Hadar BismutOne of my favorite webinars I've given was about building professional communities and guilds, and everything you need to know to choose the right shape for your professional community or guild.
- ColdGuild or professional community?
- CoolWho is the community for?
- Warming upWhat's critical in leading a professional community?
- HotHow sharp are the changes in our community?
- Let's make it routine!How do you create meetings that work for a range of employees?
We went through five key questions that bring order to the decision. They might help you too:
- Guild or professional community? The main difference is the level of commitment from the organization and its employees. A lot of organizations love the idea of a guild, but in practice a successful guild takes careful infrastructure preparation and buy-in from many employees and stakeholders, and it isn't the right fit for every organization.
- Who is it for? Investing in every role isn't always the right use of resources. Choose specific roles where strengthening them will make a significant impact on both the business and the organization's challenges.
- What's critical in professional leadership? Professional communities and guilds have an X factor other communities don't: a subject-matter expert in the technical field who knows how to lead and raise the professional bar.
- Does the impact have teeth? Professional communities and guilds need to create added value to earn the time, energy, budget, and support of every relevant layer of the organization. Make sure your focus and energy go where they're truly needed and where they move the business.
- What do you do with different knowledge levels? Guilds and professional communities are made up of a diverse mix of people (seniority, knowledge levels, types of roles). You need to define the kind of engagement you want to create and sustain for each group, through ongoing communication that hits the mark and content that meets everyone's needs (or at least most people's), without watering the content down toward any one level.
Every professional community or guild will look completely different, and these five questions will help you figure out what fits your organization best. And of course, I'm here to help :)