Community: a group of people living in the same place or having a particular characteristic in common.
When we think of community, some of us think of the cities we were born in, the teams we have joined or the places we have gone to school. But when you think about the communities that you have been or are currently part of what made those be the communities that you gravitated to instead of others? In this piece, I will touch on the communities that I have been part of and what I feel made them thrive.
The Hatch is a startup accelerator housed at Michigan State that gives access to talent, capital, and connections if accepted. The community I formed at The Hatch while building my startup LykeMe was the first time I really took notice of how communities are built outside of the ethnic/racial or religious ones that we are somewhat in by default when growing up. The first feature of this community was that everyone who came to The Hatch either as founders, employees, etc all had a passion for student entrepreneurship. The next thing that we had that made The Hatch community a tight one is that the more serious founders all wanted to help each other out any way we could. Whether that be through looking to partner or simply testing out each other's products and giving our feedback. Having a willingness to truly immerse ourselves in the ecosystem not only for our benefit but for the benefit of others is something that made the community at The Hatch stand out. Even today, although we have all moved past our companies we were building years ago we still stay in contact, and in order for a community to truly thrive you have to create a bond with people that are stronger than just the projects you are working on.
For those who have moved out of your home state or city before creating a community in a place where you have no family and minimal friends is a challenge that you are not taught how to tackle. I had to tackle this when I moved from Michigan to head to Washington D.C to take my first job in Product Management. More often than not I have found myself within a larger community albeit a university or a city and my true community comes from a micro-community within that larger space. In D.C I had two groups that I spent time with. The first was the people I worked with at U.S News & World Report and within that my true community were the people who worked within my vertical which was Autos and then the Education vertical. The central event that kept everyone together was something called Beer Fridays. Yep, its exactly what you think it is. Beer Fridays were when USN would have beer and snacks in the office and at 4 pm on the dot, people would go over to whichever part of the building it was in and chat with people that they may have not got to see all week. Having a consistent space to continue to drive connection is a feature of a community that is often overlooked. The second one I was part of was LunchBag Social, which aimed to feed homeless people in N.W D.C and also have people who are new to the city have a way to create connections in a city that has a lot of people who are implants from other parts of the U.S. Once a month we would get together for this and then after we would go to a bar to wind down. The physical space would change but the time and day would always be the same.
I could not write about the communities that I have joined without talking about ones that have made my transition to L.A easier. The Black USC community and the Marshall School of Business. Black USC are people from all over the U.S and the world that come to USC pursuing something that they are passionate about. Whether that be the arts, business, engineering, etc. What I especially like about the Black USC community is that it felt like folks were actually starting fresh. Vs at other schools it felt that the Black community was just a carryover from wherever folks went to high school or what cities they were from originally. Whether it be linking up at CBCSA, or going to BBB meetings I did feel an air of community building that was refreshing to be apart of. Without my cohort at Marshall, I would have not had the same experience hands down. We did not only learn from each other in the classroom but we spent many nights and days hanging out outside of the classroom which was great. Being able to have a community of folks from all different countries and backgrounds opened my worldview which I will always appreciate.
The common theme of all of the communities I am part of this that they are all micro-communities within a larger one. So if you ever find yourself floundering within a large community try and find the micro-communities inside of it that you most identify with.
Below are the 4 features that create strong communities for me.
People are willing to engage with the community
People invest in the community
People have a common goal or theme that ties them
People have a consistent space to interact with each other, whether it be planned or through serendipity
