Collaboration or Cooperation?

Collaboration: working together towards an output. For example: collaborating on a presentation, book, song, etc.

Cooperation: working together towards an outcome. For example: "customer centricity", volunteer fire departments protecting communities, different departments sharing resources but working separately

Which one do you need, and when?

From an org chart point of view, cooperation sits at a different level than collaboration. Collaboration is more an individual or team activity, while cooperation is at department/division/group level.

From a business point of view: what is the desired result? Output or outcomes? To understand the difference between output and outcomes consider their relation (source, mention) between themselves and impact:

Finally, here is how do they differ in terms of authority, resources, time, risk.

Authority:

Collaboration: Often has shared leadership

Cooperation: Usually maintains separate authority structures

Resources:

Collaboration: Typically pools resources

Cooperation: Usually keeps resources separate but coordinated

Time Investment:

Collaboration: Generally requires more time for coordination

Cooperation: Usually requires less direct interaction time

Risk:

Collaboration: Higher interdependence means shared risks

Cooperation: Lower interdependence means more individual risk management