Have you done your annual community check-up? Now is the right time.
Fueled by all those new year’s resolutions, now is the time of year when there is undoubtedly a surge of new members and participants joining (or recommitting to) your programs. And with all the excitement, there is a lot of work to do: you need to engage new people with encouragement and energy, while also making sure your “regulars” are valued as well (and not making eye rolls at all the new faces). In addition to that, you are probably thinking about all those new strategies you want to deploy this year, as well as the new budget you want to spend.
It’s a lot to think about.
But as you plan what your organization is going to “do” in 2020, have you looked at one of your most important resources? The biggest engine for your growth this year?
Have you checked-in on the health of the communities of individuals that comprise the past, present, and future of your success?
If not, maybe it’s time that you do.
Let’s be honest. Check-ups aren’t always pleasant affairs. They rarely leave you with a clean bill of health, and sometimes the feedback is a bit disheartening. But that’s actually why you do them. They provide baseline insight into what is going right and what could be better. Check-ups allow you to pause, assess, and then adapt.
Generally, organizations do check-ups in a few standard areas: there is the budget review and the operational checklist, as well as annual performance reviews for staff. This is all important work, and it helps you execute efficiently and effectively.
But whatever your vision and mission is, you also depend on the networks and communities of followers that help serve as the engine of your success. We sometimes refer to these communities as customers and clients, or even as fans and followers. For some of us these communities are made up of alumni, allies, and advocates. Regardless of their categorization, they often are the lifeblood of our success. In fact, most of you probably have multiple communities and networks that have fueled your growth and provided you a comparative edge to achieve your organizational objectives.
So given their importance, why do too many of us not regularly check-up on the health of the communities we’ve worked so hard to grow? Too many metrics, and not enough true insights
to justify the effort? Because it might make us answer tough questions about the why and how of our community-building efforts?
Possibly. But in actuality, there are three basic qualities (the same qualities of an applied optimist) that can be assessed to determine the health of an organization’s communities:
Purpose, Knowledge, and Wonder.
What exactly are these qualities and how do they show up in your organization’s communities? Here is the quick overview of some questions you should be asking yourself.
Purpose. This is the foundational question of any community check-up: do you have a clear purpose and rationale for investing in the development of your community? For some of us, this is obvious: more customers, visitors, fans, and listeners. But for some organizations, this question is a bit more complicated. WHY do you want to build a community? And even more so, why do individuals want to be a part of YOUR community? Is your purpose for creating a community aligned with the members’ purpose in being part of it? Getting a baseline understanding of your communities’ “whys” will not only help you make clearer decisions about how you support and grow them, but it can also serve as a reality check for the real basis of the connection you have with your community members.
Knowledge. Just as much as understanding the purpose of each of the various communities your organization maintains (for example, the employee community has a different purpose than the alumni community), its critical to assess how you deliver and animate knowledge to and among your community members. Sure, this could also be called “communications,” but it’s more than that; fostering a shared sense of knowledge in communities is critical for sustained development and growth. How do the values and the norms of your community develop? How are information and resources shared among your community members, and how is your organization fostering this sharing? If knowledge is truly power, then wouldn’t a deeper knowledge assessment help you better understand the true power of your community?
Wonder. This is the quality that might be the hardest to ascertain, but the most important to try to identify. Beyond the “why” and the “how” of your communities, what is the “wow” factor that glues people together? Sure, most communities have some element of functionality, or shared activities and insights among the community members that unites them and serves their purposes. But beyond that is wonder – the sense of connection and common purpose that are more often felt than seen. You might be using the usual “net promoter index” to assess how individuals view the experiences created for the community. But are you measuring how your communities comes together to thrive as a whole… to remain sticky and resilient? If purpose and knowledge are two halves of a community’s foundation, wonder is the quality that glues them together.
Regardless of how you drive your organization forward this year, it is likely that you are going to manage multiple communities to help you achieve your 2020 goals. So before you make a lot of plans and build a lot of programs (andspend all that budgeted money), it probably makes sense to take a step back and give yourself a community check-up focused on your clarity of purpose, the cultivation of knowledge, and the experience of wonder.
You might not be happy with all the results, but by using a check-up to know where your communities stand, you can be more optimistic about where they go (and grow) in the year ahead.
Think it’s time for your organization’s community check-up? Interested in exploring ways you can harness the power of community to better achieve your mission and objectives? Contact us at explore@appliedoptimism.comfor an initial complimentary 30-minute exploration of how you can optimistically bring purpose, knowledge, and wonder to your organization’s communities and customers.