Developing Community Is a Skill

I've not posted on this blog in ages, it seems. But again, I'm embarking on yet another journey of life, having closed the chapter before.

The school year has ended, and I just received my grades for Spring quarter. I've just returned from a fantastic conference down in Palm Springs, which has helped me refocus my priorities and re-center my life in my faith, and I'm currently "back-in-the-real-world" at Berkeley learning about how to mentor and teach students.

One particular point of learning I want to share is how building communities takes practice and skill--along with a good dose of passion and love for those around you. Communities are nebulous things, but they can still be created, and I'm both humbled and impressed at the abilities of the people at Resolved, as well as the staff at NSLC here. They have all demonstrated their prowess in building community.

The nature and definition of communities is a whole topic in and of itself, and how to build community is all but a multi-chapter book, but here are some musings:

1. Community Starts with a Shared Commitment
Sounds simple, but the weakest communities that I have been a part of have failed at this point. Either the leader has imposed a set of commitments to follow, no shared commitments have been delineated, or an agreement without any accountability has been created. At the very least, a set of standards need to be clearly stated and consistently followed--Rick begins the whole conference with worship, prayer, and then carefully calls attention to the theme of the conference. The NSLC staff--on the first night--sit down and share their expectations and norms to follow.

Most importantly, it takes skills: our discussion leader for NSLC clearly prepared for this discussion, having speakers with music to fill the gaps when we were thinking, having poster paper taped to the walls, having clear prompts, skittles for icebreakers, etc. Her questions were clearly refined and rehearsed, and her ability to focus discussion required trained listening.

2. Small Stuff REALLY Matters:
*Really* fancy wristbands that say "Resolved" that glow in the dark? Five Egyptian cotton polo shirts with NSLC written on them? Book giveaways, fancy binders with logos printed? Having a dress code that requires business formal and wearing a nametag at *all* times? These things seem so tangential to the actual mission, and take a huge amount of money and time to prepare (giving books to 4000 people is not cheap or easy). However, these things create unity and a rather visible sense of community--and accountability. When the nebulous overarching goals of a community are intangible, these will continue to bind people together. More importantly, if there is hierarchy of order, having different colored shirts is a big plus :).

3. Make Things Fun and Personal:
The more personal, the more immediate, and the more fun/engaging--the stronger the community. Break groups up, give options, let people exercise agency, play games to introduce concepts--most of all, give people space to express their ideas. Even if those ideas aren't adopted, make space!

4. Administration Is Key:
Hilarious to say this, but NSLC and Resolved both succeeded because they had a huge team of people working behind the scenes to do... office work. Boring, bureaucratic, "dumb" work. Sending emails, walkie-talkies, phone numbers, fax machines, copying, buying supplies, dealing with budgets. When building larger communities, this kind of work is a full-time job for a dedicated staff. But in any community, this kind of administrative work forms a backbone to anything else that happens--if a Bible Study decides to send out emails, somebody needs to be on it. If an a cappella group decides to share prayer requests, somebody needs to be on it. Community-building takes concerted work and organization.


In closing, I think ultimately a community is built on "fuzzier stuff"--caring for another, mutual respect, etc--but solid skills are needed to bring them to fruition. I wonder how these ideas can be brought back to, say, RUF... things like T-shirts and advertisements might actually go a long way, and having interns spend more time dealing with administrative "stuff" (e.g. sending emails when needed), or breaking into smaller, randomized discussion groups *during* large group to improve the personal and fun aspect of things (rather than just getting a sermon).