Our three projects so far have been:

Collaboration eLearning Packages

UN Food and Agricultural Organization – Rome, Italy

Modus Cooperandi worked with a team of 20+ authors, editors, and eLearning specialists to build a comprehensive set of lessons around collaboration, community, and team building. Jim and Tonianne helped devise a group writing system using a variety of online tools to facilitate communication and collaboration. Additionally, we were principle authors on three sections of the eLearning package itself. Once complete, the system will be translated into six languages, and made available to UN staff and those interested worldwide.

OzonAction’s 2010 Social Media Plan

United Nations Environmental Programme, OzonAction Unit – Paris, France

OzonAction is the UNEP’s group which, with the ambitious goal date of 2010, helped phase out the manufacturing of ozone depleting substances (ODS) such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). Now, in its second phase, two additional ozone-depleting chemicals are on the chopping block: hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) and MethylBromide. While OzonAction could certainly use their existing and successful methods to meet their deadline for the removal of these two compounds, they’ve chosen to incorporate social media to eradicate them ahead of schedule. Their success in the past has not made them complacent, and Modus Cooperandi is helping to create a social media plan that will provide the organization with actionable steps that won’t overtax their budget or their staff. The goal here is to provide the maximum benefit for OzonAction without getting caught up in the fads or hype of the social media movement.  OzonAction’s goals are serious, and so their use of social media should be directed in a way to reflect that sense of gravitas.

2010 Human Development Report for Vietnam

United Nations Development Programme – Hanoi, Vietnam

Over the past two decades, with the rise of globalization, Vietnam has experienced unprecedented economic growth. With one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, Vietnam has graduated to a mid-tier economic power. For this nation in transition, the current global economic downturn has left Vietnam with both options and opportunities. Countries in the United Nations need to provide a Human Development Report (HDR) to guide policy and funding both internally and externally. In many cases, the HDR can be several years between issues, and Vietnam is no different. For this project, UNDP and the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences (VASS) have gathered researchers and scientists from several different agencies within and outside Vietnam to create the HDR. The goal of this project is to have a full-fledge HDR, with detailed and directed recommendations, ready for the Vietnamese General Congress in October. Modus Cooperandi is facilitating this effort by implementing a collaborative management system, coaching researchers on collaboration as the document is authored. Rather than merely having a document constructed of distinct sections authored by independent researchers, the goal here is to bring all the researchers together and inform the sections with one voice, and in real-time. This should result in an end-product that makes consistent points throughout, as opposed to individual points in each section. Recommendations will then be bolstered by coherent arguments threaded throughout the entire document.

The Food and Agricultural Office of the United Nations (Photo by FAO)

Modus Cooperandi has begun a project to help the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) create on-line training courses in distributed collaboration.  Modus joins thought leaders and experts from around the world in building a curriculum that will help workers from FAO and other organizations collaborate from a distance.  The project’s aim is to provide knowledge of patterns, practices and tools that facilitate distributed collaboration and knowledge sharing – making remote locations no longer isolated , and providing expertise more quickly and at much lower cost. The resulting materials will be made available in seven languages and is scheduled for public use by the Summer of 2010.

This is the first in a series of Modus Cooperandi’s InfoPaks. They are downloadable, and work like a narrative whitepaper. Think of them like graphic novels for business.

In InfoPak One: Personal Kanban at the World Bank, we discuss the experience we had leading a rapid development project at the World Bank, specifically, how visual controls work with small groups, and why they are preferable to traditional team management.

This InfoPak is best read by clicking the “Full” button above. It’s also designed to be downloaded to distribute to others. Over the next few weeks, we will post more InfoPaks on Personal Kanban. Please feel free to comment and let us know what you think.

Launched Sept 2009

Gov 2.0 University begins on September 29th & 30th at LMI in Tyson’s Corner, Virginia.  Modus Cooperandi has been working with Hinchcliffe & Company and LMI to create a cutting-edge curriculum that focuses on how to employ 2.0 technologies, patterns, and practices. Courses are already scheduled into 2010. The university includes personal briefings for high ranking officials, two day managers’ seminars, and five day practitioner courses.

World Bank in Washington DC

Modus Cooperandi is excited to announce our upcoming personal kanban project, where we will use our Personal Kanban techniques in a directed exercise with knowledge workers from around the world.  From the 21st through the 25th of September, Jim Benson and Tonianne DeMaria Barry will be working with The World Agroforestry Centre and the World Bank to lead their Capacity Building Program on the Opportunity Costs of Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Land Use Change (OpCost) Writeshop, at the World Bank Institute in Washington D.C. The intent of this directed exercise is to create a comprehensive technical document. As small working groups and as a unified team, participants will use personal kanban to maintain project coherence and track completion. The project is expected to achieve rapid release of a highly technical product by knowledge workers from around the world.  The multi-lingual, multi-disciplinary group will benefit from personal kanban’s visual controls and work flow.

We will be blogging and tweeting about the event as it unfolds.

Photo: Brixton

Enterprise 2.0 in Zurich

On the 2nd of November, 2009, Jim Benson will be teaching Enterprise 2.0 as part of Somesso’s Leveraging Corporate Social Media in the Finance Sector event in Zurich, Switzerland. The Enterprise 2.0 track is part of our on-going strategic partnership with Dion Hinchcliffe and Web 2.0 University.  Using Dion’s courseware, Jim will be teaming with a German counterpart to tailor the materials to the European financial community.

Photo: BeatKüng

Natural Simplicity

Hello,

In the midst of the Modus Cooperandi reformation, we took the site off line.

While the new one is coming up, please see these examples of our work and philosophy:

Jim Benson’s Blog

Instant Karma: 10 Principles of Social Media for Business

Gray Hill Solutions

Personal Kanban