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Are you passionate about transforming higher education and joining a network of university changemakers? In this design guide, learn how to create your own community of practice using the i5 Canvas and dive into the i5 Framework.
by Bea UniversityRodriguez-FransenDesignInstitute
Design Your Own Community of Practice: How to Use the Canvas to Transform Higher Ed
i5
This is where a community of practice can amplify your work.
Welcome, University Designers!
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If you are passionate about the future of higher education and joining a global network of university changemakers, this design guide is for you. Wherever you are in the world, and whichever role you currently serve, you have the capacity to profoundly transform the lives of learners and leaders in your community. You may already be transforming your institution in meaningful ways; but what if you could further strengthen and scale your work at great speed?
What is a Community of Practice (CoP)?4 Design Your CoP 6 i5 Canvas 7 Table of Contents Applying the I5 Framework 8 Imagine Life Cycle of a Community of Practice 26 InnovateInfluenceInspireInform Tips from CoP Leaders 35 About the University Design Institute 36 Resources & References 37 Just Like Trees... 39 Community Rhythm24 Why start a CoP? 13
Although educational theorists Etienne Wenger and Jean Lave coined the term Community of Practice (CoP) in 1991, the concept of CoPs has existed long before then. In many sectors and cultures around the world, groups of people have gathered together to learn from one another, develop and master new skills, and co-create new knowledge. A few examples are artists forming a writing group that meets weekly at a cafe, first-time managers in a company convening regularly to share best practices with one another, or female entrepreneurs participating in monthly roundtable sessions.
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WHAT is a Community of Practice?
Simply put, it is: a group of people who share a concern or passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly (Wenger-Trayner, 2015).
Regardless of their shared domain of human endeavor, they all engage in a common process: creating an intellectual commons and harnessing the group’s collective wisdom, which often leads to innovations in their practice that they would not have been able to achieve alone.
But first...
Occasional members who sporadically engage with the community
Members engage in joint activities and discussions, help each other, and share information (WengerTrayner, 2015). Often, there are three types of members:
Core members who lead and facilitate meetings
Three Elements of Community of Practice
Active members who regularly participate in the community
It is up to you to determine how to define each type of member and their particular roles.
Community
Practice
Community of practice members are practitioners. As part of the GUD Network, they advance the field of education by developing a shared repertoire of resources: experiences, stories, tools, ways of addressing recurring problems, and innovations that not only transform the way we teach and learn, but also the way we collaborate with others to address some of the world’s complex problems, including socioeconomic inequality and our planet’s sustainability. Practitioners disseminate these innovations widely, continuously expanding their knowledge and expertise throughout the world.
This refers to the community’s shared identity defined by a domain of interest: a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic. In the GUD Network, communities of practice are passionate about re-designing the future of higher education. Because there are many aspects to transforming universities, some communities of practice may choose to focus on a specific topic, such as digital transformation or curriculum and pedagogy.
Domain
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And...
-Allison Hall, Learning Experience CoP
We interviewed current Community of Practice leaders across our university, and here are some of their Whys for wanting to start a CoP:
"There are a few people around campus who have the title of culture in their role, or tend to be culturecentric. Little by little, we found kindred spirits through social networking. We realized there was a deep hunger on campus for culture-centric practices, tools, community sharing."
"I was looking around the university for like-minded individuals to learn from, share ideas, especially outside of our own department. I didn’t have a lot of success finding them, but slowly started finding people who might not have been in user experience (UX) roles, but were passionate about UX, or interested in moving into UX, doing similar things (looking at data and surveys, designing wireframes or mockups). We started creating a group, including my own team, that allowed us to share ideas and projects. The original purpose was to have a place where we can talk about UX. As my team grew, people started wanting to learn more about tactics and methodologies. "
WHY would you start a CoP?
"We wanted the faculty to have a CoP so they can support one another, learn and connect with each other... We help them with the learning design process and identifying which digital tools are the best ones to use in their courses. "
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-Amanda Gulley, UX Collaborative CoP
-Cary Lopez, Culture Ripples CoP
If you are convening your community online, we recommend using a digital whiteboard such as Miro, which allows your members to post their ideas in real-time. You can view the i5 Canvas Template on Miro here.
Design Your Community of Practice Using the i5 Canvas
If you are meeting with members face to face, feel free to print the canvas on larger-sized paper. You can access the printable i5 Canvas PDF here. Individuals can write their ideas on sticky notes and post them so that the entire group can see everyone's input.
i5 Community of Practice Canvas
The i5 Canvas, as you will see on page 8, is a one-page community of practice (CoP) planning template created by the University Design Institute. It’s designed to help you brainstorm and plan various aspects of your own CoP. Check out a completed example of a group brainstorm on page 9 and a synthesis on page 11.
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Vision Mission
Influence
The i5 Canvas is a one-page template that helps you brainstorm and develop a community of practice (CoP). It should be regarded as a "living document" and is not meant to be finalized in one session. You may choose to work on the canvas on an ongoing basis, working on one component each time your community meets. The Values, Vision, Mission and Community Rhythm blocks collectively serve as the foundation for everything that you do in your CoP.
i5Canvas
by Bea Rodriguez Fransen
Who will be in this community? Who will be your core leaders, and what are their roles?
Values Community Rhythm
Imagine
Innovate
Why does your CoP exist?
How can you support one another as you re-design your universities?
What is the meeting cadence for your CoP (schedule, space, modalities)?
What new knowledge will you cocreate?
Imagine your community 1 year from now: what do you see, hear and feel? With your community, brainstorm your values, vision and mission.
How can you become thought leaders? How can you celebrate your stories with one another and the world?
How can you prototype and test your innovation before launching it?
Share a short, inspiring, memorable statement on what success means for this CoP.
Inform
How can you engage decision-makers in the higher education sector to change policies and practices?
How will you share knowledge and skills and practice them with one another?
What do you want to learn from one another?
Inspire
What are the principles that will guide your actions in this CoP?
Invite them to panelistsbecome and guest speakers in conveningannual Set changeandandcurrentunderstandmakerswithmeetingsdecision-topoliciespractices,howwethem
Inform
Values Community Rhythm
Inspire
Innovate
Use DialogueGUD Cards to makerswithconversationssparkdecision-
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What do you want to learn from one another?
How can you become thought leaders? How can you celebrate your stories with one another and the world?
Create own
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Imagine your community 1 year from now: what do you see, hear and feel? With your community, brainstorm your values, vision and mission.
How can we engage decisionmakers in the higher education sector to change policies and practices?
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Who will be in this community? Who will be your core leaders, and what are their roles?
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What new knowledge will you cocreate? How can you prototype and test your innovation before launching it? How can you support one another as you redesign your universities?
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After brainstorming and engaging in dialogue about the group's ideas, take some time to synthesize your collective work. See the example on page 9.
Whichever method you choose to fill out the i5 Canvas, it's important that you capture a diversity of perspectives, and that everyone in the community feels heard. For example, after collecting everyone's input under "Imagine," lead a discussion by asking your group which sticky notes could be grouped together, and ask them to name the different categories. This often prompts people to ask clarifying questions, and individuals may be asked to elaborate on their idea. They may also disagree with the way ideas are categorized, which becomes a good opportunity to discuss ideas and crystallize what the community of practice wants to focus on. Some may want to add their new ideas during the course of the discussion.
You may choose to take your time with finalizing your values, vision, and mission statements. For ideas on how to create them as a group, see our Community of Practice Leaders' Toolkit.
Synthesize Your Ideas of Practice Canvas
The i5 Canvas should be regarded as a "living document" and is not meant to be finalized in one session. You may choose to work on the canvas on an ongoing basis, working on one component each time your community meets. Another way is to organize a day-long retreat to complete the brainstorm and begin discussing various aspects of your community of practice.
i5 Community
Include university provosts and deans in meetings, events and conferences
Invite them to become panelists and guest speakers in annual convening
What new knowledge will you cocreate? How can you prototype and test your innovation before launching it? How can you support one another as you redesign your universities?
Faculty, Student Researchers, Funders, Technologists, Social Media Specialists, IT professionals, university leaders (provosts, deans, research professionals)
How can you become thought leaders? How can you celebrate your stories with one another and the world?
Explore free online repository for research data
How to collaborate with other universities
Prototyping and testing new models and practices in groups Presentations (online & offline)
Imagine
Annual convening (face to face)
Create social media platforms and post regularly (LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube)
Attend conferences and share stories of failures and successes
How to pool resources to undertake joint research
We will test our platform before launching it to the public
We will conduct interdisciplinary research to address social problems including income and wealth inequality, public health, sustainability
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Influence
Create website that features stories and online repository of research
Imagine your community 1 year from now: what do you see, hear and feel? With your community, brainstorm your values, vision and mission.
Meet virtually for 1 hour, once a month Members meet offline as often as they want Convene members annually, face to face
We will co-create an online repository of open-source research data
Values
Vision
Set meetings with decision-makers to understand current policies and practices, and how we change them
What do you want to learn from one another?
Mission
Who will be in this community?
Innovate
To co create and disseminate interdisciplinary knowledges that address social problems, in our communities and the world
How to collaborate across the university
Inform
Publish articles and stories, both scholarly and multimedia formats
Diversity, equity, inclusion, justice Trust Interdisciplinarity Collaboration
How will you share knowledge and skills and practice them with one another?
Inspire
A community of learners and teachers collaborating to help shape the future of interdisciplinary knowledge generation and research. There's a sense of belonging and a feeling of connectedness among members.
How to create an intellectual commons that is open-source and accessible to all
Informal discussions (online & offline)
Universities in our region are contributing to a shared, interdisciplinary intellectual commons via open source software that can be accessed by all
Joy
Community Rhythm
How can we engage decisionmakers in the higher education sector to change policies and practices?
Imagine
How can you become thought leaders? How can you celebrate your stories with one another and the world?
Values Community Rhythm
What do you want to learn from one another?
Imagine your community 1 year from now: what do you see, hear and feel? With your community, brainstorm your values, vision and mission.
i5Canvas
by Bea Rodriguez Fransen
Who will be in this community? Who will be your core leaders, and what are their roles?
How can you prototype and test your innovation before launching it?
What is the meeting cadence for your CoP (schedule, space, modalities)?
What new knowledge will you cocreate?
How can you support one another as you re-design your universities?
Influence
Inform
How can you engage decision-makers in the higher education sector to change policies and practices?
How will you share knowledge and skills and practice them with one another?
Why does your CoP exist?
The i5 Canvas is a one-page template that helps you brainstorm and develop a community of practice (CoP). It should be regarded as a "living document" and is not meant to be finalized in one session. You may choose to work on the canvas on an ongoing basis, working on one component each time your community meets. The Values, Vision, Mission and Community Rhythm blocks collectively serve as the foundation for everything that you do in your CoP.
Share a short, inspiring, memorable statement on what success means for this CoP.
What are the principles that will guide your actions in this CoP?
Innovate
Inspire
Vision Mission
The Frameworki5 i5 Community of Practice Canvas
Learn more about each i5 component on the following pages.
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What is this community's vision for the higher education sector?
Be patient and give your community as much time as it needs to agree on the answers to these questions.
When you have finished revising your values, vision and mission statements, fill out the corresponding boxes in the i5 Canvas.
Imagine 15
Questions to consider asking your members include:
Who will be in this community? How do we identify members?
What impact will this community make on higher education in the future--1 year, 3 years, 5 years from now? What specific activities will this community do?
What values does our community choose to uphold?
Activate your community’s imagination by conducting visioning exercises and brainstorming sessions. For ideas on how to facilitate these sessions, see our Community of Practice Leaders' Toolkit.
How do we create a sense of belongingness and emotional connection?
What knowledge and skills would you like to share with others?
How would you like to share and practice your knowledge and skills?
A primary purpose of a community of practice is to share knowledge and skills with one another. Sharing knowledge--rather than hoarding it--increases the collective intelligence and wisdom of the group, and creates opportunities to co-create new knowledge and innovative solutions that they would have not been able to create alone. Key questions to ask your community are:
Answers would depend on the composition of your membership. Depending on your group, you may want to recruit more members to ensure that there is diversity of knowledge and skill sets that the group can benefit from. Finally, gauge the comfort level of your members when it comes to sharing information: do they prefer sharing in-person or certain software or online platforms over others?
Inform
What would you like to learn from and with others?
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To encourage information sharing with one another, leaders must be intentional about creating a sense of psychological safety among members. One way to foster feelings of trust and safety is through teambuilding exercises; we provide some examples in the Team Connections section in our Community of Practice Leaders' Toolkit. You will also find a resource on how to provide feedback, some popular online platforms that communities of practice use, plus a video tutorial on how to use Miro, a digital tool for creative collaboration in real-time.
How can you become thought leaders in higher education, beyond the traditional publications in journals and participation in academic conferences? How will you share your stories of successes and failures, within and outside of your community of practice?
Inspire
Sharing your stories digitally can quickly share your wisdom. Whether it is a 2-min video, a blog article, or a short e-book, you can publish them on your preferred medium, such as your social media or website. To learn how to tell compelling stories using UDI's STORI Framework, see our Community of Practice Leaders' Toolkit.
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Because our world is changing so rapidly, the new knowledge and initiatives we cocreate must be quickly shared and amplified. Key questions to ask your community are:
At the heart of inspiring others is sharing your knowledge and wisdom with others in compelling ways. Traditionally, those in the higher education sector share their expertise through books and scholarly articles, published in journals and presented in annual conferences. This method is one way to become thought leaders in a particular field, as it has been effective in sharing knowledge and innovative ideas with other scholars in the field. However, it may take months or even years to get published in journals or have the opportunity to present at an annual conference.
At the University Design Institute, we believe in collaborating with diverse actors in the higher education sector--including university leaders and students, policymakers, business and industry professionals, philanthropic institutions, civil society members--to create large-scale change in our educational systems. Large-scale change can only happen if you are able to influence decision-makers to recognize your innovation efforts within your institution.
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Influence
For ideas on how to engage policymakers and decision-makers using the University Design Institute's GUD Dialogue Cards as well as other tools, see our Community of Practice Leaders' Toolkit.
How might your community of practice influence decision-makers in the higher education sector? Decision-makers could be your colleagues, university leaders, policymakers, funders and philanthropic leaders, or corporations in your region.
A key theme that emerged in our interviews of current CoP leaders across the university is the need to influence senior leaders to support the existence and growth of communities of practice. In many cases, CoP leaders have convinced their administration to embed their CoP activities as part of their job roles and responsibilities. They have used data, both quantitative and qualitative, to show university leaders the value of their respective communities of practice.
In the process of sharing knowledge, tools, and processes with one another, your CoP may co-create innovations that transform the ways we teach and learn, operate our universities, or collaborate with others to address the world's complex problems. Key questions to consider are:
What is one change you'd like to see in your university? In the higher education sector in general?
How can you support one another in your quest to transform higher education?
CoP members may choose to disseminate innovations widely, throughout their community or the world. For example, at ASU's User Experience (UX) Collaborative CoP, one student member helped the university create a new competency that didn't exist before: immersive design. Through the CoP, staff were able to nurture students' thinking, encouraging them to develop ideas that advance education. The student is now a professional staff member, leading two full-time employees and growing his team. They are now building out proofs of concept on how to use virtual reality, augmented reality, and game design to enhance educational outcomes, and scaling them across the university.
How can you prototype and test your innovation before launching it?
Innovate
There may be times when you want an external facilitator to co-design innovative solutions with you. If you would like the University Design Institute to co-design solutions with you, contact us at udi@asu.edu
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To generate momentum and build team camaraderie, it's important to establish a cadence for your community of practice, and agree on a regular schedule and space to meet up, whether online or offline.
Community Rhythm
For ideas on how to establish your own community rhythm, see our Community of Practice Leaders' Toolkit.
Community rhythm also refers to the flow of each meeting. This would depend on the style and culture of your team, or how your facilitators choose to structure each meeting.
When you have determined the cadence of your meetings, fill out the corresponding box in the i5 Canvas. The needs and schedules of your members may change over time, so be prepared to be flexible and revise it as appropriate.
Community Rhythm
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Tips from CoP Leaders
Conducting post-event surveys is helpful. Through them, we've found that people leave our events feeling inspired. We take our work seriously but we don't take ourselves too seriously; this really resonates with people. They also feel like their voices are heard here; that may not necessarily be the case in their school or company. They feel like they can come here and have a conversation about things that are important to them.
When we first started in 2018, we tapped into our unit's networks and database. Currently, our biggest avenue for recruiting new people is LinkedIn. We set up a LinkedIn page as an affiliate page of the main ASU page; so what we post there can be potentially seen by the 700,000 people that follow ASU's page. I also do podcast interviews to recruit new members. Today, we have more than 4,000 community members from all over the world.
Engagement among your members is critical. You can gather numbers and attendee data to demonstrate your reach, but the most difficult and time-consuming part is engagement. It has to be a two-way communication: don't just push information out there; ask people, "What's going on in your community? What are the hot button issues for you at this time?" We distill their responses and create workshops and events around them.
Tips from CoP Leaders
Best practices and lessons learned from leaders of Communities of Practice
Recruiting and engaging 4,000+ members
"We take our work seriously but we don't take ourselves too seriously; this reallyresonates with people."
-Stephanie Pierotti, ShapingEDU CoP
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In both Culture Weavers and Culture Ripples communities of practice, we intentionally build pathways to belonging, by implementing clear action steps. One way of deeply connecting with each other in our community is by doing appreciative interviews. In our Culture Ripples CoP, we asked members to interview one or more people in their respective realms. We used the qualitative data themes to inform our Innovation Quarter events. The results also led to the co-creation of a new Innovation course, taught by one of our faculty members.
I start meetings with a minute of silence and a reflective question. We then share our answers in a check-in format, one by one. Over time, this practice raises people's awareness of themselves and of one another. As I share, I feel connected with other people. This is especially effective in Zoom calls, when they could be easily distracted by email or work to do on their computer. Doing this simple practice at the beginning of each meeting brings a moment of centering.
To start and grow your own community of practice, it is vital that you help people get connected to themselves and each other. Also, ask your members to come up with ways, over time, to continually weave and integrate what they learn in your community into their day to day work in their respective units. I emphasize presence and connection; when we deliberately practice being fully present as individuals, we are available to connect with one another and with what's coming into the field.
-Christine Whitney Sanchez, Culture Weavers & Culture Ripples CoP
Tips from CoP Leaders
Being centered and connected with one another
"When we deliberatelypractice being fullypresent as individuals, we are available to connect with one another and with what's coming into the field."
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From then on, we began each meeting by stating our purpose and norms. Now the community is much more understanding and collaborative. Our community understands that being part of our CoP is not a transactional experience; it's really an ongoing transformation experience.
-Allison Hall, Learning Experience CoP
We launched at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, because we wanted faculty to have a CoP where they can learn, connect with, and support each other. However, learning technology businesses have been volatile; sometimes, they go out of business without warning. In several cases, we had adopted learning technologies that went out of business. So when we started transitioning to new technologies, faculty thought we were taking something away from them. There were a lot of negative, angry feelings; it was very contentious.
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Tips from CoP Leaders
"Co-creating norms helped shift the tide ofadversarial relationships to collaborative ones. "
Addressing conflicts & co-creating norms
We then asked the community to co-create our purpose statement and norms. We asked: are our actions and words contributing to our purpose? They then realized that accusations were not helpful for building progress or trust. Together, we created and agreed upon a list of norms, including speaking respectfully with one another.
-Susan Wynn, Project Management Network CoP
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-Danielle B. Steele, Project Management Network CoP
Early on, when we first started meeting, we realized that two of our members were working two disparate projects: one for parking, and one for fleet management. The parking project manager wanted to implement a new software program that tracks vehicles in ASU parking lots. At the same time, our fleet services staff was evaluating technology solutions for tracking where our ASU vehicles are at any given time.
Tips from CoP Leaders
The result? Some savings were realized because the two project managers learned--through talking with each other--that they were able to use the same solution for both of their projects.
Developing professional skills
"We provide a fforum or people to meet and network and not have to reinvent the wheel."
"I noticed a gap that the Network could fill:offering education hours required Pfor MP exam eligibility."
Saving costs through collaboration
Between Fall 2016 and Spring 2019, a total of 131 of our CoP members completed our PMP (Project Management Professional) exam training. This counted towards their eligibility for the CAPM (Certified Associate in Project Management) and PMP certification exams. When the Project Management Institute announced that the PMP exam outline was significantly changing, we decided to forgo the course and offer a study group instead.
Of the 24 study group participants, 9 earned either their CAPM or PMP certification. One member shared: “At every step of the process, from completing my application, to memorizing formulas, to knowing what to expect on exam day, the members of the ASU PM Network generously shared their wisdom and experience." Not all participants choose to take the exam; some simply wanted the education so they could apply it directly to their jobs.
So this is what happens when you get people sitting at the same table together talking. Even though they're working in disparate units, they might end up being connected. This was one of our goals: to provide a forum for people to meet and network and not have to reinvent the wheel.
Using events-based programs to learn & practice new skills
Tips from CoP Leaders
Each year we have a theme. We then plan events that teach practical skills people can use immediately. Throughout the year, we offer "One-Hour Skill Mastery" workshops that are taught by ASU faculty and staff on a voluntary basis.
Our Organizational Excellence CoP wanted to do things better, faster, smarter across ASU. It's easy to gather people to meet, but we knew we needed to be events-based because it just works better in terms of engaging members. We also wanted to see a business result from our efforts: how can our ASU community think about things differently, learn new technologies and tools that they can use in their respective roles?
Once a month, we host a networking event attended by 20 40 people across the university, intentionally teaching techniques and opportunities to practice their elevator pitches. People make good connections, meet senior leaders, and sometimes end up collaborating on new projects.
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"The stronger the community is--the more that we can do for our students, faculty and others-the stronger the university will be.."
To find the bandwidth to get this done right, we ensured that our operational structure supported the CoP. I garnered support from my leadership, and it became part of the roles and responsibilities of my Organizational Excellence staff.
-Clayton Taylor, Organizational Excellence CoP
It's the only way we can sustain our CoP. We also partner with other ASU units such as American Change Management Association, Project Management, Leadership & Workforce Development, Global Outreach & Extended Education, and Business Analysis; and we have volunteer committee members who help us plan and execute our annual events.
"We leveraged our extra time innovatingand bringing new ideas to senior leaders."
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The design system and automation freed up our time. As a result, we leveraged our extra time innovating and bringing new ideas to senior leaders. We are constantly asking ourselves, how can we work smarter so we have time to solve bigger problems?
We also do more than what's requested of us. Executive staff don't always understand what our capabilities are. A lot of units are constantly asking us to do very tedious things. One of the things we did to address repetitive requests is building a design system. We asked ourselves: how do we become more efficient with our time, so we can have more time to innovate? So we built a design system with one designer and one developer, which automated some of the requests.
-Amanda Gulley, UX Collaborative CoP
Including students & influencing decision-makers
Tips from CoP Leaders
User Experience (UX) is a newer field: five years ago, my unit had one designer; now we're a team of 40. Our UX Collaborative community of practice, which now has 250 members, as well as my team have grown dramatically because of several things: 1) student engagement in our work, 2) leveraging data, and e) the support we've received from senior leaders. We hired students, and gave them challenging work. We asked them to present to university leaders, so we were able to show administrators that we could do more with more staff.
The most important piece is data. We partnered with an Analytics staff to figure out: how do we quantify the design and development to show people who have a business mindset how the work generates outcomes? We integrated Google Analytics and other tools, to help prove the value of UX to our senior leaders.
"Our members were able to craft their role in a way that they never have Tbefore. hey didn't have the language for it bbefore; ut now, they feltempowered to do the work."
-Cary Lopez, Culture Ripples CoP
Practicing skills and co-creating new knowledge
What’s inspiring for me is the empowerment that I’ve seen happen. Two of our members felt like they were the only lonely person in their unit who wanted to focus on helping colleagues feel like they are welcomed or belonged. Being part of our CoP gave our members the vocabulary to help make the case that culture work is important: it can impact retention and people’s productivity levels where they actually experience happiness at work. We were able to give some vocabulary and evidence-based practices that they can share with their bosses. Our members were able to say, "I want to add this formally to my role. Here’s what I believe the benefits are for our unit." Their bosses agreed and formally changed their job description! Our members were able to craft their role in a way that they never have before. They didn’t have the language for it before; but now, they felt empowered to do the work. These two cases are our prototypes; we are now thinking through how we can do this for more members.
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Tips from CoP Leaders
It's easy to become learning and development communities as opposed to practice. It's easy to bring experts to talk about best practices, but how do you build spaces to practice in a safe way? Our members didn't know how to take what they've learned and apply it in their respective environments; some were not in a position of authority to implement the changes that our experts had suggested. So we pivoted this year to address this. For example, we shared our Appreciate Inquiry tool and provided opportunities to use the tool during one of our sessions. Then they tried a couple of interviews in their respective organizations. This enabled them to use appreciative interviews to help strengthen community bonds, elicit strengths an common values of their organization.
Influencing senior leaders
"Because of their involvement with our CoP, business analysts across the university are becoming more confident and becoming leaders."
"Use data to show how awesome your efforts are as a Gcommunity. et administrators and deans excited and get them on board."
-Darci Nagy, ASU Open Door
What made us successful is using data to get senior leaders excited and on board. Every year we track the number of activities our community offers to the public and the number of attendees; and we gather feedback from participants. Our surveys show how awesome our program is: annually, up to 45,000 people attend ASU Open Door, and they love it! One child attendee said, "It's better than Disneyland!" We use our data to demonstrate to administrators and deans that we can take it up a notch.
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Tips from CoP Leaders
Now we have the support of management: some are now paying for IIBA (International Institute of Business Analysts) institutional memberships for their staff, which allows our CoP members to access to really great resources for business analysts.
When ASU Open Door started nine years ago, it was a huge success. It initially started as an open house to promote our College of Liberal Arts & Sciences. Eventually, it became so large that it became a university-wide event. Today, all four campuses participate, and we have built a community of 500 people who deliver annual interactive activities across all campuses during the month of February.
-Lesa King, Business Analysis CoP
Years ago, a colleague tried start a CoP for business analysis staff across our university. It had no support from senior management, so it failed.
Over a year ago, those who were interested in revitalizing the CoP. We worked on registering it as an employee organization at ASU. Through brown bag sessions, social activities, and new initiatives such as a book club, our CoP now has more than 105 members. With their new knowledge and skills, our members are becoming more confident, serving as leaders in various projects.
Iterating a CoP
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Define the activities, technologies, group processes, and roles that will support the community’s goals.
Engage members in collaborative learning and knowledge sharing activities, group projects, and networking events that meet individual, group, and organizational goals while creating an increasing cycle of participation and contribution.
Cultivate and assess the learning, knowledge, and products created by the community to inform new strategies, goals, activities, roles, technologies, and business models for the future. Does your CoP need to retire or change?
Phase 3: Prototype
Life Cycle of a Community of Practice
Every community of practice takes time to grow and develops at its own pace. Communities of practice will typically experience the following five phases of development:
Phase 4: Grow
Phase 5: Sustain/Transform
Adapted from Wenger et al (2002)
Phase 1: Inquire
Pilot the community with a select group of key stakeholders to gain commitment, test assumptions, refine the strategy, and establish a success story.
Identify the audience, purpose, goals, and vision for the community.
Phase 2: Design
Charles Labrador, Mi’kmaq Spiritual Leader, Healer, and Chief of Acadia First Nation, Nova Scotia (McMahon, Griese & Kenyon, 2019)
Just Like Trees...
Take, for example, how trees behave. When you step into a forest, you will notice trees standing quietly and independently; but look underground, and you’ll see vast networks of mycorrhizal fungi that connect these individual trees together, allowing them to communicate and share an enormous amount of information and nutrients, such as water, carbon, nitrogen, and minerals. Yes trees talk with one another and form networks! (Simard, 2016; Wohlleben, 2016). And instead of competing for resources, trees cooperate with one another so that all of them can thrive.
Just like trees, human beings that belong to a community of practice share knowledge and expertise with one another, united by a common concern or goal. We hope that this book will help your own communities of practice harness their collective intelligence in order to transform universities, and the world.
At the University Design Institute, we harness the wisdom of nature and become inspired by its strategies to help solve the most pressing challenges of our time.
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Mycorrhizal networks. Circles represent tree nodes, sized according to the tree’s diameter, and coloured with four different shades of yellow or green that increase in darkness with increasing age class. Lines represent the Euclidean distances between trees that are linked. Line width increases with the number of links between tree pairs (Beiler et al., 2009).
“Go into the forest, you see the birch, maple, pine. Look underground and all those trees are holding hands. We as people have to do the same.”
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Founded in 2019 at Arizona State University, the vision of the University Design Institute is simple yet profound: that universities around the world emerge as powerful engines of social transformation and economic impact.
About the University Design Institute
Our mission is to become a catalyst for transformation in higher education. We do this by reimagining the future, codesigning solutions with various stakeholders to move from ideas to implementation, and advancing innovative, scalable, and sustainable models. Our growing team is driven by six values:
Learn more at https://udi.asu.edu/
The work that we do is centered around six design imperatives that are critical to transformational change in higher education:
To date, we have engaged with 90 institutions in 20 countries, offering leadership programs, facilitating co-design sessions to transform various aspects of their universities, and engaging diverse stakeholders —including funders, policymakers, university leaders, and students—to work towards systems-level change. Now more than ever, it is vital that we intensify our work together in addressing the complex challenges that our world faces.
About the University Design Institute
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Articles
More Resources
Books
Vogl, Charles H. (2016). The art of community: Seven principles for belonging. Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.
Wenger, E., McDermott, R. & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating communities of practice. Harvard Business School Press.
Wenger-Traynor, E. & Wenger-Traynor, B. (2015). Introduction to communities of practice: A brief overview of the concept and its uses.
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Building Effective Communities of Practice by Arizona State University-ShapingEDU.
Websites
Cambridge, D., Kaplan, S. & Suter, V. (2005). Community of practice design guide. Educause. Snyder, W.M. & Briggs, X. (2003). Communities of practice: A new tool for government managers.
Webber, E. (2016). Building successful communities of practice: Discover how connecting people makes better organizations. Drew London Ltd.
Beiler, K.J., Durall, D.M., Simard, S.W., Maxwell, S.A. & Kretzer, A.M. (2009). Architecture of the wood-wide web. Rhizopogon spp. genets link multiple Douglas-fir cohorts. New Phytologist, 185(2), p. 543-553. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-8137.2009.03069.x
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References
McMahon, T.R., Griese, E.R. & Kenyon, D.B. (2019). Cultivating Native American scientists: An application of an Indigenous model to an undergraduate research experience. Cultural Studies of Science Education 14, 77-110.
Snyder, W.M. & Briggs, X. (2003). Communities of practice: A new tool for government managers. IBM Center for the Business of Government. https://www.businessofgovernment.org/sites/default/files/Communities%20of%20Practices.odf .pdf
Simard, S. (2016, June). How trees talk to each other [Video]. TEDSummit. https://www.ted.com/talks/suzanne_simard_how_trees_talk_to_each_other
Arizona State University. (2022). Building Effective Communities of Practice. ShapingEDU. https://shapingedu.asu.edu/communities of practice intro
Vogl, Charles H. (2016). The art of community: Seven principles for belonging. Berrett Koehler Publishers, Inc.
Cambridge, D., Kaplan, S. & Suter, V. (2005). Community of practice design guide. Educause.
Wenger, E., McDermott, R. & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating communities of practice: A guide to managing knowledge. Harvard Business School Press.
Wohlleben, P. (2016). The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate Discoveries from a Secret World. Greystone Books.
Wenger-Traynor, E. & Wenger-Traynor, B. (2015). Introduction to communities of practice: A brief overview of the concept and its uses. https://wenger-trayner.com/introduction-tocommunities of practice/