By Ron Shulkin

Here are some thoughts on contributor’s perceptions when involved in crowd sourcing and collaborations…

It is an accepted fact at this point: tapping into the “wisdom of the crowd” or “crowd sourcing” is a great way to get to a reliable set of truths. By asking lots of people what they think about any given challenge, the group, acting as a holistic unit, will generally push the best idea forward.

A promoted idea will most often

• yield the best financial return,
• offer the best way to answer the challenge at hand and,
• ultimately point to the best path forward for the organization discussing the topic.

However, human nature can sometimes add a mix of positive and dangerous components into the process! By being aware of both effects, the company’s innovation managers can keep the process on track.

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By Peter Verschuere

Our clients don't worry about not getting enough ideas. When you deploy CogniStreamer at your company your problem might be too many ideas!

Fortunately our social science algorithms will help you promote the best ideas automatically taking into account which ideas were voted on, discussed, viewed the most, and so on.

This infographic illustrates in 10 steps how the principle of the Wisdom of Crowds can boost an idea.

Peter Verschuere is Team Coordinator at CogniStreamer®, an Open Innovation Management System. Learn more about CogniStreamer®, follow our tweets or join us on Facebook. 

By Peter Verschuere

At CogniStreamer we strongly believe in innovation through collaboration. Our core values are the paradigm of open innovation and the principle of "the wisdom of crowds." Last week I ran into this video clip where Derek Powazek explains the 4 elements that create wise crowds: Diversity, Independance, Decentralization and Aggregation. Because these four items are a perfect match with our CogniStreamer view on crowdsourcing, I couldn't resist to share this clip with you.

Derek Powazek helps companies develop strategies to engage their audience, enable user-created content systems that actually create great experiences, and generally avoid the problems that so often strike when companies meet communities. He's the author of "Design for Community: The Art of Connecting Real People in virtual Places".

Peter Verschuere is Team Coordinator at CogniStreamer®, an Open Innovation Management System. Learn more about CogniStreamer®, follow our tweets or join us on Facebook. 

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by Peter Verschuere

Being part of the CogniStreamer® Development Team, my main experience with Innovation & Idea Management topics is from a practical point of view. "How can we improve the user experience when discussing an idea?" "Is it always necessary to collect ideas starting from a challenge (or seed, or campaign...)? And how do we handle unsolicited ideas?"

Recently I focused on this one:
Should the participating crowd be rewarded for their contributions? Some say this is absolutely necessary - others state that introducing a reward system or showing a leader board discourages or impedes people. The main goal of this post is to find out what's the best way to attract as many contributors as possible to a challenge and how to make sure these contributors (and more, new people) keep coming back to help solving even more challenges. 

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