Supporting Communities of Practice: 5 Facilitation Tips for Authentic Learning
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Many nonprofits and funders are turning to communities of practice to facilitate learning and deepen impact. What exactly is a Community of Practice? Communities of practice are made up of “groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.” Before 2020, many communities of practice took place in person, but COVID has required people to recreate community, to reimagine how they bring people together and facilitate meaningful connection. Further, more and more of these communities are digging into racial equity and other complex systemic challenges, making authentic connection all the more critical.
At Engage R+D, we partner with nonprofits and their funders on several communities of practice across the country – in some cases as the facilitator and in other cases as the evaluator. These communities cover a range of issues including workforce, education, youth development, systems change, and racial equity. The stakes are high, with organizations and individuals giving their time and expertise, learning and listening with peers, and aiming to build their own practices, and their field. How are these communities building connection and deepening shared learning around tough issues in a virtual environment? Looking across these diverse communities, we have identified five helpful facilitation practices.
Prioritize connection. People want to connect more than ever. Within large groups, think small when it comes to agendas and activities. This might mean going lighter on content for large groups or having more time for smaller group discussions and larger group share outs. For example, as part of one of our evaluations, we hosted focus groups with just 3-4 questions for the group to discuss. We purposely limited the amount of questions so that participants had room to share, connect, and call in others to speak or offer their own questions to the group. This allowed room for the group to make the conversation their own, ignited collective curiosity and sharing, and strengthened relationships among participants. In another example from a community we are currently facilitating, we created a meeting norm that the first twenty minutes of every session will be dedicated to participants celebrating recent work-related wins or sharing personal or professional updates with the rest of the community. This time has allowed for relationships and connections to develop organically across the lifespan of this group’s work. Another activity that we commonly incorporate into community practice spaces is the Peer Consultancy. This activity helps participants practice how to dive deeper into a specific issue and gain support from peers to develop new insights and ideas.
Model the culture you wish to create. Take care in how you structure and hold space. For example, if you are looking to cultivate creativity, inclusivity, reflection, and authenticity, find ways to show what this looks like in practice. This could mean bringing your whole self to the role and sharing what you are noticing about your own engagement and/or appreciating in others. Sharing past experience teaching, performing, or creating/admiring different forms of art can grant others the permission to activate the playful, creative, and empathic parts of themselves. For example, the incorporation of poetry readings, such as Amanda Gorman’s “The Hill We Climb”, into a community of practice session with nonprofit leaders helped us frame conversations about collective change and what it means to disrupt systems of oppression. It also set the tone for participants to engage in conversations about issues of internal bias, anti-Black racism, and colorism in communities. Within our own team of facilitators, the incorporation of this poem inspired us to reflect on “the hill we climb'' in our community of practice work – what we are grappling with concerning these complex topics, the roles we play in shaping the culture within the community of practice, and how the overall experience is shaping us.
Surface and prioritize complex issues such as racial identity. Discussing difficult topics such as racism and oppression can bring about complex emotions and issues around identity, both within communities of practice and within teams of facilitators. Internally, we have found it helpful to discuss power dynamics and positionality within the facilitation team. Are there conversations better suited for one facilitator to lead versus another? Who has the lived experience to facilitate sometimes uncomfortable and necessary discussions that will ensure inclusive dynamics for all community of practice participants? In a field (of evaluation, philanthropy, and nonprofit activism) where white supremacist norms have prevailed, facilitating and supporting a community of diverse practitioners means discussing and navigating issues of dominance. These conversations, while necessary, are not always easy. Because of this, we have shifted from the idea of a “safe space” for sharing to a “brave space” for engaging as an invitation for everyone to gather their courage and lean into the discomfort associated with discussing challenging issues. Even with this invitation, it is wise to recognize when different forms of support might be needed and to be open to bringing in an external facilitator or supporting a CoP participant to facilitate or co-facilitate.
Lean into participant ownership. Communities of practice are most successful when facilitators work with participants to co-create agendas and experiences. Developing initial learning goals with participants is often a good starting point. However, from there, the process is often non-linear, requiring ongoing exploration around shared purpose and goals. Your facilitation and evaluation skills can help you shape questions to gain clarity: How do we engage around a shared vision or commitment? How do we gain buy-in? How do we support networking and collaboration? Approaching collaboration with an open mind and exploring multiple angles helps to increase participant ownership of these learning spaces. For example, as part of a community of practice we facilitate that includes both grantees and funders, we recently introduced an optional, funder-free space just for grantees. In this peer space, grantees set the agenda, shared updates, identified opportunities to collaborate, and discussed critical issues pertaining to the development of a collective vision for their work. Although this space is new, the connections, sharing, and coordination that we witnessed among grantees is inspiring! We look forward to seeing how this additional space contributes to conversations in the larger community of practice about the collective change and the vision for this important work.
Bring joy. We are all tired of Zoom, which makes it important to come up with creative ways to make things feel as “unZoom” as possible when we gather virtually. Many members of our team draw inspiration from Priya Parker, who asserts,“We need to be creative and bold in how we are gathering.” Our team actively seeks ways to bring levity and design gatherings that we would want to be a part of with clever themes, art, poetry, inspirational quotes, videos, and other forms of media. For example, we all know music can be a powerful mood booster. We open gatherings with fun tunes that fit the themes of community of practice sessions. My personal favorite is "Lovely Day" by Bill Withers or “With You” by Eryn Allen Kane. Asking communities of practice members ahead of time about what songs they would like to hear during sessions is also a great way to promote participant ownership of the space and allow people to get to know each other on a different level. Plus, the songs can be shared with everyone as a playlist.
Bringing humanity into communities of practice, especially during the past two years, has been really powerful. It takes thoughtfulness, openness, and vulnerability/courage to redefine how we collectively show up and to center the human experience. As poet Toi Derricotte penned: “joy is an act of resistance.” Like others, we are intentional about bringing joy, creating opportunities for human connection, and building community as we leverage learning, a critical tool in our effort to achieve racial equity and justice.
