Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Need to use a SharePoint intranet due to internal policies, company transitions, or legacy systems? When all the available information is overly technical or negative, where do you turn? Enter Fresh Perspectives: Living in the reality of SharePoint intranets. We provide useful, jargon-free insights and real-world examples to help you maximize the benefits of SharePoint intranets and tackle its challenges. Pro-SharePoint but realistic, we debunk misconceptions and share product management insights from Fresh Intranet.
David [0:00:14]: Welcome to another episode of Fresh Perspectives.
David [0:00:16]: My name is David Bowman.
David [0:00:18]: I am the product director for Fresh Intranet.
David [0:00:22]: Special episode today, which is why I am not joined by Jarbas Horst.
David [0:00:26]: That isn't the reason that is a special episode.
David [0:00:28]: A while back friend of the show, Juliet Stott, who's is the founder of Bright Star content marketing, interviewed Community Hero, Laurie Pottmeyer who ran the Microsoft most value professional Mvp community.
David [0:00:40]: Juliet, interviewed Laurie for a written piece of content, and I thought that Lori views, practical advice guidance would really benefit our listeners our customer community who are often struggling with the concepts of building communities, developing champion programs and charges around end user adoption more broadly who better to run the episode than Juliet herself, plus, just there's a special guest appearance from Riley, who is Laurie dog who was understandably reiterate irritate by the t in a her house at the time.
David [0:01:12]: Really hope you enjoy the discussion.
David [0:01:13]: Cheers?
Juliet [0:01:15]: Hi.
Juliet [0:01:15]: I'm Juliet Stott, co-founder of Bright Star content marketing agency that works with Microsoft Partners.
Juliet [0:01:19]: I'm thrilled to be talking to the queen community building, Laurie Pottmeyer.
Juliet [0:01:23]: Many of you will know her is the brains behind Mike our three six slide Mvp program, and she spent almost two decades at Microsoft building communities, But I'll let her tell you her story.
Laurie [0:01:35]: Thanks, Juliet.
Laurie [0:01:35]: I'm really happy to be here with you.
Laurie [0:01:37]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:01:37]: Said, my name is Laurie Pottmeyer.
Laurie [0:01:39]: It's spent a lot of time at Microsoft.
Laurie [0:01:42]: And here to talk community with you.
Laurie [0:01:45]: And the last community that I worked on was the Microsoft three sixty five Mvp program.
Laurie [0:01:52]: But so for those of you who are not familiar with the Mvp program, it is a room that is awarded.
Laurie [0:01:58]: People are awarded in the Mvp award for their technical death in Microsoft products, but most importantly, their community contributions.
Laurie [0:02:07]: So people who are out there.
Laurie [0:02:09]: Blogging and talking about the products and educating people, answering questions about the product and so on.
Laurie [0:02:17]: Before I managed the Mvp program, I went on feedback and user adoption programs and really kinda helping shape how customers engaged with Microsoft three sixty five, and that's kinda where I fall in love with community.
Laurie [0:02:31]: I really saw how.
Laurie [0:02:32]: Communities can impact change.
Laurie [0:02:34]: So that's a little bit about me.
Laurie [0:02:36]: And I live in Portland Oregon, so I'm, just on the West Coast here in the Us.
Juliet [0:02:43]: Thank you so much.
Juliet [0:02:43]: Well, often nearly decades shaping in communities?
Juliet [0:02:46]: What does community actually mean to you?
Juliet [0:02:48]: And how has it changed over the last two decades?
Laurie [0:02:51]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:02:51]: I mean, that's a good question.
Laurie [0:02:53]: Community to me is really where connection turns into momentum.
Laurie [0:02:58]: So what I mean about is, you know, it's not about people being in the same space.
Laurie [0:03:02]: It's really about, kinda how people feel when they're safe enough to share and challenge each other and ask questions.
Laurie [0:03:10]: And ultimately build together?
Laurie [0:03:13]: And that building could be really anything for different organizations, But...
Laurie [0:03:18]: And then how does that momentum grow once those personal relationships are built.
Laurie [0:03:22]: And I really seeing how community can spark innovation, scale support is a big one and really create real change.
Laurie [0:03:30]: But for me, personally, the most meaningful outcome is the connections that I've built, I'm with so many technical expert who have really become friends around the globe?
Laurie [0:03:40]: And what's the
Juliet [0:03:41]: rule of building this community?
Juliet [0:03:42]: Can you put a tangible Roi on it for those considering it?
Juliet [0:03:47]: What are the sort hard and soft metrics on community building?
Juliet [0:03:51]: Community is
Laurie [0:03:52]: a hard thing to measure, And, you know, people always wanna know one of the metrics behind a school community, there's a few things to look at what is customer retention?
Laurie [0:04:02]: Are your customer sticking around and how is community impacting that?
Laurie [0:04:06]: Supporting cost reduction.
Laurie [0:04:08]: That could be community helping offset support costs by answering questions and forums and things like that.
Laurie [0:04:16]: Product innovation.
Laurie [0:04:18]: How are they helping talk about features that are needed, problems that need to be solved.
Laurie [0:04:23]: Community can come and bring that to organizations, really help them understand what those things are, and that can increase innovation and really help product quality as well by testing, and validating and understanding what's working and what's not working.
Laurie [0:04:39]: We can measure what community is bringing to us in terms of those feature requests and those bugs and and product issues, messaging for announcing something to the world.
Laurie [0:04:52]: Maybe we run it by community first, and they help us understand how that's going to land.
Laurie [0:04:58]: And so measuring those types of things.
Laurie [0:05:01]: What are the messages that we we're able to tweak and change prior to going to market or going and launching broadly content creation.
Laurie [0:05:10]: What is community doing in the way of supporting our messaging by creating their own content.
Laurie [0:05:15]: So are they talking about our product or our service?
Laurie [0:05:19]: Are they blogging, Are they going to conferences and talking about it and being able to track what that output is if we give information to our community, are they out there kinda helping us extend that messaging.
Laurie [0:05:33]: And, like, for internal, there can be different things that you measure for internal teams too.
Laurie [0:05:39]: Like, if you have a champions program, how are teams becoming more efficient by what we're sharing with each other.
Laurie [0:05:48]: And that could be in the way of forums and how many questions there are and how many answers or, you know, what is that ratio?
Laurie [0:05:57]: And then, you know, just ways that they're more efficient.
Laurie [0:06:00]: So maybe it's a product that you're rolling out internally that is solving a problem, and then you're measuring how that tool is doing.
Laurie [0:06:11]: And that's based on how your community sharing with people.
Laurie [0:06:15]: So there's lots of things that you can measure.
Laurie [0:06:17]: Some of it soft.
Laurie [0:06:18]: Some of it's the hard metrics, You know, numbers are certainly important, but what numbers are most important.
Laurie [0:06:26]: Your numbers of how many people in the community may not be the most important thing.
Laurie [0:06:31]: You may be more interested in what those people who are in your community are doing.
Laurie [0:06:38]: So all those things that I just mentioned, Right?
Laurie [0:06:41]: When you're talking about...
Laurie [0:06:42]: Okay.
Laurie [0:06:42]: We have fifty people in this community or fifty thousand in this community.
Laurie [0:06:46]: Really, what's most important is how they're engaging.
Laurie [0:06:50]: What do they bring?
Laurie [0:06:51]: What how them are they solving?
Laurie [0:06:52]: And some finding those matters are important in measuring it it's what you need to determine.
Laurie [0:06:58]: Sort of softer metrics.
Juliet [0:06:59]: It's like the feeling of belonging, whether that's internal or external of how important is that in terms of pop that community feel.
Juliet [0:07:07]: I feel like I belong to this community.
Laurie [0:07:10]: Well, I mean, that's certainly a way that you get people to engage in your community.
Laurie [0:07:14]: Right?
Laurie [0:07:14]: Let's say it's a an internal program like a champions program?
Laurie [0:07:18]: Why are people going to wanna be in a champion?
Laurie [0:07:21]: In the program.
Laurie [0:07:22]: You know, why are they going to wanna talk about or help others in their organization, roll out a new technology for instance.
Laurie [0:07:31]: That's not their job.
Laurie [0:07:32]: Right?
Laurie [0:07:33]: They may be an executive assistant or they may be in the marketing department or they may not be in the It department that's in charge rolling this out, but why do they wanna be part of that program.
Laurie [0:07:44]: So what it's going to what kind of benefit are they gonna get?
Laurie [0:07:48]: And I think belonging is obviously a huge one but, you know, there's simple things like having a badge.
Laurie [0:07:54]: It's crazy at how exciting people get it because they're being recognized.
Laurie [0:07:59]: And unless whether it's internal or external.
Laurie [0:08:03]: We can have external they definitely for external communities, you know, there's ways to recognize.
Laurie [0:08:09]: And I think it's important that people feel like when they're contributing to something.
Laurie [0:08:15]: They are a part of it and part of that community, but also, being recognized so that they understand that their impact is well.
Laurie [0:08:24]: So how do you go about getting executive buy to start a community, and I suppose that coast hand in hand with how
Juliet [0:08:29]: do you get the budget for it?
Laurie [0:08:31]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:08:31]: You know, community kind become a buzz word, it'll last number of years.
Laurie [0:08:35]: I remember when I was working on user adoption programs, and which is an internal community program, helping customers really build those champion and programs in order to increase user adoption, executive sponsorship was one of the very first things that we talked about.
Laurie [0:08:58]: And used to be something that we really had to sell and explain because it wasn't widely understood.
Laurie [0:09:06]: But as time has gone on, it's become kind of this bus word.
Laurie [0:09:10]: And I think similar whom we get confused about what community is and that's probably a whole another conversation that we could talk about, but to answer your questions about kind of that executive buy in how to get budget.
Laurie [0:09:22]: There's kinda some a few things that you need to look at.
Laurie [0:09:27]: Executives aren't gonna buy into community just because it's a buzz word.
Laurie [0:09:30]: They're didn't buy into outcomes.
Laurie [0:09:32]: So our job is really to connect the dots between that human connection and the business, like, the business goals or business acceleration.
Laurie [0:09:42]: Like, what is our executive team going to care about?
Laurie [0:09:45]: And so kinda trying to tie the idea of of community into those goals.
Laurie [0:09:51]: So how is community going to support the key metrics that the organization has been able to articulate that in terms of adoption, support deflect, employee satisfaction, product feedback, Like, whatever those things are that are important, and then translating that into measurable things, Roi, Kpis scalability compete.
Laurie [0:10:16]: Like, one of those things that what's the language that's going to matter to executives.
Juliet [0:10:23]: And what about choosing the right person as well?
Juliet [0:10:25]: Are they got to have certain characteristics profile?
Juliet [0:10:28]: They don't mind of cascading information?
Juliet [0:10:30]: They've been involved in community or community style projects before?
Juliet [0:10:34]: How would you go about approaching that executive?
Juliet [0:10:36]: I mean, could you go to somebody else in a different department or and where does community belong in an organization, Which department?
Laurie [0:10:43]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:10:43]: I think, you know, recruiting an executive sponsor is a really important thing.
Laurie [0:10:48]: And buying really starts with belief.
Laurie [0:10:51]: And so there may be kind what they call low hanging fruit.
Laurie [0:10:54]: Right?
Laurie [0:10:55]: We always love that term But who are those people?
Laurie [0:10:58]: Who are those leaders that already value, connection, innovation, employee voice who has this relationships already, maybe?
Laurie [0:11:08]: Those are kinda...
Laurie [0:11:09]: That's kinda of your low hanging fruit.
Laurie [0:11:11]: They can make position as champions, not just a gatekeeper, definitely.
Laurie [0:11:15]: And they can kinda help bring in other leaders who may be able to participate in that as well.
Laurie [0:11:22]: I think also they're executive assistance, I think are definitely undervalued in terms of how they can participate in a public program or a Champions program because they play a very big role in bringing in the executives onto onboarding.
Laurie [0:11:40]: If so that's also an area?
Juliet [0:11:43]: Got got no fingers on the polls seven layers as well.
Juliet [0:11:45]: Perhaps also than the executive that we work with?
Juliet [0:11:48]: Is that right?
Juliet [0:11:49]: Yeah.
Juliet [0:11:49]: So from a sheet paper, how would you start building a community?
Juliet [0:11:53]: What would you advise?
Juliet [0:11:54]: I mean, from the very else set.
Juliet [0:11:55]: Okay.
Juliet [0:11:56]: So you've got some...
Juliet [0:11:57]: It's the executive buy in the first step.
Juliet [0:11:59]: And then once you've got that buy in, or do you have to go to the executive with the plan.
Juliet [0:12:04]: So what comes first.
Laurie [0:12:06]: I think that really depends.
Laurie [0:12:07]: I know people don't like that.
Laurie [0:12:09]: Answered, but I think it really depends on the organization.
Laurie [0:12:12]: Is this something that people are doing casually already or different parts the organization are doing casually already or maybe there's since sort of a feedback program or a program that already exists that maybe is in a full blown community yet.
Laurie [0:12:29]: I think that's different than an organization that's completely starting from scratch.
Laurie [0:12:35]: And that goes for internal and external, but there's a few things when you're looking at what makes a community successful.
Laurie [0:12:43]: Successful community really where members of that community feels seen heard and empowered.
Laurie [0:12:50]: I mean, they need to know that their participation is driving real outcomes for the organization.
Laurie [0:12:55]: Like, why wouldn't I wanna be a part of something if it's just gonna go into a black hole.
Laurie [0:13:01]: If this just...
Laurie [0:13:02]: Suppose it feels good just to be around other people that share a passion.
Laurie [0:13:07]: Right?
Laurie [0:13:08]: That's a community of its own kind.
Laurie [0:13:10]: But an organization is going to see value in that community when they're helping to meet their outcomes, their goals.
Laurie [0:13:21]: So starting up, it's really important to understand to have, like, a purposeful design.
Laurie [0:13:28]: What's the mission, what's the value proposition?
Laurie [0:13:31]: Both for the internal team and if it's an external community for those external members?
Laurie [0:13:39]: Is there a clear mission and value proposition.
Laurie [0:13:42]: Once everybody's goals, what are the guessing and gets that everybody wants to receive?
Laurie [0:13:47]: If I'm internal, and I'm building this program, what do I care about, what is important to me what's important to my leadership?
Laurie [0:13:55]: Is it product feedback?
Laurie [0:13:57]: Is it getting the messaging out?
Laurie [0:14:00]: Is it being kind of an auto marketing?
Laurie [0:14:02]: I mean, the there are very different goals for those things?
Laurie [0:14:07]: And then for, you know, students just being really clear on what those goals are, and then for the people that are participating in the community, if they're going to me, what are they getting out of it?
Laurie [0:14:19]: Is this just a social thing to be around other people that have kind of a shared passion?
Laurie [0:14:23]: Or are we asking them to do something?
Laurie [0:14:26]: And if we are, what are they getting out of that?
Laurie [0:14:29]: So for instance, for me, with the programs that I ran, I was going to our Mvp is quite a bit because their experts in the technology.
Laurie [0:14:40]: They have a wide following in many cases.
Laurie [0:14:44]: And they understand what real customers are having challenges with.
Laurie [0:14:51]: So for me, I was going to them oftentimes asking for feedback, asking them to help share our messaging.
Laurie [0:14:58]: But what are they getting out of that?
Laurie [0:15:00]: And so it was really important for me to understand what was important to them?
Laurie [0:15:03]: What do they wanna get out of it?
Laurie [0:15:05]: And so when you're building a community, understanding what your goals are, but also understanding what the people, what your target market for that community, what do they want?
Laurie [0:15:16]: And understanding when they need to get out of it, then finding a balance that will help you understand, okay.
Laurie [0:15:22]: Here's where we start.
Laurie [0:15:23]: And here's maybe kind of a a crawl run...
Laurie [0:15:26]: Sorry.
Laurie [0:15:27]: I
Juliet [0:15:27]: interrupted you.
Juliet [0:15:27]: Sorry.
Juliet [0:15:28]: I was just gonna suggest you about the digital tools, potentially that are available to people?
Juliet [0:15:33]: Whether it start with the viva engage or your Internet Or did it start small in at teams or...
Juliet [0:15:40]: But how do people use the technology they've got to sort of create that sort of foundation a place where people can go.
Juliet [0:15:47]: And I presume these days, most companies are working in a hybrid way.
Juliet [0:15:51]: So how do you then also cater for those on side and those off sizes like a two part question to that.
Laurie [0:15:58]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:15:58]: We're really living in a digital role.
Laurie [0:16:00]: Right?
Laurie [0:16:01]: Like, I remember when everybody was going to the office.
Laurie [0:16:04]: Right?
Laurie [0:16:04]: You probably do too.
Laurie [0:16:05]: We all went into the office every single day.
Laurie [0:16:08]: We checked our voice mail and checked our email, and then we got started with work.
Laurie [0:16:13]: And now we are, you know, oftentimes working around the clock and we're working here we are in completely different time zones as well.
Laurie [0:16:21]: After hours for you almost, and I'm just getting started in my day.
Laurie [0:16:26]: So we are working very different than we did even just ten years ago.
Laurie [0:16:32]: But I think Ai obviously is a huge help to us.
Laurie [0:16:38]: And we can talk about kind of that in a minute.
Laurie [0:16:41]: But...
Juliet [0:16:41]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:16:42]: I think tool wise, there's different things you can do depending on if it's an internal community or if it's an external community.
Laurie [0:16:48]: So I with an internal community, if you're building, say, like, a champions program where you're wanting to adopt a new technology within the organization and a good example of this would be c copilot.
Laurie [0:17:02]: Right?
Laurie [0:17:03]: Something that is new to people that maybe they've played with in their personalized lives or kind of try to use just kind of for fun, but now organizations are rep pushing this, like, you need to automate, you need to be more efficient.
Laurie [0:17:19]: And so this is a new thing for people.
Laurie [0:17:22]: And so being able to use the tools that you have internally, maybe that's like, V gauge or you have teams obviously where you have collaboration through channels and meetings that you can track, you have internet or, you know, like, a sharepoint where you can post content and have resource hubs and, you know, feedback portals that you can manage or where you kinda where you track your questions and So there's different tools that you can use internally, obviously, that are, you know, already available to you.
Laurie [0:17:56]: I think if you have the ability to have meetings in person or even if it's just semi regular gathering for people to participate in person, we cannot get away from that.
Laurie [0:18:08]: And we we need to have some sort of personal connection.
Laurie [0:18:13]: And if it is people from scattered all around the world than a team's meeting is next that's right where we're seeing faces and engaging that way.
Laurie [0:18:23]: But then external communities is a a different story.
Laurie [0:18:26]: Right?
Laurie [0:18:26]: You may be using a lot of those tools communicate.
Laurie [0:18:29]: Obviously, you know, for maybe you're gonna use Microsoft teams and have the ability to communicate with people, you know, real time in that way or in person, but also you have Linkedin groups, you have different online forums.
Laurie [0:18:44]: And for Microsoft products, you have the Microsoft Tech community, which is a tool that I helped get off the ground and there's thousands of people in the Microsoft Tech community, and it's a great way to engage with people so say your a partner, a Microsoft partner, and, you know, you focus on Sharepoint.
Laurie [0:19:05]: There's a whole community of Sharepoint users, It pros, developers, in the Microsoft tech community.
Laurie [0:19:14]: So that's like a great place for you to go and engage with people answer your question, share your knowledge.
Laurie [0:19:20]: Get your name out there.
Laurie [0:19:21]: There's nothing about those types of platforms, whether it's the Microsoft debt community or another online virtual platform like, discord or something like that, even Facebook groups.
Laurie [0:19:32]: Where you can go in and answer questions and be part of the community, and oh, by the way, I work for this partner.
Laurie [0:19:39]: I manage these programs, and that's an additional marketing tool for you too.
Laurie [0:19:44]: So you're sharing your knowledge and made part of the community, but doesn't hurt to put your name off there and let people know, gosh.
Laurie [0:19:50]: This egg really knows what he's talking matter.
Laurie [0:19:53]: This gal really has a lot of experience doing this.
Laurie [0:19:57]: I wonder if they could help us.
Laurie [0:19:59]: So use those tools.
Laurie [0:20:01]: But, yeah.
Laurie [0:20:02]: There's other custom portals and forums that you can create if you're trying to create your own thing, But look for once already out there in ways that you engage with people through their community?
Juliet [0:20:14]: I wanted to touch going back to where community the belongs in an organization.
Juliet [0:20:18]: Is that responsible is Hr responsible?
Juliet [0:20:20]: Is that comes?
Juliet [0:20:21]: Or is it where did you sit in the organization.
Juliet [0:20:25]: And then I suppose it starts with one person or your tasks with creating the ideal team look like and what kind of roles are or who's responsible for what?
Juliet [0:20:36]: You talked about multiple channels there.
Juliet [0:20:38]: You say best practices to try and keep your channels to a minimum so that you excel in one rather than spread yourself in in five, for example.
Juliet [0:20:46]: What's your take on that?
Laurie [0:20:48]: If you are building a community, the community team or person in many cases, you know, hopefully it's a team.
Laurie [0:20:57]: But sometimes it's an individual.
Laurie [0:20:59]: That person is sitting in whatever team related to the goals of what that.
Laurie [0:21:05]: Community is doing.
Laurie [0:21:07]: So if that community is trying to get more influencers talking about their product, maybe got somebody who sits in marketing.
Laurie [0:21:18]: If that's a community that is built around people who are driving internal communications at their organization, and we wanna talk to all those people at a bunch of different organizations around the world who are doing that role.
Laurie [0:21:37]: Then maybe that is somebody who is starting a program within that part of the organization that is selling or developing tools related to that.
Laurie [0:21:52]: Right?
Laurie [0:21:52]: So for instance, I sat in the engineering side of things When I was at Microsoft, that wasn't the case for every team related to the Mvp program, but we always try to have somebody from...
Laurie [0:22:06]: On the end through set things, we always try to have somebody from each product that was from engineering and somebody from marketing because we needed to come together to run and efficient and impactful community.
Laurie [0:22:21]: The community members that we worked with as part of the Mvp program, they needed very deep technical knowledge of our products, And from the engineering side, we really cared a lot about what their feedback was and bring a wealth of knowledge hundreds and thousands of Mvp around the world were able to come to us under Nda and share what their customers needed.
Laurie [0:22:46]: Why things weren't working, why things weren't working and brought the problems to us to solve and we were able to talk with them under Nda about those things.
Laurie [0:22:58]: That wouldn't be a function of marketing that wouldn't be a function of Hr.
Laurie [0:23:03]: That's what engineering cared about.
Laurie [0:23:05]: That said, we've worked very closely with our marketing partners because marketing really cared about what the messaging was when we had events like ignite coming up.
Laurie [0:23:16]: You know, it's very important for those messages that are gonna to be announced to the world to be run by people on Nda who are very passionate and knowledgeable about what it is we're doing.
Laurie [0:23:28]: And so being able to say, hey, we're gonna start talking about this thing on this day.
Laurie [0:23:34]: Here's how we're gonna announce it.
Laurie [0:23:37]: We have the opportunity to hear the...
Laurie [0:23:39]: Oh, my gosh.
Laurie [0:23:40]: No.
Laurie [0:23:40]: You can't say that because this this and this or, wow, People are gonna be really concerned about this part of your message.
Laurie [0:23:47]: And that gives us a chance to be like, oh, okay.
Laurie [0:23:50]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:23:50]: Good point.
Laurie [0:23:51]: We should week that or we should message it in another way.
Laurie [0:23:54]: Or in some cases, like, we had an example where we completely changed our licensing structure on a product prior to an announcement because of that feedback.
Laurie [0:24:06]: So it really depends on where that person sits, and it can mean different but I think looking at your goals as a community and where it might sense for your organization.
Laurie [0:24:20]: There may be multiple people from multiple teams that come together to build a community team.
Juliet [0:24:26]: So how long does it take to get a community off the ground or sort of that's Process.
Laurie [0:24:32]: A community can be two people.
Laurie [0:24:34]: You lie could be...
Laurie [0:24:36]: We could be a community today.
Laurie [0:24:37]: Right to.
Laurie [0:24:38]: So time it does it really matter.
Laurie [0:24:40]: You can have a community and not even know it.
Laurie [0:24:43]: Let's look at where people are that already exist, there's probably a platform somewhere where people are having conversations about the very things that you as a community builder wants to engage with.
Laurie [0:24:59]: So looking at where are those people?
Laurie [0:25:02]: And can you plug into an existing community?
Laurie [0:25:06]: Not like you're gonna steal people away from that, but pump yourself into something that already exists and invite them to the additional opportunities to engage that you have.
Laurie [0:25:19]: So it could take no time at all, and you could start plugging into existing communities.
Laurie [0:25:27]: It's Or if you wanna start, like, a more formal program, that may take a little bit longer, but again, you're gonna plug into those existing communities to invite people to be a part of what it is you're doing.
Juliet [0:25:41]: Don't try and do it on your own?
Juliet [0:25:42]: And then I suppose...
Juliet [0:25:42]: Then once you've got this community, how do you keep them engaged?
Juliet [0:25:45]: What are the sort of how often do you have to engage with them, how often do you have to, like, communicate with them, reward them, give them badges, send them a, a clerk, or.
Juliet [0:25:54]: What is it?
Juliet [0:25:55]: Tell me about that engagement piece.
Juliet [0:25:57]: You've got the community.
Juliet [0:25:59]: How do you keep it going?
Laurie [0:26:02]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:26:02]: I think the most important thing is consistency.
Laurie [0:26:05]: Like if you walked into a room that was empty, you would walk right back out.
Laurie [0:26:12]: You wouldn't stay there and hang out by yourself.
Laurie [0:26:16]: It's the same thing.
Laurie [0:26:17]: If you...
Laurie [0:26:18]: Well, maybe you would, Sometimes that's really peaceful.
Laurie [0:26:20]: But that said, when you're talking about community, you wanna go where other people are.
Laurie [0:26:27]: And in order to have people there, you have to be consistent.
Laurie [0:26:32]: And so whether that's once a quarter, once a month, once a week every day, depending on what it is you're doing, you have to be consistent.
Laurie [0:26:42]: You have to show up.
Laurie [0:26:43]: And so you could start by doing a monthly call that's virtual and just bringing people together getting to know people.
Laurie [0:26:52]: You know when I started the women in Microsoft Teams community.
Laurie [0:26:57]: We just did a monthly call.
Laurie [0:26:59]: It was super laid back.
Laurie [0:27:01]: We brought somebody from Microsoft, a woman that was in an engineering team at Microsoft, and then we brought a community member.
Laurie [0:27:07]: And the two of them would both talk for fifteen minutes, and then we would just have time for questions and answers.
Laurie [0:27:14]: And that gave us a way to really engage with one another on a consistent basis.
Laurie [0:27:19]: And if you couldn't make it, We had a recording, and we had a online team that everybody was a part of, and you could converse and share information and ask questions there.
Laurie [0:27:29]: When it was just a call.
Laurie [0:27:31]: Right?
Laurie [0:27:31]: It was just a call and, like, a really easy platform on, you know, throwing into a team.
Juliet [0:27:38]: It's key to that then having, like, telling your audience.
Juliet [0:27:41]: It's always going to be on this time.
Juliet [0:27:43]: It's a bit like, you know, broadcasting.
Juliet [0:27:44]: You knew that eight o'clock this show is gonna be on Us.
Juliet [0:27:47]: So having that regular note that regardless whatever always goes on.
Juliet [0:27:51]: Is that important of.
Laurie [0:27:53]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:27:53]: I think it's really important.
Laurie [0:27:54]: You know, when you have a global audience or global participation, you're never gonna get everybody.
Laurie [0:27:59]: You know, let's see your partner organization, you're working with people all over the world, and you're looking to reach a wide audience that you may consider doing me, like an Am at a Pm to do, different time zones.
Laurie [0:28:11]: I think one of the learnings that I had was I was trying to reach a global audience.
Laurie [0:28:16]: So I was dealing with time zones, but then when you're working with a global audience, you also have things that you need to consider like language, not every country in the world speaks English as your first language.
Laurie [0:28:29]: Right?
Laurie [0:28:30]: That's very important to consider, but also, you know, there's a lot of cultural things as well.
Laurie [0:28:35]: Like, in some cultures, sometimes those females will not speak up or sometimes, there's a ranking in your title, and you don't speak up if somebody with a more important or bigger title is on the call with you.
Laurie [0:28:49]: Right?
Laurie [0:28:49]: There just cultural things to consider.
Laurie [0:28:51]: As you're kinda offering, looking at who your audience is, what your priorities are.
Laurie [0:28:56]: What are the ways you can engage those different people who may need a a different environment or something.
Laurie [0:29:05]: And one of the things that I did for instance in Asia Pacific.
Laurie [0:29:08]: We were seeing that we had Ko so many Mvp from this region, but we're really not engaging with them even when we think we're doing something in their time zone.
Laurie [0:29:20]: What we didn't realize and after engaging with internal people who were in those regions, I came to understand that sometimes times in certain countries it's important to do things during business hours, and not after business hours, which a lot of times the community you're trying to reach people after they are done with their day job, but in some regions, you know?
Laurie [0:29:45]: So really understanding those types of things.
Laurie [0:29:47]: And then the other thing is language, even if somebody spoke English, a lot of times they don't feel confident enough maybe to converse, which me being an English not speaking any other language fluently, I'm just happy that people are engaging, and I'm very impressed.
Laurie [0:30:05]: However, by having a native speaker adam Saw I can't even tell you the numbers they were exponentially bigger.
Laurie [0:30:14]: And if, you know, we just kinda sat in the background and use translator and have them having those conversations from Babies years.
Laurie [0:30:23]: So just considering those types of things, you know.
Juliet [0:30:28]: So that leads me answer sort of what does success look like?
Juliet [0:30:30]: How do you measure success?
Juliet [0:30:32]: Is it numbers is engagement?
Juliet [0:30:34]: I mean, you'd often said, you know, we could be a community of two.
Juliet [0:30:37]: But in order to take it back to the executive team to say this is what we've done and a success in Roi eyes.
Juliet [0:30:43]: What is success?
Laurie [0:30:45]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:30:45]: So before I go into that, I really wanna talk about, like, what makes a community successful.
Laurie [0:30:52]: So, like, one or the thing then I'll talk a little bit about how to measure those things.
Laurie [0:30:56]: But one, like, having a purposeful design.
Laurie [0:31:00]: Like, I talked to the beginning about having a mission and value proposition that is first and foremost.
Laurie [0:31:06]: Being really clear on what you wanted to.
Laurie [0:31:08]: Because before you measure anything, you need to understand what's important, and it may be you personally, but for your job sake.
Laurie [0:31:17]: It's really organization.
Laurie [0:31:18]: Right?
Laurie [0:31:19]: And that's balancing up because a lot of people who manage communities are really people driven.
Laurie [0:31:24]: And I'm one of those people.
Laurie [0:31:26]: And so remembering that the value for the organization is also really important.
Laurie [0:31:31]: Consistent engagement, we mentioned that having a regular interaction, whether that's live in person virtual, but having regular content, having regular events and times to meet, but also, being responsive even if you have, like, a virtual forum or something.
Laurie [0:31:50]: What is your response rate?
Laurie [0:31:51]: Not something that you can measure.
Laurie [0:31:53]: Peer to peer value, like, understanding how members are helping each other, not just the person managing the community.
Laurie [0:32:02]: Because one person, once your community grows one person can't do it all.
Laurie [0:32:06]: So you have to bring others from your team, but mostly community is helping each other.
Laurie [0:32:12]: We're all answering questions for the larger collective.
Laurie [0:32:15]: Leadership opportunities is like, how are you going to bring people along with you and then help you lead, and that could be people internal or people external, having feedback loops, and that could be related to the product that you're building or selling or getting community insights.
Laurie [0:32:38]: But it also is feedback on the program itself.
Laurie [0:32:42]: And then when you're measuring feedback on the program itself, that's your internal people, Like, what are we getting out of this community that we built, are we meeting our goals, but also than people participating.
Laurie [0:32:55]: Are they getting what they need or what they want from the community as swallow, and then having an inclusive culture?
Laurie [0:33:02]: So say, welcoming, respecting and one representing different voices drug diverse voices, like that's really important as well.
Laurie [0:33:12]: So those are all things that you can measure.
Laurie [0:33:14]: So it's not like you're launching a product and you have x number of features that you've launched and now you can go to your leadership and say, I I release this feature and or this program or this offering whatever it is.
Laurie [0:33:30]: And here's how people have engaged with it or purchased it or used it.
Laurie [0:33:35]: We don't handle the that luxury of having those types.
Laurie [0:33:39]: So when you're measuring community, the things that you can measure our engagement, and I think that's very, like, first and foremost, most important because, again, doesn't matter how many people are in your community.
Laurie [0:33:52]: Nobody's is engaging, and helping you get the information or whatever it is you're looking for, then it doesn't really matter.
Laurie [0:33:58]: So if I have a hundred people in my community or old thousand, like, our ten percent of them attending things and engaging and providing feedback and showing up, or is it eighty percent?
Laurie [0:34:12]: Like, what's...
Laurie [0:34:12]: And you need to decide thinking about that
Juliet [0:34:16]: With your community and the engineers.
Juliet [0:34:19]: Did they value that feedback?
Juliet [0:34:21]: I mean, they said an ego thing there where the builders, where the tech people we know what we're doing?
Juliet [0:34:26]: We don't need the community feedback.
Juliet [0:34:28]: Was there some pushback from sort of the very technical people?
Juliet [0:34:32]: Was there some skepticism around using community as a sort of a feedback loop I suppose.
Juliet [0:34:38]: And that is a success measure if you persuade those people to listen.
Laurie [0:34:43]: Well, that's kind of a cheaper part thing.
Laurie [0:34:45]: So one, yeah.
Laurie [0:34:46]: Absolutely.
Laurie [0:34:47]: I mean, there are people that are just nervous.
Laurie [0:34:49]: Right?
Laurie [0:34:50]: They're, like, Oh gosh.
Laurie [0:34:52]: If I ask for feedback, I'm afraid of what I'm gonna hear.
Laurie [0:34:55]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:34:55]: And so one of the ways that, you know, I really kinda tried to make people comfortable with that is by showing examples if other people in this assess that they had had.
Laurie [0:35:07]: So there's probably five people, like, I can count on one hand, who were, like, my champions.
Laurie [0:35:14]: They were the people who were on the technical.
Laurie [0:35:18]: They were the engineers who were had great success stories and involved our community on a regular basis and they're taking their stories.
Laurie [0:35:28]: Like, this is how they did it, and this is what they did and here's what they got out of it.
Laurie [0:35:33]: That can be really powerful.
Laurie [0:35:35]: So yes, and there are those people, but showing them.
Laurie [0:35:40]: And also just having them attend as their people doing community work.
Laurie [0:35:46]: Play, why don't you just come to this other call or be a part of this other thing where somebody else is doing this and just see, like, get to know the community.
Laurie [0:35:53]: I think a lot of times, the problem is they don't know who the community people are.
Laurie [0:35:59]: So it's really it's a lot of anxiety.
Laurie [0:36:03]: Not only...
Laurie [0:36:04]: Do I not know what they're gonna say?
Laurie [0:36:05]: Like, who are these people?
Laurie [0:36:06]: Do they like me?
Laurie [0:36:07]: Do They not like me do they like my product?
Laurie [0:36:09]: Do they like what I'm bullying?
Laurie [0:36:10]: Right?
Laurie [0:36:11]: So...
Laurie [0:36:11]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:36:12]: Last supposed to I
Juliet [0:36:13]: think the the community.
Juliet [0:36:14]: How much do you have to tell them?
Juliet [0:36:16]: The feedback you gave us help shape this product in this way.
Juliet [0:36:19]: So thank you very much.
Juliet [0:36:20]: Or and she feedback we had to ignore because it was totally impractical, and it wasn't profitable to do this.
Juliet [0:36:25]: Or, I mean, I suppose that...
Juliet [0:36:26]: Also it's managing...
Juliet [0:36:27]: If...
Juliet [0:36:27]: That's side.
Juliet [0:36:28]: Isn't.
Juliet [0:36:28]: How do you manage the expectations of your community who think they are also experts.
Juliet [0:36:33]: And also can we never...
Laurie [0:36:36]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:36:36]: We call that a feedback loop.
Laurie [0:36:37]: Right?
Laurie [0:36:38]: It's really important to ask for feedback, but if you're not doing anything with it, then why you've even asked for it.
Laurie [0:36:43]: So that's the first thing.
Laurie [0:36:44]: If you have a survey and it's a hundred questions long, it's probably really way too long.
Laurie [0:36:49]: Even if you have ten questions, it may be too long.
Laurie [0:36:52]: When you're asking for feedback, whether that's in a survey or verbally, you need to ask yourself, what am I doing with this information.
Laurie [0:37:01]: If it's meaningful information to you then ask the question, but tell the people that you're asking for feedback from why you're asking the question, what is the relevance?
Laurie [0:37:11]: I need to make a decision.
Laurie [0:37:13]: I have a b or c, and I need your help deciding A b or c.
Laurie [0:37:19]: Tell me why.
Laurie [0:37:20]: Right?
Laurie [0:37:20]: Give them that context.
Laurie [0:37:22]: And then once you ask for the feedback, First of all, be open to it and listen, you're asking, so take the time to listen and be open to it, but then also loop back, let them know what you did with it.
Laurie [0:37:39]: And it may not be what they wanna hear.
Laurie [0:37:41]: But then providing the calm, and especially it, like, this may not be something that you share in, you know, huge public form, but with your, kind of tight knit, community people, especially if they're under Nda, Like, hey.
Laurie [0:37:53]: We listen your feedback.
Laurie [0:37:54]: Here's what you told us.
Laurie [0:37:55]: This is what we did with it with way the pros and cons, we want this other direction and this is why.
Laurie [0:38:00]: And people love that transparency.
Laurie [0:38:04]: They respect that.
Juliet [0:38:06]: So what advice would you give anybody starting out a community today.
Juliet [0:38:11]: With all the sort of en encroaching of Ai technology and Ai is gonna do everything for us in that context, what advice would you give, obviously we wanna embrace the tools and acknowledge their part, but also remember the human part of connection.
Juliet [0:38:28]: So...
Laurie [0:38:30]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:38:30]: There's kinda three things when you think about, like, where do I start.
Laurie [0:38:34]: And it can be really overwhelming.
Laurie [0:38:35]: And like I said, we can start small and you you and I can be our own community.
Laurie [0:38:39]: But ultimately, you need to start with three things, and that's purpose, participation and sustainability.
Laurie [0:38:45]: First, why does this community exist?
Laurie [0:38:49]: Why are we doing this?
Laurie [0:38:50]: What is it for?
Laurie [0:38:51]: And then see the engagement and leadership.
Laurie [0:38:54]: Understanding kinda who your committed voices are?
Laurie [0:38:57]: Who are your founding members?
Laurie [0:38:59]: Who are your champions?
Laurie [0:39:00]: Who are those leaders or gonna help you?
Laurie [0:39:02]: Build a frame and get people involved.
Laurie [0:39:06]: Mana that's where a champions program can come in.
Laurie [0:39:09]: And then finally, it set success metrics in your feedback loops.
Laurie [0:39:12]: Like measure what matters like I said, And then involves that based on your input.
Laurie [0:39:18]: And then to answer your question about kinda Ai, like, Ai can generate answers.
Laurie [0:39:24]: Right, fake automate task, scale systems, like, Ai can be at fabulous tool, and it should be a fabulous tool for us to really do things faster and do more.
Laurie [0:39:36]: However, it cannot replicate trust.
Laurie [0:39:40]: It cannot replicate empathy or shared purpose.
Laurie [0:39:44]: Like, that's where community comes in.
Laurie [0:39:46]: It's really the human layer.
Laurie [0:39:48]: It's the people that makes Ai meaningful.
Laurie [0:39:50]: Ai is a great foundation.
Laurie [0:39:52]: It helps us do a lot of the busy work on the back end.
Laurie [0:39:56]: It gives us a starting point.
Laurie [0:39:57]: It can help us think of things to talk about.
Laurie [0:40:01]: It can take our feedback and I can pilot it.
Laurie [0:40:04]: Like, it can do great things But it's really, like, how we ensure that these tools are serving our needs and reflecting different voices and kinda evolving responsibly, but it's ultimately about the people.
Laurie [0:40:17]: And I think if you start with having that in mind, but this is...
Laurie [0:40:22]: You know, we're gonna use these tools but really is to us as individuals as people to engage maybe a lot more successful.
Juliet [0:40:31]: Right Well, I think we are almost done.
Juliet [0:40:33]: It just leads me to ask if people want your advice or want to engage with you outside of this, how do they connect with you?
Laurie [0:40:41]: Yeah.
Laurie [0:40:41]: I love to talk about this stuff.
Laurie [0:40:42]: It especially now.
Laurie [0:40:44]: You know, it's really meaningful to have these conversations to me, and I love helping people who are just getting going in this in this area.
Laurie [0:40:53]: It can be really intimidating, but it doesn't have to be and you can start small.
Laurie [0:40:58]: So how many have these conversations?
Laurie [0:41:00]: If you have questions or wanna reach out, you can connect with me on Linkedin.
Laurie [0:41:04]: It's just at Laurie Pottmeyer.
Laurie [0:41:05]: And, yeah, I'd love to get in touch with people.
Juliet [0:41:09]: Thank you so much for your time today.
Juliet [0:41:10]: It's really lovely to chat to you and see you as always.
Juliet [0:41:13]: Thank you very much, and thank you
Laurie [0:41:15]: Thanks, Juliet.
Laurie [0:41:15]: Nice to talk with you.