The Busting Bureaucracy Hackathon

Crowdsourcing Participation and Engagement. Fear is a huge hindrance to personal and professional change management. One of the biggest barriers to employee engagement and participation is the ‘fear of retribution’. The workplace needs to shift gears into a safer environment where everyone is free to contribute and participate without fear. Technology can help begin this process with the use of online, workplace crowdsourcing initiatives where all employees can contribute to innovation, strategy development and change initiatives and are rewarded for doing so. The crowdsourcing process would begin with topics for idea and concept generation. All members compete with one another and vote to move ideas/concepts into the next higher phase of evaluation and development. This is a quicker and less fearful approach to begin capitalizing on the talents, ideas and thoughts of all employees. There could also be an option that all contributors can remain anonymous until moved into the final phases of idea/concept development. These crowdsourcing initiatives could form the beginning of a safer, more participatory environment which encourages, values and rewards employee contributions. The crowdsourcing platform would provide employees with an outlet to reveal their talents and ideas that may otherwise have been overlooked. It’s a start.