Cohort-Based Online Communities: Exploitation or Real Connection?
Release Date: 11/01/2021
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When private equity buys online community platforms, who wins? What about if those platforms were built on open source software? Does the company continue to be a good citizen of the open source community that helped build the product? History has shown us that it is often the community managers and pros who lose. They might not just lose a good platform though, they might lose their job. has an interesting perspective on this topic. He joined Vanilla Forums, an open source community software platform, as a senior developer in 2011, having already used it for a couple of years. He left...
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Safeguarding a Diabetes Charity Community and Knowing if You’ve Done the Right Thing
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Safeguarding is a term used in Ireland and the United Kingdom that covers efforts to protect the health, wellbeing, and human rights of people, especially children and those who are otherwise vulnerable. At , four people alternate by week as the safeguarding lead, helping to protect those that the charity comes in contact with. One of them is Josh Poncil, the online community and learning manager. Among his responsibilities is . On this episode, we talk about safeguarding and knowing if you’ve done the right thing at the end of the day, plus: What is considered “too technical”...
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Employee resource groups (ERGs) can do a lot to create a greater sense of belonging at your organization. But the folks who volunteer to lead these groups may find themselves in need of help when it comes to utilizing perhaps the greatest tool at their disposal: Your internal employee community platform. As a community strategist within large organizations, has trained employees to help them get the most out of these platforms. She has also managed two large migrations, both from Jive, and that has led her to have a (in her words) cynical perspective on the resources made available...
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The Chief Community Officer Hype Machine
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Why Community on the Product Team Works, From a Product Leader’s Perspective
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Recently, community pro Danielle Maveal joined Community Signal to discuss . In this episode, we’re getting the opposite perspective from product leader . Gitesh and Patrick worked together at CNN, where community reported into product. And while the product and community that they were building were short lived, they both speak highly of their time working together. Gitesh describes creating a team atmosphere where each individual’s expertise was respected and given room to ladder into organizational goals, giving each person the opportunity to see the impact of their work....
info_outlineIf you threw a random group of people together, united primarily by a shared educational goal that they can accomplish with or without the group, and had two weeks to build a sense of community among them, what would you do?
That’s what Alex Witkowski spends time thinking about. He’s the community lead for Section4, which offers business courses they call sprints. These sprints are typically around two weeks long and then the experience is over – if you want it to be. If you don’t want it to be, you can continue to benefit from and collaborate with the students that took the same course.
Alex oversees a team of four community managers that guides this growing number or cohorts and hopes to bring then together through an upcoming alumni membership program. He also believes that cohort-based communities often exploit community rather than build it. We chat about that, plus:
- Alex’s transition from English teacher to community pro and the condescension he felt when making the move
- How he determines when a community manager simply has too many cohorts
- Why Slack may not be the right tool for their alumni product
Our Podcast is Made Possible By…
If you enjoy our show, please know that it’s only possible with the generous support of our sponsor: Vanilla, a one-stop shop for online community.
Big Quotes
Checking your assumptions when interviewing job candidates (05:02): “I’m doing a lot of interviewing, I’m doing a lot of hiring, and I’m trying to be hyper cognizant of everything in an interview process [that] is an assumption. … I’ve been trying to be really aware of making assumptions and holding people back from opportunities, just because I’m assuming they won’t be able to make [a specific] change.” –@HeyLifeboat
The Section4 community helps students apply course knowledge in the real world (10:55): “I’m really hoping to build the continuing community around this idea of application. We all have this shared language, we all have these concepts, and I often think about it as the marriage of: We can offer the book smarts, the community is where the street smarts comes in. … We can’t give you every answer for what this looks like in a B2B SaaS context in our two-week course, but we can connect you to people who can engage in discussion with how they’re thinking about applying it to a B2B SaaS context.” –@HeyLifeboat
Section4’s community managers focus on bringing humanness to the community (17:11): “I’ve taken other online courses before, [and] I couldn’t name one person at the company. I’ve never interacted with anyone. I didn’t feel a connection to them. I felt the connection to the course, but [at Section4], I feel like there’s a connection to our ethos, which has been really exciting.” –@HeyLifeboat
Section4’s community managers focus on bringing humanness to the community (31:14): “Oftentimes the self-promoters are some of the loudest, nastiest people that you have in professional groups. They are the ones who respond most offensively when challenged on it. They will attack the community manager, or they will say, ‘Of course, I’m not doing that. This is relevant! You’re going to kill the community! The community’s never been the same since Patrick took over!’ This is all stuff that you have to hear and deal with. Those are some of the worst folks in professional circles, but yet, if you let them do it because it’s easier in the moment to not take their abuse, it is its own insidious thing that infects the space.” –@patrickokeefe
What does community-based learning actually mean? (54:57): “As someone who taught for six years, there’s an art to education, and throwing out a bunch of articles or a handful of videos and then dumping people in the space together and hoping that something happens, that’s not education. I think that’s where the word ‘community,’ to me, feels exploitative. Just because there are other people here doesn't mean it's a community.” –@HeyLifeboat
About Alex Witkowski
Alex Witkowski is a former high school English teacher who left the profession when he found out that he could take the best part of his job – nurturing community – and do it full time. Since leaving teaching, he has worked in the non-profit and educational technology space, helping a variety of communities including global volunteers, college students, college professors, and business professionals make valuable connections and memories. He is currently the community lead at Section4, which aims to make MBA-quality education more affordable and accessible through interactive, community-based courses led by the world’s top business professors. In his spare time, he watches countless independent movies, makes themed mixtapes, and walks everywhere.
Related Links
- Sponsor: Vanilla, a one-stop-shop for online community
- Alex on Twitter
- Section4, the business education provider where Alex is community lead
- Prof. Scott Galloway, the founder of Section4
- Patrick’s new job: Community lead at CNN+
- Bassey Etim‘s previous appearances on Community Signal: #4, #123, #145, and #160
Transcript
Your Thoughts
If you have any thoughts on this episode that you’d like to share, please leave me a comment, send me an email or a tweet. If you enjoy the show, we would be so grateful if you spread the word and supported Community Signal on Patreon.