How to run a Community of Practices (COP)

Patterns and anti-pattern on COPs

Community of Practices

What is it ?

A group of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.

Its purpose

• Connect people / break silos

• Consolidate the collective knowledge

• Improve quality

• Spread knowledge

• Standardize practices in the organization

• Share practices

• Build new skills / learn together

• Build a learning organization

• Solve problems by using the collective intelligence

Who ?

• 1 leader / facilitator

  • Keep it alive

  • Organize the events

  • Motivate people

• 1 core of people / Volunteers

  • To participate and contribute

In fact in Community of Practice you can observe 3 types of participants :

src : https://www.lemonade.com/blog/psychology-givers-takers-matchers-2/

• Takers : self-focused and put their own interests ahead of others’ needs. They try to gain as much as possible from their interactions while contributing as little as they can in return.

• Matchers : like to preserve an equal balance of giving and taking.

  • Their mindset is: “If you take from me, I’ll take from you. If you give to me, I’ll give to you.”

• Givers : are others-focused, and tend to provide support to others with no strings attached.

  • They ask themselves, “How can I add value for this person? What can I contribute?”

Communication is key

• Create the buzz around you community

  • Make it viral

• Choose the right channels

• Be consistent in your communications

  • Brand it internally

Examples of Events of a COP

• Organize Brown Bag sessions

  • 1 speaker on a dedicated topic

  • Spread/Share knowledge

• Lightning taks

  • Everyone can share a few minutes on 1 topic

• Lean coffees

  • Solve problems by using Collective Intelligence

• Xtrems format : learn collaboratively

How

There are some key steps when introducing a COP. This kind of initiative can be associate to a change process :

• Define the goals of the community

  • Do it collaboratively with those who see the needs to create one

• Sell the idea internally

  • Find sponsors

• Initiate a backlog

• Kick-off the community

• Run your first events

• Introduce Continuous Improvement process

  • Gather feedback regularly

  • Organize retrospective

  • Check regularly if you meet the goals you defined

Xtrem Reading

XTREM WATCH — Découvrez la puissance de la veille collective

How to bootstrap yours ?

Here is the facilitation format I use to help organizations bootstrap their own COP.

During a 2 hours workshop you can invite motivated people on the topic you want to create a COP about (examples : software development, UX, Agile, Analysts, Project Managers, ...).

The goal of the workshop : Co-construct a first version of a community vision.

I use a divergent / convergent format with individual / collective reflection times.

1) Vision / Importance

You need to be sure that everyone agrees and is aligned on the Vision and why the community is important at this stage.

2) How / Measures

3) Impact (on what / who)

4) Resources

5) Force Field Analysis (Optional)

Anticipate what could support the Community Vision and what could slow it down.

6) Choose a name

Naming is always important so choose it all together as well.

At this moment you can also elect a leader for the Community.

COP Canva

You can then format the outcome of the workshop into a Canva that you can display everywhere like the one below :

Craft cop vision

Success criteria

From my experience here are some key success criteria for your COPs :

• Co-construction is key

  • Involve people from the beginning (Vision)

  • Collaboratively refine your backlog

• Have 1 and only 1 leader

  • I have already seen COPs with several leaders

    • On the paper I like the idea : no Single Point Of Failure, load is split

  • But I have never seen it worked so I prefer to recommend to have only 1 leader

• A leader with dedicated time on it

  • Lead / facilitate a COP takes time

  • It must not be a Nice To Have activity

  • Must be part of the person's job

• Leader needs to be coached at the beginning

  • Often on the skills

  • How to federate and involve people

• Transparency everywhere on everything

  • Every events should be public

  • Measures of the progress as well

  • Keep a log of everything

  • Publish event minutes and contents on a dedicated platform (Slack, Wiki, ...)

• Have a strong sponsorship

  • From the management

  • Gather resources

  • Not a nice to have activity for people

  • Need to be convinced that it's a way to evolve as an organization

• Use different event(s) format(s)

  • Vary the pleasures

• Autonomy

  • Autonomy means clear responsibility as well

  • Have a clear boundary on what can be done within the COP / clear vision

    • Examples : create standards for programming in the organization

• Involve people

  • Create a safe place for people (without judgement)

  • The key to involve them

  • No need to be an expert to share. It's by sharing that you will become an expert.

• Reflect regularly on the community

  • Do it with a survey (self assessment) based on the outcomes expected from the Vision

  • Organize retrospectives

  • You can use the self assessment questions below (I recommend to adapt them regarding your own COP vision)

Community Health check

1MB

cop-health-check.pdf

pdf

Download the cards

Infographic

Resources

• Building Successful Communities of Practice by Emily Webber
• Fais survivre ta communauté dans un monde hostile
• Self evaluation tools by Jimmy Janlen
• Lean Change Management - Jason Little
• Community Canvas