The qualities that make Communities of Practice work – openness, honesty, lack of judgement and confidentiality “You need to really understand who’s part of your network, what they’re interested in and how your network can be useful for them to achieve their goals.” ”If you want to run a successful network you have to create relationships where people are getting equal amount of value for their time and effort,” says Will Nicholson, a network coordinator for the Lambeth Portuguese Wellbeing Partnership. They need to be peers and possess the qualities that make Communities of Practice work – openness, honesty, lack of judgement and confidentiality. Community of Practice members have to be active practitioners so they can contribute current, lived experiences that are relevant and valuable to others. There do need to be some rules about who’s in and who’s out. Read on for our essential community of practice best practices. Don’t try to do everything at once – think about what is the simplest thing you can do that will get you a long way towards your goal and that you will learn the most from.”īut there are things you can do that will increase the effectiveness of the Community of Practice and its impact on the movement at large. “Sometimes that means letting things go slower than you would have preferred.

“You can’t move faster than you can build trust and ownership, without making the network reliant on you. “Start small and be patient,” says Jamie Pett from the London International Development Network. So if you’re thinking of starting one, remember that laying down the law around the subject matter or prescribing outcomes each time the members meet will kill it dead.ĭon’t try to do everything at once – think about what is the simplest thing you can do that will get you a long way towards your goal Community of Practices that are created by organisations and institutions still have to be organic and driven by the interests and needs of their members to work. They work because members decide what’s important, and get and take what they need from it. The E-Campaigners Forum or Losing Control are excellent examples of Communities of Practice. How do I create a community of practice?Ĭhances are, you may already be in a Community of Practice without knowing it. And the experience of being in the Community of Practice strengthens the sense of shared purpose and values between key movement members. New knowledge gets created, which the members take back out again into their domain. Why do they work?Ĭommunities of Practice work well in large scale dispersed social movements because they bring influential practitioners with diverse experiences together around a common purpose. They can emerge naturally or be deliberately created by an organisation or institution to pool and acquire knowledge. So what are Communities of Practice, why do they work and how do you create one and govern it well? Check out our handy how-to guide below, featuring tips and best practices from a number of community and network managers What is a community of practice?Ī community of practice is where a groups of active practitioners in a specific field come together to share ideas, experiences and best practice and support each other.

They galvanise and energise leaders in their practice areas, helping accelerate social change. These spaces form what is often known as a peer network or Community of Practice. When you’re building social movements, it helps to provide safe spaces for discussion: spaces which allow people from different disciplines and practice areas to come together and share information.

Setting up practice network kit