CoP a Starters Guide

Are you trying to organize, design, or support a community of practice?

I have years of experience supporting Communities of Practice. I know firsthand how complicated it can get. This little visual guide was created to give you a bit of a jumpstart.

COP a Starters Guide. So you're trying to build a Community of Practice? Great! This guide is for you! I built this to make the process a little bit less overwhelming.

But first things first, just what is a community of practice?
My favorite definition comes from Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Traynor.
"Communities of practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly."

They go on to identify 3 crucial characteristics.
1. The Domain
The shared interest, passion, or thing that they do.
2. The Community
The group of people that interact and learn together.
3. The Practice
The community members are practitioners in the domain.

Now CoPs can be informal or formal. Sometimes they are well funded initiatives and other times a labor of love from participants with a shared purpose. But regardless of their structure, a CoP's success depends heavily on the organizers.

So, here are a few questions for you.
What is the domain? The shared purpose.
Who is in the community? Can you name real people?
How do you define practitioner? What does practicing look like?

So how are you imagining the structure of your CoP?
Clearly, we will meet for lunch once a month.
Webinars, all webinars.
Twitter hashtags and a LinkedIn group.
If you are on a team don't assume you are all on the same page.

Here are a few ways you can build your community. There are so many ways to get started.
If you're local, meet in person.
Have a series of digital discussions using web meeting tools.
plan a series of expert webinars and Q&As.
Organize a LinkedIn or Slack Group.
Develop a community WordPress blog.
Launch a community forum.

And there are so many more!
So which is best? That depends.
Here is one way to think about it.
Many members/low engagement. Webinar series, community blog, social media group.
Few members/low engagement. Video roundtables, piggy back off bigger events, hashtags.
Many members/high engagement.
Community forums, digital conferences, learning academies.
High Engagement/Few members.
Digital lunch & learns, regular digital meetings, email listservs, digital mini-conferences.

But we have lots of audiences not just one.
You are definitely not alone there. But my guess is that there is likely a core group of practitioners That doesn't mean you can't deliver value to others but they shouldn't be your focus.
Start with your primary audience, then work your way to secondary audiences, and then finally other interested people.

And one other thing to think about. It may be cool to have a super fancy digital app or software program. But is that really feasible?
You have the expertise.
You have the time.
You have the money.

Then once you have an idea of what you plan to do, develop a timeline strategy and set some targets (engagement level, members joined, etc.) This can help you evaluate your CoP's direction.

And if you want a really useful way to evaluate your efforts. I suggest using a rubric. Just describe how you are hoping your CoP will work and the evidence that would support your vision. Then rate progress against the vision using a rich mix of quantitative and qualitative data.

CoP design can be a huge rabbit hole. Keep it as simple as possible, then build upon that. And if you need help, I can help.
Good luck!