Success Through Cooperation

Somewhere in the deep blue ocean, offshore the Niger Delta area of Nigeria where oil drilling activity was going on, I noticed nature's lesson depicting cooperation as an important ingredient for success.

It started with the cacophony of dozens of seabirds swarming over a portion of an otherwise calm and quiet ocean suggesting that something was likely happening below the surface. As if to confirm my thought, suddenly bubbles appeared, gradually forming continuous set of colourless rings. I was still trying to discern what was it in the water bubbles that excited dozens of seabirds when moments later two massive dark whales appeared in the middle of the clear water rings from the ocean depth with their mouths open. At surface, they closed their massive jaws, sprouted and dived to repeat the performance. I could remember a documentary I read some years back in the Awake Magazine about how whales cooperate in order to successfully feed. These two whales were likely working as a team to feed on the tiny sea creatures (shrimps, krill, and small fishes) that were streaming around the drilling rig due to thrashed food normally thrown overboard the rig into the waters.

According to the documentary, whales, once they detect their prey (normally crustaceans) dive as a team below them and swim in a tight circle while releasing air from their blowholes. This ingenious manoeuvres form a net of bubbles vertically through the middle of their net, making it easy for them to feast on their prey. The seabirds with their keen eyesight could detect this process early enough for them to arrive and lay in wait to eventually join in the feast. Naturally, achieving success is more like staying alive. It is as much about bonding with your good friends, neighbours, spouse and relations as it is about growing and reproducing. The woman and man need to agree and accept each other to be able to live together as wife and husband and should mutually cooperate in love to come together and start (reproducing) a family. The Creator of nature had already set these natural models to demonstrate why cooperation is vital for our success. No man or any organism is an island; each one has a relationship to one another either directly or indirectly.

The web of success is truly a network of interconnected and interdependent activities made possible by people through cooperation. However, unlike other organisms, human beings should seek success through symbiotic cooperation where an atmosphere of peace and trust is created. Such cooperation and alliances are fundamental to the higher development of every system and ultimate success of every participant.

History has shown that people who plunge recklessly and irresponsibly ahead with every idea that moves through their brain, be it business or personal idea, without stopping to test such ideas by seeking other people's opinions are bound to fail. In business as well as other life endeavours, we need the cooperation of each other to succeed. It is an established fact that we can make our business empire more relevant and successful if we turn it from a one-man's business to a corporate organisation with additional members. The Bible talks about 'two being better than one because when one falls there is another standing to give him a helping hand'. According to Robert Schuller in his classic bestseller "Tough times never last but tough people do", the secret of success is to find a need and fill it. Finding these needs and filling them at the same time can be made faster and easier if we seek the second person's opinion. No man has overall control over knowledge.

Cooperation that makes a person survive and thrive successfully must be mutual and commensally. The best principle of successful cooperation is partnership for propagation, where every participant benefits without harming each other. Take the case of the bee when it alight on a flower, it enters into a symbiotic partnership with its host. The bee receives nectar and pollen from other blossom of the same kind. This alliance enables flowering plants to reproduce successfully. After being pollinated, flowers ceased producing food for the bee and other insects by losing their scent, drop their petal or change their orientation or colour. To us this might look mischievous but it is said to be an act of courtesy to the bee and other insects that can now focussed their efforts on other plants that are still open for business.

Ants are also a perfect model of healthy cooperation, industry and order, often working together to drag home objects larger than themselves or assist injured or exhausted members of the colony back to their nest.

In all these accounts, it is worth noting that business cooperation should be conceived with people of like positive minds, optimism, desire, dedication and determination. It is paramount to take into consideration the benefits of such cooperation to others especially the consumers or end users. This is where and how true success through cooperation can be attained and sustained.