Community of Practice
How-to guide
This guide provides steps to set up and maintain a community of practice (CoP).
A CoP is a group of people who share a common interest or passion, who regularly interact to deepen their knowledge, share their expertise, and solve problems within a specialised domain. CoPs are a knowledge-sharing model that focuses on a specific topic or area of practice to help professionals build their skills and knowledge within that domain.
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Membership is voluntary and may change over time.
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It fosters collective learning through shared experience and best-practice to connect professionals and create partnerships to bridge gaps in professional knowledge.
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It generally disbands when interest fades or evolves to focus on a different vision.
Step 1. Purpose and vision
Identify the reason for the CoP existing.
- Define the shared topic of interest: What topic, skill, or challenge are you bringing people together for?
- Clarify the value proposition: Why does this CoP matter for members?
- Set a simple vision statement: What does success look like in 6-12 months?
Step 2. Roles
Identify who should be involved and how they will contribute. Leadership and roles may differ based on the topic of interest and vision statement.
- Sponsor or champion: A leader who provides visibility and support. This is usually a senior stakeholder who may help secure resources and advocate for the group’s value.
- Coordinator: Responsible for logistics and scheduling, including organising CoP meetings, the agenda, and taking minutes.
- Chair: Responsible for preparing and hosting CoP sessions. Some CoPs use rotating chairs to distribute responsibility.
- Subject matter expert (SME): Responsible for providing content expertise where required. Participant: Anyone interested in learning, sharing, or improving practice.
Note
A CoP commonly includes individuals that hold multiple roles. Some roles could also be filled by rotating volunteers.
Step 3. Structure and governance
A key step when forming a CoP that is sustainable is shared expectations on decision-making, communication, and participation. This creates psychological safety and shared ownership.
- Discuss the purpose and vision of the group.
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Introduce members and set expectations:
- Discuss norms for participation, communication and decision-making.
- Create an agenda template with recurring items for sharing/ discussion.
- Create a charter to hold everyone to account to agreed expectations. This is also valuable for new members once the group is established.
- Consider how new members join and get oriented.
- Consider role rotation to keep engagement high.
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Identify the frequency of sessions:
- Monthly or bi-monthly sessions work well to encourage momentum.
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Consider networking and sharing opportunities
- Use communication channels like Microsoft Teams or a mailing list to continue engagement between sessions.
- Encourage sharing with member networks to extend reach and align with broader organisational priorities.
- Consider keeping the group semi-structured to allow for clear guidelines without too much red tape.
- Subsequent meetings may use an agenda to guide the meeting. It may include:
- A presentation – Share information and discuss best practice.
- A case study – Present/ discuss a case or issue that has been encountered in practice.
- Recommendation(s) – Provide advice and/or recommendations based on a problem or issue presented to the group.
- Roundtable discussion – Interaction and discussion on key topics of interest.
The first session
Subsequent sessions
Step 4. Evaluation
By defining success in Step 1, there is clear criteria to track progress and assess the value of the CoP. Below are some tips to evaluate a CoP using the Kirkpatrick Model.
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| Learning |
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| Behaviour |
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