Collaboration questionnaire
Aneta Rostkowska

In the Islands of Kinship project, we did a lot of collaborative work. I noticed that even when I worked with people who were my friends, I didn’t know some specific things about them that related to work processes. I decided to test a solution that could improve the quality of working together. It is a questionnaire that can be discussed during a meeting or in the form of an email exchange. The aim is to get to know the person better, to avoid some misunderstandings during the collaboration process and to create a good basis for the collaboration process.  Each person answering the questions is also encouraged to suggest changes to the questions or to add new ones – in this way, the questionnaire can be improved.

Here are the questions I used:

1. How do you see your role in this collaboration? What kind of tasks are you willing to do? 
2. What is your motivation for the collaboration – why do you want to work together?
3. What are your needs as a collaborator? What is important to you?
4. Is there anything you have learned about collaboration in the past that you think might be useful for this one?
5. What don’t you like about working with others – what kind of behavior or attitude?
6. Are you interested in adding a more social layer to the collaboration – a dinner, a walk, or a visit to an exhibition together?
7. How do you identify yourself – gender, ethnicity, country of origin, etc.? What pronouns do you prefer or want to avoid, and what descriptions of your identity are you comfortable with?
8. What are your working hours during the week (days and hours)?
9. Which email address should be used for collaboration?
10. What telephone number should be used for collaboration? 
11. Are there any means of communication you would prefer to use for collaboration? (Phone call, Email, Apps, Face-to-face meeting, Zoom meeting)
12. Are there any means of communication that you would prefer NOT to use for collaboration? 
13. Are there any periods this year when you don’t want to be contacted (e.g. holidays)? If so, when (give exact dates)?

As you can see, it is a mix of deeper questions related to experiences and motivations and more practical ones. I find the ones related to working hours really useful – for example, I’ve had several situations where someone ‘suddenly’ went on holiday, which surprised everyone (‘suddenly’ – from my point of view, of course, as I wasn’t informed beforehand) 😉 A friend of mine also revealed to me that she doesn’t like long what’s app audio messages – totally fine, of course, but I had no idea she didn’t like them (and I sent many 😉 ) A proliferation of communication methods requires a conversation about their use in the context of a project.

I have included a question – number 6 – which relates to a more non-verbal way of establishing a good ground for collaboration – doing something together that is not directly related to the project we are working on. I believe that this level is often left out of many collaborations (they have to be efficient, so these elements are often skipped…), but they can contribute to a better understanding of the project partners.

I have used this questionnaire several times so far and I think it works well. It creates a certain level of honesty and openness about circumstances and needs and allows for a deeper grounding of the collaboration. 

photo: Luise Flügge, from Festival of Feelings