A private, asynchronous book club for community professionals
Online book clubs are hard to join – they’re almost always at an inconvenient time to attend, and who has the time for Yet Another Video CallTM on top of all their other meetings?
The Community Reading Guild aims to remedy the common issues with online book clubs by implementing three core features:
- It is fully asynchronous – there is no live chat, video or voice calls, and no need to be online at any particular time.
- It is designed for long-form discussion – the platform is designed to facilitate discussions that give time to think about responses before posting, removing the pressure to respond immediately.
- It is 100% private – only guild members can access the platform, ensuring that any shared thoughts and discussions remain private.
The books read in the guild will be relevant to people working as community builders in some way.
Guild members collectively vote on books to read, and discussions happen in a private forum at a pace suitable for all members. If you’re a community professional wanting to connect with others through reading books together but would rather not join another video call, this group is for you.
What are we reading?
The Community Reading Guild is currently reading Building Brand Communities by Carrie Melissa Jones and Charles H. Vogl.
Why do people join the Community Reading Guild?
I’ve been wanting something like this for so long!
I’ve joined virtual book clubs in the past, but as you say, it’s just hard to schedule everything in at the given time. I’m a big fan of async everything.
I like learning from others, I love reading, I love meeting other community builders.
I like books and read a ton! I love discussing them with people. My brain hurts on video and my schedule changes a lot right now so a consistent hour is hard.
I’m fairly new to the community space and am the only community manager at my organisation. I have a lot to learn from others in the community space and a lot to give by ways of sharing about an internal community of practice.
I love reading and exchange about books, but I also get extreme Zoom fatigue. Most (if not all) of the groups I got introduced to in the past were via video calls, and this format seems perfect to me.