COLLAB: A Collaboration Playbook

Client: Celestra Healthcare (Name Changed)

 

Role: Subject Matter Expert, Instructional Design, Graphic Design

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Project Overview

This project was developed to address ongoing collaboration challenges between small biotech firms and large global pharmaceutical partners engaged in joint drug development. These partnerships often struggle with misaligned expectations, communication breakdowns, differing work cultures, and unclear decision-making processes.

 

To solve these pain points, I created the COLLAB Framework, a two-page partnership starter kit that provides a structured, repeatable workflow to reduce friction and accelerate scientific progress across cross-company teams.

Problem Statement

Interviews with operational leads, project managers, and scientists revealed several core challenges:

  • Unclear roles and decision ownership
  • Mismatched timelines and bottlenecks in scientific workflows
  • Gaps in communication across tools, time zones, and reporting structures
  • Conflicting definitions of readiness, data quality, or “final” materials
  • Lack of alignment on documentation standards, research rights, and IP boundaries
  • Increased friction across teams working at very different organizational speeds

These issues often resulted in delays, duplicated work, and reduced trust between collaborators—raising the risk of missed regulatory milestones.

Subject Matter Expert and Instructional Designer

In this project, I served dual responsibilities:

As the Subject Matter Expert:

  • Synthesized operational realities from biotech–pharma collaborations.
  • Defined the pain points, scientific workflows, and regulatory interdependencies.
  • Clarified terminology gaps and helped establish shared definitions across organizations.
  • Identified the behaviors, communication practices, and decision patterns that needed standardization.

As the Instructional Designer:

  • Translated complex operational and scientific interactions into a clear, intuitive framework.
  • Created a structured learning asset (the COLLAB framework) that teams could immediately apply.
  • Designed job aids, checklists, and decision models that supported real-world collaboration patterns.
  • Ensured the final product was visually clean, accessible, and aligned with adult-learning principles.

This dual role was crucial in creating a solution that was both scientifically grounded and instructionally effective.

Solution: The COLLAB Framework Starter Kit

The final deliverable was a two-page starter kit built around the COLLAB model:

C — Clarify Roles & Responsibilities
O — Operationalize Communication Channels
L — Lock Standards & Definitions
L — Limit Surprises (Transparency)
A — Align on Timelines & Dependencies
B — Build Trust Through Documentation & Follow-Through

The first page focused on defining the framework and core partnership principles.

 

Second page provided practical tools—checklists, triggers for escalation, collaboration language guides, project management essentials, and research rights guidance.

Design and Development Process

The visual and structural design evolved through multiple iterations across Adobe XD, Illustrator, Photoshop, and Figma:

I used Adobe XD Used to build the initial layout structure, test different page compositions, and establish visual hierarchy.

I created clean, scalable icons and vector elements to represent each component of the COLLAB framework with Adobe Illustrator.

 

I enhanced visual clarity, refined spacing, and polished export-ready assets for portfolio and client use with Adobe Photoshop

 

For collaborative review, component management, and rapid iteration, I used Figma. I gathered feedback, tested accessibility, and refined spacing and typography.

 

Using these tools allowed me to rapidly prototype several versions of the job aid. I continuously refined the design language—color palette, typography, iconography, and spacing—based on peer feedback and usability considerations.

Why the Format Was Chosen

A two-page starter kit was the ideal format because:

  • Teams needed a fast, practical reference, not a long training module.
  • It had to be printable, shareable, and easy to display in project workspaces.
  • The content needed to support real-time collaboration during meetings.
  • It reduces cognitive load by organizing information into structured, predictable segments.
  • It aligns with the way scientific teams prefer to engage—with concise tools, not lengthy coursework.

This format balanced strategic clarity, operational practicality, and visual brevity.

Impact and Outcomes

Following deployment in the partnership environment:

  • Cross-functional teams reported improved clarity in roles and decisions.
  • Communication friction decreased due to aligned definitions and expectations.
  • Teams adopted consistent collaboration language, reducing misunderstandings.
  • Project managers used the checklists to streamline meetings and documentation.
  • The COLLAB framework became a baseline tool for onboarding new team members into cross-company collaborations.

The framework strengthened trust, sped up workflows, and helped teams move more confidently through scientific and operational milestones.

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