handcrafting community [webdev42 2013-07]

@cczona

HandcraftingCommunity

W e b D e v 4 2 ° , H o b a r t , A u s t r a l i aJuly 2013

Carina C. Zona

@cczona

"Handcrafting"Community...?

@cczona

Research.

• Presentation

• Conversation

• Exchange

• Brainstorm

• Crank up momentum

TONIGHT IS...WHAT, EXACTLY?

@cczona

HANDCRAFTING COMMUNITY

Craft career

and profession

and industry

by crafting colleagues

and future competitors

(collaborators)

(referrals)

with sense of shared purpose

and of belonging

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Community can be counted on

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Communityis self-sustaining

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GUILD SYSTEM

Apprentice

Journeyman

Master

See

Do

Teach

Entrant

Contributor

Leader

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• Satisfying

• Growing

• Opportunity

• Mentorship

• Modeling

HANDCRAFTING US

Create a career arc that gives you something to give back.

@cczona

The power ofgetting people into a room

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Build &share

network

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Make an introduction

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Words of wisdom:

@cczona

"If you feel a certain way, you're not the only one."

"You think you're throwing a birthday party, where only your friends are going to actually come. You don't expect anyone to show up."

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"Put your enthusiasm on display"

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"Do expect people to be generous

in their support"

Mentors gave lots of advance time, mentorship. Then gave access to their networks.

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"Showing that you have your shit together —that this clearly will be happening again — makes people comfortable with leaping in."

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"Tell everyone you know. Make it easy for them to tell everyone they know."

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And make personal invites

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"If you already know everyonein the room, it's a clique.

Not a community"

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"Open source the community"

RailsBridgeRailsGirlsPython Software Foundation

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 "'That's great. Help do that with someone else.'"

Decide what's the essential of the vision. It's okay to say no to offers & requests that are too far afield from that.

@cczona

Create leadership mastery.

@cczona

Self-replicate

as leadersas communities

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Make way for others

one person carrying too much weight will burn out; thing fizzles w/o them.fostering peers/replacements before you need them assures that people can take care of their needs & keep contributingleaders have more stake in success & more enthusiasm for pursuing it; delegating meaningful roles -> investment in deepening commitments

@cczona

Successful community?Seed more like it.

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"Yes, And..."

meet a request for help with a better offer, if you can

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Lend access to brand, network, &

infrastructure

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Cross-pollinate

- if you don't have enough people to sustain niche community (yet), connect with communities of similar vision even if not similar implementation. piggyback. bootstrap.- do it also out of humility (like lightning talks, it's opportunity to have interesting surprises)

@cczona

Riff on what'salready working

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Learn from the greats of

community building

Religious organizations have finely-honed success models. Look locally. Who's rocking that one?

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META-COMMUNITY

•Python Software Foundation

•Fiscal sponsors

•Make it easy to piggyback on you've built

@cczona

COMPANIES, CONTRIBUTE

• Sponsorships

• Donations

• Matching

• Venues

• Co-working

• Publicity

• Scholarships

• +1 to Employees' time

• Swag (*cough*)

@cczona

THANKS!Carina C. Zona

@cczona

cczona@gmail.com

http://cczona.com