Spotify Sessions give rising hitmakers a first taste of professional collaboration, helping songwriters connect with artists, producers and engineers further along in their careers. For Aaron Buckingham, a lead on Spotify’s songwriter and publishing relations team, Ines Dunn stands out.

Though it didn’t originally, podcasting now has the opportunity to be a two-way, interactive form of artistry and communication. As Spotify has become the number one audio listening platform in the world, we’ve been innovating on engagement tools like Q&A and Polls to help fans and creators interact.

The crossover collaboration is one of music’s great traditions, allowing artists from different genres, regions, or career stages to bring their talents together on a track to the delight of fans. How successful are those partnerships? We dove into the data to discover the full impact of the crossover effect.

The benefits of Hack Week—providing opportunities to collaborate outside of one’s everyday team, giving employees flexibility to improve upon the product, and offering ways to stretch beyond comfort zones—are endless. Here are five thoughtful tips to teams and companies looking to host their own hack weeks.

Music should be shared. That’s why Spotify created Blend, shared playlists that combine the different tastes of friends and family, as well as fans and artists, into one. Through Blend, fans have a magical way to connect with friends, loved ones—and even total strangers—in a shared moment of enjoyment.