Introduction
I’m seeing a surge of interest, labor, and questions popping up around the topic of our co-communities from all directions, and I’m taking that as a good sign that it’s time to really start coordinating our efforts. My goal with this topic is to create a container for discussion, questions, and ideation where the folks who are doing labor related to Co-Community Relationships (CCR) can weigh in and share their experiences.
Note that while topics like tithing and ambassador payments are relevant to this conversation, there is also another Discourse topic for diving deeper into Incentive Structures on its way. I encourage you to join the conversation there as well!
Context
Definitions:
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What do I mean when I say “co-community”? A co-community is any web3 project utilizing the SourceCred product, which we may or may not have an ongoing relationship with.
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What do I mean when I say “ambassador”? An ambassador is a contributor within the SC community who acts as a point of contact and support for a specific co-community utilizing our product.
- (Note, I’m happy to change this term in the future, but we need a word for this so we can talk about it.)
What is the “Co-Community Relationships Sub-Circle”?
Within the over-arching department called “Ecosystems” there are five “sub-circles” aka five primary areas of responsibility related to the successful management of our ecosystem.
- To learn more about the emerging org structure of the Ecosystems Department as a whole, checkout this in-progress Miro Board.
The “Co-Community Relationships” sub-circle is the area of focus and responsibility related to how we maintain effective and positive relationships with those communities utilizing our product.
- Once fully organized, this circle would do and manage the labor involved in screening potential co-communities, onboarding new co-communities to our product/support system, providing ongoing support to active co-communities, and ending relationships with co-communities as needed.
- This circle would have the authority to decide the best ways to organize that labor on our end, how we filter incoming interest from new co-communities, when we offer commitment to support co-communities, and what services we do/do not offer to co-communities.
Call to Action
At this time, most of the labor related to managing and supporting our co-community relationships is being done ad hoc by individual contributors who may or may not be in communication with each other and generally have low coordination or support in their crucial efforts. Our goals in setting up some structure for the Ecosystems Department as a whole, and the Co-Community Relationships circle in particular, is to increase our ability to be aligned, supported, intentional, and effective in our labor together. One of the first steps to creating a supportive structure is to learn from the folks who are on the ground managing those relationships right now.
So, if you’re doing labor related to managing relationships with our co-communities, we want to know:
- How would you categorize and describe the Co-Community Relationships labor you’re currently performing?:
- Ambassadorship
- Technical support/maintenance
- Other (describe)
- Which co-communities are you supporting right now?
- What types of labor do you regularly perform for those co-communities? (Stick to categorizing types of labor for now, try not to list out every contribution/action.)
- What is the biggest challenge you face while doing this work?
- What type of co-community support work is needed, but isn’t being done right now?
- What kind of support or resource would have the biggest impact on your ability to do this work well?
- Any other burning questions/points of information you think are important to take into consideration as we flesh out our understanding of this circle.
If you’re doing this labor, please share your insights in the comments. We’re eager to hear from you!
And remember, there’s also an Incentive Structures topic on its way for hashing out opinions around tithing, compensation for ambassadors, financial sustainability via the ecosystem, and other monetary incentive considerations within our ecosystem.