The Community Accelerator Program
The Challenge
There are a lot of learning programs out there for folks who want to build customer communities, learning communities, or global networks of various kinds, but after some substantial benchmarking, we realized there wasn’t much available for community managers inside large organizations leading employee resource groups (ERGs), communities of practice, or other internal workplace communities. One of Cultivate’s core functions is to support this type of community building, so the challenge for this project was to build a new, flagship program specifically targeted at those community builders. We wanted to give them the tools, content, and social learning opportunities they would need to build and empower an amazing workplace community from the grassroots.
Many of the specific challenges of this design project stemmed from the context we identified during the persona development stage. Namely, our target persona was an exceptionally busy person with a lot of needs and a limited amount of time and resources.
Our Solution
To fill the gap we saw in the market and help people like our target persona working in companies around the world to develop new skills and knowledge as community leaders, we created the Community Accelerator program. I led the project to design and develop the new online, cohort-based learning program from the ground up using an iterative approach that included multiple rounds of design collaboration, feedback, and revision with internal and external SMEs and stakeholders. This included managing all aspects of the project from start to launch, conducting extensive research, designing all aspects of the learning program, and collaborating with our digital/print production specialist, our UX and learning design specialist, the course facilitator, and our marketing team to develop over a dozen separate physical and digital resources and tie everything together as one cohesive learning experience that would enable the participants to meet the four key objectives they needed most:
What We Made
Ultimately, we designed a hands-on, 6-week learning program that included…
Live Session Materials
over 300 slides and 14 hours of instructional content I designed for 8 live, online sessions (this gif shows just a small selection)
Participant Workbook
an 80-page, comprehensive, digital & print-based workbook designed by me and developed by our learning production specialist; the most critical resource in the program, designed to be useful both during instruction and long afterward
Data Tracking Template
a spreadsheet and digital dashboard created by our resident data specialist for tracking community-related metrics
Hands-On Learning Activities
dozens of activities designed in alignment with the objectives; used during live sessions or as independent practice between sessions
Slack
a dedicated Slack space for online collaboration with 15+ prompts I created to promote social learning and sharing between sessions
Pre-Reading Material
an online document called “Workplace Communities: Explained” designed to introduce participants to some of the core concepts around workplace communities they would be exploring in depth throughout the program
Supplemental Course Content
4+ blog posts I wrote to share additional self-paced content, examples, tools, and templates throughout the program
Course Evaluation
a post-program survey I designed and developed in Qualtrics as part of the overall evaluation strategy for the course
Inspiration Board
an interactive online inspiration board template and collaboration space in Miro
Card Deck
a new card deck (digital & printed) I designed to help participants design a clear “community personality” as one of the live activities in the program (image credit: Colleen Smith)
Digital Badge
a digital badge certifying achievement of the program objectives (visual design by our resident graphic designer)
Impact
After months of work, we launched the program for our first cohort in May 2021. Sixteen community leaders representing eleven companies participated.
When we collected their feedback at the end of the program, we received some great ideas for improvement that we rolled into our continuous improvement plan. We also saw lots of evidence that our program helped the cohort accomplish their goals and feel more empowered and confident as community leaders.
%
of participants said they felt more empowered after participating in the program
NPS Score
Several participants shared positive feedback about their experience in the program as a whole. This not only warms my little designer heart but also helps our team know what’s working, so we don’t lose those elements as we continue to improve the program for future cohorts:
“We have been looking at rituals a lot within our groups. The resources you’ve given us are fantastic and will be used as a resource for our volunteers for years to come.”
“I am doing this for the first time and underestimated this project. I am so glad that I came across this at the right time.”
“This was an incredible experience; the cohort was great – amazing first acceleration program!”
“The time spent sharing – hearing what others are doing – the facilitation abilities of Steve to guide us along. All really sooo well done. Having the community threads as a way to stay connected is also brilliant.”
Workbook & Selected Slides
More Info
- Read my blog post about how we designed the Community Accelerator program.
- Browse the research bibliography I created as I explored the academic and industry literature throughout the design process.
- See the Airtable I used as our home base for development collaboration throughout the project.
- Visit the official program landing page on Cultivate’s website.