The Energy of Partnership
I have been lucky enough to spend the majority of last week in partnership: first, at the ITC Vegas conference with the SPLICE partners, next, in conversation with Connie Jakab, B.R.Ed exploring new concepts for Think Big, DO BIGGER, then at the Female Athlete Sports Talk in Strathmore with the Thunder (and all the other local organizations supporting female sport), and finally on Collective Contribution TV with the amazing JenLyn UNBN, Robert Snyder and Kissmic Woody talking about reciprocity. And while all these experiences touched different edges of my personal brand, there was something that very clearly connected them all...
HINT: I used it for the title of this article 😉
It was the ENERGY that was created when two (or more) partners collide.
And it is undeniable.
But what if it wasn't just undeniable.
What if it's measurable.
What if, we could actually measure that energy the way we measure other energy in nature?
After all, it's not unusual to talk about how people "bring energy into a room." We (at least, I) often describe conversations as energizing. We leave certain people feeling more alive than when we arrived (and vice versa).
Put the right group of humans together and you can FEEL something change.
So, what are we feeling exactly?
Turns out, Science has a suggestion.
Humans in Sync
I recently discovered a field of research around interpersonal synchrony. Essentially, when humans interact, we create the possibility of coordinating with each other. Sometimes it's conscious, but often it's not.
Our movements can synchronize. Or our speech patterns. But maybe most interestingly:
Our Attention.
When we talk about partnership, we often focus on the people involved. We ask questions like: Do we like each other? Do we trust each other? Do our values align? Do we have complementary skills?
But there's another question that RARELY gets asked:
What are we paying attention to TOGETHER?
And when we know what that is, that's where the energy creation can begin.
The Energy of Shared Attention
Science comes to the table again with another concept, known as joint attention.
At its simplest, it happens when two people focus their attention on the same thing. But the really interesting version goes a little further: I know what I'm paying attention to. I know what you're paying attention to. And we both recognize that we're paying attention to it together.
We aren't simply looking in the same direction.
We are, in a sense, knowing together.
I mean, I feel the energy in my body just writing that.
Because suddenly, partnership isn't only about the relationship between two people. And it isn't only about the destination of the journey (say, shared revenue).
It's about the thing we're both looking at.
It could be a problem. An opportunity. A person we want to help. A system we want to change. A question we haven't answered yet. A possibility neither of us completely understands.
Whatever it is, our attention begins to converge around it.
And perhaps that's where the conditions for energy creation begin.
The Power of Convergence
The Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary defines convergence as:
Convergence: the process of moving together from different directions and meeting; the point where this happens.
Key items in this definition include "moving together" and "from different directions".
And it doesn't just happen because people are physically in the same space.
It happens at the point when the people in the room achieve joint attention SO THAT movement together becomes possible.
The energy isn't the outcome. It's the fuel.
At ITC, the energy wasn't created because SPLICE has partners. It emerged when we focused together on what might be possible for the people our combined technologies serve.
In Strathmore, it wasn't created simply because a bunch of organizations care about female athletes. It emerged because we put our attention on the athletes themselves and what becomes possible when an entire community contributes to their success.
On Collective Contribution TV, it wasn't created simply because four interesting humans showed up for a conversation. It emerged because we all put our attention on the same question about reciprocity and then explored it from completely different places.
THAT'S the formula.
Chosen Partnership gives us someone to contribute WITH.
Our Shared Attention gives us something to contribute TO.
Our Differences give us something unique to contribute.
And when those three things interact, perhaps THAT is convergence.
Not simply people coming together, but their Attention AND their Contributions meeting at the same point.
And no, those two things are NOT the same thing.
Shared Attention ≠ Sameness
I think it's important to call out here that Shared Attention doesn't mean that what we think about the thing our attention is on is the same.
In fact, that would hugely defeat the purpose.
After all, if you and I are looking at the same problem and seeing exactly the same thing, I'm not sure how much energy we've actually added. But if we're looking at the same thing and you see something I don't, and I see something you don't, and someone else sees a connection neither of us noticed...
Now we're getting somewhere.
The Science of interpersonal coordination actually distinguishes between synchronization and complementarity. Sometimes successful coordination means doing the same thing at the same time. Other times, it means doing different things that contribute to the same outcome.
A simple example is playing catch. Successful coordination is one person throwing a ball and the other person catching the ball. They both contribute to a successful catch. But two people throwing and no one catching? Or two people waiting to catch but no ball is thrown? Neither of those scenarios lead to success EVEN IF both parties can do the job.
If we extrapolate that to perspectives, it means:
Shared attention doesn't require shared perspective.
In fact, perhaps its greatest value comes from the opposite:
Can we synchronize around where we're looking without synchronizing what we see?
And when those different observations start interacting with each other, now THAT creates possibility. But has it actually gotten us to the point where we can MEASURE that energy?
Measuring Partnership Energy
In sales and marketing, it's really easy to measure a lot of things; a lot of things that aren't any of the things we talked about above. So, we get distracted by what we CAN measure instead of the things that actually drive movement.
But if we take a note from physics, we would understand that we don't necessarily know that energy exists because we can SEE the energy itself.
Instead, we observe what it does. Movement is initiated. Heat can be felt. Light can be seen. Change can be observed.
Now, if the energy of partnership works the same way, maybe we don't measure how energized everyone felt. What we measure is what moved because people came together.
Chosen Partnership + Shared Attention + Unique Contribution = Convergence → Movement
And suddenly, there are things we can observe. In fact, there are two.
#1: Did convergence actually happen?
Did our attention become more focused?
Did we see more together than any one of us could see alone?
Did someone's contribution change someone else's thinking?
Did a new idea emerge that didn't belong to any one person coming in?
These things tell us whether something NEW was created in the convergence. But then there's a second—and perhaps more important—measurement:
#2: Did that convergence create movement?
Did a decision become clearer?
Did someone take an action they wouldn't have taken otherwise?
Did a new connection form?
Did something that was stuck move?
And maybe that's how we measure the energy of partnership. First, we measure its creation by what emerges. And second, we measure its impact by what moves.
Not how many people were in the room. Not how many ideas went onto sticky notes. Not even whether everyone left saying, "WOW, what great energy!"
But: What exists now that didn't exist before we converged?
And: What moved because it does?
Now THAT feels like a measurement of energy I can get behind.
From Energy to Momentum
One of the common movements I experience in these types of convergence is creating a new way of thinking. And in all of this, I'm changing how I'm thinking about Think Big, DO BIGGER.
We've been referring to it as an immersive innovation experience. But really, it's about using a convergence to create momentum.
500 people, coming from different directions, with different experiences, expertise, relationships, resources and ways of seeing the world.
Stage 1: 500 people enter a room (not the destination)
Stage 2: 500 people pay attention to the same thing (not the destination)
Stage 3: 500 people bring their unique contributions to the Shared Challenge (getting closer)
Stage 4: Together, we measure what moved because 500 people converged
An idea becomes an experiment.
A conversation becomes a partnership.
A connection unlocks a resource.
A perspective changes a decision.
A problem looks different enough to become solvable.
An individual action becomes collective momentum.
THAT'S the experiment I'm interested in. And Think Big, DO BIGGER gives us one pretty fascinating place to test it.
In that room, we're going for 500 people.
But none of us need 500 people to start.
The next time you're in a partnership conversation, at a work meeting, at a community gathering, or simply having a conversation that has that unmistakable feeling of ENERGY, pay attention. And ask yourself:
What are we paying attention to together?
What are we each contributing differently?
And, perhaps most importantly:
What moved because we came together?
Because, if my hypothesis is correct, the energy of partnership isn't something we have to learn how to create.
Humans have been creating it all along.
We just haven't been paying attention. And we haven't been measuring what it moves.
