Reactions vs Responses
Reaction or response – how can you encourage better community interactions?
The Only Problem-Solving Technique You’ll Ever Need
This technique will help you solve almost any problem you have – in work or in life. This was originally presented as a technique for debugging code, but I’ve found it to be exceptionally effective in all areas.
What Makes a Good Community Leader?
This post is based on two Bible passages that list valuable leadership qualities. I believe these principles apply to all communities, whether religious or secular. So even if the Biblical references aren’t your thing, please read on – there’s a lot to learn here!
Creating Equitable Hybrid Communities
We’re heading deeper into a hybrid future – usually envisioned as in-person events with an online component included. While this is certainly a great way to allow for events to accommodate people who cannot attend in person, what if we could do more? What if we could build an entire community that brings people together in multi-faceted and impactful ways, regardless of where they are in the world?
The Three S’s of Creating Community Connections
I believe there are three things you can provide that will pave the way to natural, organic, and authentic connections between members of any community. So let me introduce you to the three s’s of curating community connections.
Pilot Holes and Countersinks
Who are the pilot holes and countersinks in your community? Find them, nurture them, and empower them to do more.
What Roger Wilco Taught Me About Problem Solving
Roger Wilco – space janitor extraordinaire and the everyman hero of the Space Quest adventure game series – has a lot to teach us about problem solving.
Owning your Community Platform with WordPress
In order to have full control over how your community interacts and to retain ownership over all the content your community produces, you need to host your community platform yourself, or at least the critical parts of it, in way that you grants you access to your members, content, and data.
The Infinite Monkey Exercise: A Project Planning Framework
The Infinite Monkey Exercise is a way to plan your projects using an iterative, scalable approach to blue-sky thinking based on the infinite monkey theorem.
Building Community in a Post-COVID World
Communities have evolved a whole lot in 2020. The global COVID pandemic has changed the face of the world and the community industry has become more relevant than ever. But what’s going to happen once the pandemic subsides? What will communities look like & how will groups come together?
A Membership Identity for the WordPress Community
I recently presented a workshop on defining a membership identity for your community. I found this to be a valuable exercise and thought I would apply the same principles to the WordPress community since that is the community with which I am most familiar.
Workshop Resources: Defining a Community Membership Identity
Yesterday I presented a workshop as part of the first CMX Global Connect event about defining a membership identity for your community. As promised during my session, here’s a link to the worksheet that we worked through together, as well as the slide deck.
The Art of Impactful Writing
While writing is something we learn at a young age, it continues to be a skill that we all develop throughout our lives. With so much of our work taking place online these daysknowing how to communicate effectively in writing when managing a community is essential.
Empathy and the Feelings Box
You could say empathy is a skill that everyone should develop regardless of their daily work, but the way you employ your empathy is definitely a skill that people working with communities need to work on in order to be successful.
When Good People Go Bad: Mediating Community Conflict
We all know how great in-person communities can be, but what happens when things don’t go so well? What happens when people in your community cause conflict and make things difficult for everyone else? Here is a practical path towards successfully mediating conflict within community.
Too Much, Too Young
When organising events for a community, it’s so easy to fall into the trap of thinking that bigger is better. This is an especially dangerous trap when your community is still in the early stages – shooting for a large event before your community is ready for it will inevitably do more harm than good.