering what are the various different names of that lovely global network of Change Agents, right? I tell you, if you have been in the space of Social Business and Social Networking for a good while you probably know already vast majority of them. But, as an additional teaser, allow me to share over here first a couple of testimonials from themselves about their own experiences of being a member of the CAWW network. Let’s start with my good friend Harold Jarche:

“Change Agents Worldwide is a new type of consultancy, which functions as a transparent cooperative. It includes solo change agents (like me) and enterprise change agents who are trying to bring about change in their respective workplaces. This is a network of progressive and passionate professionals, who really want to bring about substantive change in how work gets done.“

How about the always inspiring Kevin Jones:

“Imagine a company without managers or employees but a ton of leadership. One that has a physical address only because, by law, it needs one while it uses the world as its playground. Where the status quo does not exist. Nor does a hierarchy or a vacation policy. Where teams who work together may have never met, but their collective ideas and expertise melt together to create the most innovative solutions to business’ most vexing problems. We have recruited the best minds in a mere matter of a few months. Their experience is vast. The collective knowledge and wisdom frightening.“

Or, perhaps, these few words from the only and only Marcia Conner:

“Without a doubt the smartest, most insightful, on-the-ball group of people I have ever worked with–and by ‘working with’ I mean ‘learning from, and at a distance no less’ because most everything any one of them says or writes or does is nourishing to my soul. Together and individually we’re all committed to creating a better world, where organizations can have dramatically better outcomes because they value the capabilities of people. We’re just getting started, but it’s a long time in the making, so many of us working on our own on this for years, dreaming of finding people who we can work on this with together … because it’s time!“

I could go on sharing some more additional testimonials (You could read them all over here in this link, if you would want to), but I guess you are all dying to know who the entire CAWW network of members are, right? So, here we go, then. Without much further ado, and in no particular order, this is the network of people who have made it possible, for me, the system of we!: 

Susan Scrupski 

Jon Husband

Christoph

Ernst Decsey

Patti Anklam

Marcia Conner

Kevin Jones

Harold Jarche

Lois Kelly

Sharon Richardson

Ayelet Baron

John Stepper

Thierry de Baillon

Carrie Basham Young

Peter Vander Auwera

Jane McConnell

Clark Quinn

Catherine Shinners

Charles Jennings

Jim Worth

Ian Thorpe

Harald Schirmer

Simon Terry

Bruce Galinsky

Danny DeGrave

Rob Caldera

Dennis Pearce

Bryce Williams

Eric Ziegler

CheeChin Liew

Frederic Chauvin

Jonathan Anthony

Dom Burch

Rainer Gimbel

Chris Carpenter

Josh Dormont

Celine Schillinger

Heidi de Wolf

Alvaro Caballero

Richard Martin

Kari Pearlson

Paul Andersen

There is a Twitter List out there already currently being curated by Celine herself, if you would want to start following what we are all up to. After all, one of our key main areas of joint work is, eventually, working out loud and I am sure I will have plenty of opportunities to share with you folks over here what we have been up to lately, including the publishing of an upcoming eBook under this rather suggestive heading: “Changing the World of Work. One Human at a Time“.

And you know what is really cool about Change Agents Worldwide? Well, that it is not a closed network, so you, too, could join us! And start walking the talk today, actively participating on what it is like being at the forefront of the future of work: The Socially Integrated “Enterprise”.

 

Let The Next Adventure Begin … Welcome to Change Agents WorldWide! (#CAWW)