Drumbeat/p2pu/Assessment and Accreditation/Webcraft Assessments - detailed/Community builder

Background

One hallmark of open projects is the distributed, collaborative nature of most work. In addition, the participants can bring diverse backgrounds and expertise to any project, which also means that not everyone has the entire suite of skills and knowledge that might be needed to be most effective. In these situations, one or a few people often assume a role as a community builder - attentive to and engaged with the members of the community in such a way that they facilitate successful outcomes for everyone.

This skill is multidimensional, and excellent community-building behavior in one context runs the possibility of simply being disruptive or even disrespectful in a different context. The skill is a mix of communication, work habit, and leadership skills. There is always a danger that a good community builder will act in that capacity to the detriment of her own work, so excellence in this skill demands balancing personal goals with facilitating the goals of other people.

Some comments

From Jane Park - This is a tricky skill to assess holistically. Though the info on the wiki page makes sense, I feel like it's describing one type of community participant (maybe an ideal). However a community, or any working group, is diverse in its participants, with different roles to fill. ie. One community member may be especially active in providing moral support while another is more active in providing concrete feedback. I am not sure whether every single community participant must have the essential "balance" of all of these skills, especially when people contribute in different ways to a community due to time and other constraints.

From Ahrash Bissell - Yes, excellent points. But actually, this is what makes this an interesting skill for our purposes. One way to think of it is like this: someone can be good at "track and field," but actually only excel at the sprints, or the long jump, or what have you. Regardless, such a person would be welcomed as an expert to any track and field event, and we would expect the person to participate in a manner suited to their specific talents.

To turn that idea to the "community builder" skill, we have a few options. One option is to determine, as best we can, a "community builder" skill set which is most widely recognized as such in the web developer community, assuming that our focus in this domain allows us to eliminate some of the other types of community builders that might be active in other areas. I suspect, as you suggest, that even with the web-developer focus, we will still find that there are many ways someone can emerge as a "community builder." Another option is to recognize people as "community builders" when they have achieved some level of expertise for a subset of the possible component parts. In other words, you need not have the essential balance of all these skills to qualify as a community builder. We would want to define, again as best we can, which combinations and subsets of skills are sufficiently meaningful to qualify. Or perhaps the skill is more like a salad bar - the more component parts you master, the greater your recognized skill as a community builder, regardless of the actual component parts involved.

This may also be a case where we are better off relying on some single, semi-amorphous, summative qualification, such as the general opinion of your peers regarding your community-building skills. For example, at the end of a course, we could simply ask everyone to evaluate each other on one or more skills, such as whether that person was a "good community builder." In this case, we would want to provide pathways to developing and demonstrating that skill for people who are interested in it, but we would have to acknowledge that it is possible that people will not recognize them for their community-building contributions even if they follow our recommended practices. The nice thing about this approach in P2PU is that it is subject to research and empirical review. We can recommend certain types of behaviors (or subsets therein) for aspiring community builders and then we can see if those actions lead people to recognize the contributions as "building community." Through trial and error, we might be able to formalize some of the pathways to "community building" with greater confidence that people will really value those skills in the manner intended.

Community builder skill

Breaking down this skill into component parts, we get:

• Your attentiveness to other members of the community.
  • Receptive to questions and comments.
  • Able to receive messages and respond to them in a timely manner.
  • Identified as a "go-to person" in the community.
  • Appropriateness of responses.
• You are useful, in the sense of being able to provide accurate advice and comments.
  • At times, may require a certain degree of decisiveness.
  • At times, may require referral or delegation to the correct person, such that people are confident that the correct referral has been made.
• You are deferential and accommodating
  • The goal is to build other people's capacities, not just show off.
  • You don't have to be expert in everything, and recognizing when others may be better positioned to help is itself a hallmark of community facilitation.
  • Balance between making a decision and consensus building, as a measure of leadership.
  • Strike appropriate tone.
  • Members of the community value your presence, and they feel that their own presence is valued.
• Community-based projects tend to run more smoothly and achieve desired outcomes more efficiently by virtue of your presence.

Each component part of community builder considered in turn

Your attentiveness to other members of the community

• Receptive to questions and comments.
• Able to receive messages and respond to them in a timely manner.
• Identified as a "go-to person" in the community.
• Appropriateness of responses.

This aspect of community building reflects the ability of a person to make it known that this is a role they want, and perhaps is an area of proficiency. Probably the best single metric we could use here is simply the perceptions of the other members of the community; for example, if asked to identify someone who was particularly adept at community engagement and facilitation, who is it?

There may be some automated mechanisms for tracking the sub-metrics, such as timeliness of the responses.

You are useful, in the sense of being able to provide accurate advice and comments

• At times, may require a certain degree of decisiveness.
• At times, may require referral or delegation to the correct person, such that people are confident that the correct referral has been made.

The good community builder knows how to encourage discussion and debate, and knows how to draw consensus and closure. She also is able to "call the question," and decide when it is appropriate to move from discussion to action, and is able to convince others to follow that lead.

You are deferential and accommodating

• The goal is to build other people's capacities, not just show off.
• You don't have to be expert in everything, and recognizing when others may be better positioned to help is itself a hallmark of community facilitation.
• Balance between making a decision and consensus building, as a measure of leadership.
• Strike appropriate tone.
• Members of the community value your presence, and they feel that their own presence is valued.

Nothing here yet.

Community-based projects tend to run more smoothly and achieve desired outcomes more efficiently by virtue of your presence

Nothing here yet.