 Hello there, welcome back to Understanding Design. This is our sixth session and I do hope it has been a stimulating journey for everyone. Last time we spoke about the concept of sustainability in design. In our session today I am collaborating with Mukesh Patel in a discussion on Yes, Design and Collaboration. Mukesh Patel is a practicing information designer and currently the Dean at the Indian School of Design and Innovation in Mumbai. Thank you for joining us Mukesh. A pleasure Nina. Let's begin. Please share with us your views on collaboration. Well, collaboration really means that as a group we are creating something better, something greater than it would be possible for us to create as individuals on our own. The ability to work effectively in groups is considered a necessary skill in design practice today. Collaboration is about designers enhancing each other's work in a harmonious way. It means that the collaborators follow a smart plan to avoid confusion and waste. Like we are doing here, bringing different people with different skills to share their experience in this course. Exactly, collaboration is a common feature of teamwork in any organization. One team member may have excellent writing skills, another may be good at math and another may provide strong leadership. By collaborating on a project, we expand the pool of resources and skills that the project can draw upon. You mentioned strong leadership, but everyone is an expert in their own field and sometimes there can be different perceptions leading to conflict and creative people can be quite individualistic. Do they accept working with leaders easily? Well, if rigid protocols are forced into the creative design process, design collaborations can be challenging. This could happen, for example, in a large companies that may have strong controls built into their processes. The key is to get the best out of each member. In my work as an exhibition designer, I get opportunities to collaborate all the time. Remember we worked on My Land My People in 1986? This was a festival of India exhibition that traveled across the former Soviet Union. It was a huge collaboration between the two governments, diplomats, designers, photographers, filmmakers, fabricators, printers, craftsperson and performing artists. It created a huge sensation. That is why we speak of setting out common aims and goals. The thing to be designed whether a product or a service or a system has its own requirements and calls for a certain range of skills for which specific collaborators are invited. Also, successful collaborations means give and take. A good manager or leader must work to ensure that the different creative people work together smoothly. Does the leader always have to be a manager? A leader does not always have to be a manager. They could be designers, engineers, scriptwriters, in short anyone who has a good understanding of the subject and more critically must have the ability to work with people with various skill sets. So it is an interdependent process, right? Each one has its own expertise and the team members accept the given guidelines. Each one has their own expertise and the team members accept the given guidelines. Of course, but if someone has an out of the world idea that the others love, it may well be accepted without trying very hard. Let's watch a success story that demonstrates the power of teamwork.