The Math of Collective Contribution
It's back to school time, so today, I want to talk about Math.
Specifically, People Math.
Because People Math doesn't work the same way as Math Math.
In Math Math: 1 + 1 = 2
But in People Math, something different happens.
First, there is no "1+1", because two different people don't have the same contribution. Which means, we only ever looking at "1+2" (or choose your favorite number combination). So minimally, we're looking at three.
But there is also something that exists between them that didn't exist before. In the equation, it looks like a plus sign, but it's actually it's own thing entirely.
It could be a conversation. A connection. A new perspective. A possibility.
And the equal sign is where ALL of those things merge into ANOTHER something new.
And when it comes to the collective this series happens again and again. Until, theoretically, weappraoching infinity with the amount of possibilities we've created.
It gets difficult for the human mind to comprehend.
And when that happens, we tend to default back to what we CAN comprehend. Connecting on LinkedIn. Sending emails. Selling goods. Searching for jobs.
But what might be possible if we stayed in that discomfort for a minute?
Digging Into The Numbers
Let's use a baseball team as an example. There are nine players on the field, so the formula might look like this:
1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 9
But what happens when the firs ball gets pitched? One of those people (the pitcher) is now interacting with a new variable, the BATTER on the other team. That adds another +1. So, now we're at 10.
Now let's say the ball gets hit to the second baseman. They field the ball and throw the runner out at first. Imagining that the first baseman and the second baseman are two of the ones in the equation above, the + sign between them has now increased with the play. For the sake of this example, let's call it trust.
So now, inside the nine, smaller equations have started to form.
We have brackets.
(1 + 1) + (1 + 1) + (1 + 1 + 1) + 1 + 1
And those brackets naturally develop. Pitchers and Catchers. First and Second basemen. Outfielders. Not to mention all the coaching staff, trainers, etc.
In the real world, this looks like teams, departments, committees, projects, partnerships, communities, ecosystems, and the list goes on.
The brackets make contribution manageable. And maybe more importantly, SEE-ABLE. And they CAN lead to multiplicative opportunities...but NOT if they become silos.
When Brackets Become Silos
Imagine if the infielders decided their job was simply to be the best infield possible. They field every ground ball flawlessly. They communicate well with one another. They know exactly where everyone else is going to be on any given play.
Their bracket is functioning perfectly. Except they stop paying attention to the outfield. Or the catcher. Or what is happening at the plate.
They could become an exceptionally high-performing group while the team loses the game.
And in business, organizations do this all the time. Marketing gets better at marketing. Sales gets better at sales. Operations gets better at operations. Product gets better at developing product. A partnership team builds better partnerships.
We optimize the bracket without optimizing the entire equation.
When we look at the Math, there's not a lot of difference between these two equations:
1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 9
(1 + 1) + (1 + 1) + (1 + 1 + 1) + 1 + 1 = 9
Because we're still only measuring how much contribution is PRESENT.
It doesn't tell a good story about what happens when those contributions INTERACT.
A More Robust Human Equation
Let's go back to the baseball team. The pitcher throws a pitch that produces a grounder. The shortstop fields it and throws to second. The second baseman receives it, steps on the bag and fires to first. The first baseman makes the catch. The result? A double play.
No single player created the outcome. And the outcome cannot be understood by simply adding together four independent actions.
They affected one another. In sequence.
Each contribution changed the conditions for the contribution that followed it.
In Math, we call that multiplication; a function that increases a number with greater speed.
In business, we might call it velocity. Or personally, I like "momentum".
But in order for that momentum to be available, there are certain behaviors the contributors need to bring to the table.
The Behaviors That Multiply
Ok, so moving beyond having contributions (that's addition), multiplication is about what we DO with them. And doing is all about behavior. So, what are the behaviors that "add up"?
Understanding our unique contribution: A shortstop doesn't need to become a pitcher. A pitcher doesn't need to become an outfielder. Collective Contribution doesn't require everyone to become more alike. It requires us to understand what we uniquely bring — our perspective, expertise, experience, relationships, resources and capacity — so we can put it into the equation intentionally.
Getting curious about everyone else's contribution: Knowing what I can do isn't enough. Multiplication happens when I understand enough about what you can do to recognize where our contributions might intersect. That means asking questions. Listening with intention. Looking beyond titles. And resisting the assumption that we already know what someone else has to offer.
Making our contribution available: Potential sitting on the bench doesn't change the game. Neither does an idea we never share. A connection we never make. A question we don't ask. Collective Contribution requires generosity; in being willing to put something useful into play.
Paying attention to what the collective needs: Sometimes the most valuable contribution isn't the thing we are best at; it's the thing the situation needs right now. It's the star player, who is having a bad game, sitting on the bench pumping up the B squad to a win. And it requires awareness beyond our own bracket.
Building trust before we need it: A second baseman can't stop mid-double-play to verify whether the shortstop is trustworthy. The speed of the play depends on trust already being present. The same is true in organizations and ecosystems. Trust reduces the friction between contributions. And when there is less friction, we can move faster.
Experimenting together: You all know I love me a good experiment. Why? Because not every combination of contributions is going to deliver what we're hoping for. And since we can't know the perfect play in advance, we need to try something small enough to learn from. If contribution creates possibility, then experimentation tells us what that possibility can become.
Staying connected to the bigger equation: This might be the most important behavior of all. Taking our eyes beyond our own bracket to see how we're moving the whole equation. If we keep heads up, we prevent ourselves from getting hit in the head with a fastball because we weren't looking at who's throwing it.
Moving from Capacity to Momentum
This isn't about removing addition from the equation. In fact, it's highly necessary. To accomplish specific goals, we need more people, more perspectives, more experiences, more expertise, more ideas and more connections.
And it isn't about removing brackets either. Or creating brackets where they don't naturally exist. We need to allow smaller groups of people to work closely together without requiring everyone to participate in every conversation.
But those two things alone don't guarantee collective impact.
The greatest opportunity is in connecting the brackets. To allow an idea generated over here to collide with expertise over there. To let someone's connection unlock someone else's possibility. To let one group's experiment become another group's starting point. To allow contribution to move through the collective instead of simply accumulating inside it.
And when things are moving, momentum becomes possible.
After all, the real opportunity of a collective isn't simply to gather more contributors. It's to create the conditions where each contribution makes the other contributions more valuable.
Now that's some good Math 💖
