Towards a gift economy
In our company Another Dimension we are experimenting with different ways of looking at value and transactions. I believe that in many cases in our society today we look at the world from a scarcity point of view. In other words there is not enough for everyone so if I get a piece of the cake there will be less left of the cake for others. Which can also translate into “I better get my piece of the cake before someone else eats it!”. Certain aspects of our world (as we know it) have a limited amount of certain tangible things, like oil. In other aspects of the world we live in we have created a limited amount of certain “tangible” things, like money. In yet other aspects of life many believe that there is a limited amount of certain things, like love. What if we could change our perception of the limitations that we ourselves create and either create an abundance or view those aspects from an abundant point of view? To me this is one aspect of the gift economy, i.e. that there is enough for everyone to go around so we don’t have to compete for resources but rather can collaborate and help each other and we will all benefit from doing so.
Now you might say that this does not work in practice, and I am inclined to agree that due to many people in the world acting from a scarcity point of view a gift economy is really hard to achieve. However in my part of the world there are more and more people that have more than they need and they acknowledge that the world would be a better place if we all helped each other rather than fought each other over the crumbs in the cake we have baked. So how can we all contribute to creating a world of abundance?
At Another Dimension we are experimenting with three different models of agreements and ways of valuing the work we do.
- Traditional safety — Sign a contract
We create a contract between Another Dimension and the person or organisation we are helping and specify our different rights and obligations. Generally this includes a transaction of some sort like time for money, i.e. according to the contract we work a certain amount of time and the other party pays a certain amount of money for that time.
- Mutual intention — Write a Memorandum of Understanding
We set up a Memorandum of Understanding outlining our respective intentions which could include intended result, estimated time needed and possible intended monetary exchange.
- Full trust — Live the question that you are trying to answer
We start with setting up an agreement specifying how we can support each other, the support could also be one sided. However exploring how the work can help achieve both parties desires can be very beneficial. During any time this agreement is still valid or once the work is done it is up to the receiving party to value what the work is worth and if that includes money ask the helping party to send an invoice according to the perceived value under given circumstances.
The above overview is extremely high level and each of these three types of agreements include a lot more detailed aspects and processes to actually work. However I will leave those details for another blog. What I want to point out here is the transition from a rather crude transactional view where we often focus on the competition between individuals and organisations and where we primarily measure time and exchange that time for money. To the transition of creating agreements based on trust where we can collaborate between individuals and organisations and look at both the process and the result to evaluate what is actually being created right now.
One of the fears I can relate to transitioning from “traditional safety” to “full trust” is “what if the other party doesn’t value my result at all in the end”. In other words what if the customers might not be willing to pay as much or anything at all for a delivered project? There are many projects today that are considered a failure and do not deliver what was expected from the start and going forward I believe it will only require more and more of us to fully be able to deliver and create meaningful results. The Project Management Institute has some interesting numbers on the “success” of projects in today’s businesses. According to their numbers it actually looks like we have collectively been able to increase the success rate over the last couple of years. They also note that it seems that the organisations that are able to consider new ways of working (what they call gymnastic enterprises) seem to be doing better than those hanging on to past ways of working.
Writing contracts and creating a very controlled environment for our businesses to function has been one way to support our businesses and has created safety for the many people working in said companies. However I believe that said support is starting to show that it is in some cases limiting our potential rather than help us, as it might have done in the past. There are many reasons for this but one of the major reasons from my point of view is the increasing complexity in the world. The more complex the world becomes, the harder it will be to beforehand try to estimate what needs to be done and what is needed to reach a specific result. In other words we need to change the way we relate to each other and what we are trying to achieve, both before and during our collaborations.
I believe one of the new ways of working going forward will be to look at other ways of collaborating than we do today, going from a competitive and scarcity point of view to start more collaborations based on trust to create abundance. Having more trust between two or more parties does not necessarily mean “hands-off”, it means that we trust that we both want to achieve the best outcome which sometimes demands a very close collaboration. A collaboration where it is also important to have a dialogue on how we can both contribute to our respective desires and intended results. Another benefit of depending on trust is that we actually have to actively work on that trust, otherwise it will not work out at all. The trust becomes the prerequisite and at the same time the aspect that creates the best possible outcomes. In my experience there are many benefits of having trust between individuals or organisations and the time spent on creating that trust is worth a lot both during and after any kind of collaboration.
One way to look at the gift economy is that we are rewriting our mindset in regards to collaborations, agreements and the value exchange. Instead of focusing on a beforehand agreed transaction we try to stay more present in the moment, which helps us to better understand what is required of us right now rather than what we thought was important at an earlier time when a contract was signed. This does not mean that we have to abandon contracts altogether, it is more a matter of trying out new ways of collaborating, sometimes the traditional safety is most appropriate and other times discussing mutual intention or working with full trust is better. It does not require us to completely avoid transactions either, however to me there is a big difference between deciding on a transaction beforehand and expecting that transaction compared to going into a collaboration with trust and exploring what value can be created that might lead to gifts being exchanged. The first option can be limiting to me as it usually does not generate more than what was first agreed, even though the transaction most likely will happen the result might or might not be very fulfilling for the involved parties. The second alternative is to me usually very fulfilling to all parties and the potential value exchange has the possibility to be much more in line with what was actually needed rather than what was expected.
That said, having trust in the fact that there is enough of what is needed for all involved parties in a collaboration and that I will receive value for the work I do even though I don’t have it in black and white can be very scary. Facing those fears will be a huge challenge for anyone trying to walk this path. I however believe that the rewards for overcoming those fears, the value that can emerge and the liberating feelings of being in an abundant space far outweigh the risks from my point of view.
There is still a long way to go for this change to emerge into the field of business on any larger scale. It is however already starting to happen. I have now done my first commissioned work through Another Dimension where I spent time on a project without expecting any kind of payment, but once it was done the receiving party wanted me to send them an invoice to show their appreciation for the work I had done. This was my first gift invoice!
