Cohere Podcast

In this episode of the Cohere Podcast, hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas talk with community expert Betty Ray about the profound impact of rituals on personal and community well-being. Betty shares her extensive experience and research on the role of rituals in fostering belonging, purpose, and navigating transitions. The conversation delves into practical applications of ritual in both online and offline communities, offering valuable insights for anyone looking to create meaningful and supportive community spaces. Summary and Key Topics: 00:00:00 - Introduction Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas introduce the episode and guest, Betty Ray, highlighting her extensive background in community leadership and her recent focus on the positive role of ritual. 00:02:00 - Understanding Ritual Betty explains the concept of ritual, its historical context, and its benefits, emphasizing its role in fostering belonging, purpose, and helping individuals navigate transitions. 00:06:23 - Betty's Career and Community Rituals Betty shares her career journey, detailing her experiences with community rituals at organizations like Live365, Edutopia, and Minnesota Public Radio, and discussing the importance of creating rituals in community settings. 00:11:17 - Mechanics of Ritual Betty outlines the specific structures that differentiate rituals from routines and habits, and provides examples of how rituals can be designed and implemented in daily life and community contexts. 00:19:31 - Current Work and Projects Betty talks about her current initiatives, including the Center for Ritual Design and Pandora's Way, focusing on creating meaningful rites of passage for young people and supporting families through technological transitions. 00:24:00 - Addressing Challenges in Rituals Discussion on potential negative aspects of rituals and how they can be misused, emphasizing the importance of intention and positive, pro-social purposes. 00:27:00 - Evolution and Flexibility of Rituals Betty and the hosts discuss how rituals can evolve and adapt to different cultural and personal contexts, and the importance of keeping rituals meaningful and relevant. 00:29:40 - The Future of Rituals and Closing Thoughts Betty shares what excites her most about the future of rituals and her projects, expressing hope for the positive impact they can have on communities and individuals.   About our guest(s):  Betty's Website:  Pandora's Way: Betty's Soundcloud:  

 In the Cohere podcast episode, hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas, along with guests Scott Smith and Susan Cox-Smith, delve into the shift from traditional forecasting to the dynamic practice of futuring, as explored in their works How to Future and Future Cultures. They discuss the importance of evolving strategic frameworks to foster anticipation and adaptability, particularly in navigating complex crises. The conversation highlights the role of online communities in driving innovation and building future resilience. Through insights and case studies like the UNDP Future Trends and Signals System, they advocate for viewing "future" as an active process and emphasize the critical role of communal networks in shaping responsive and anticipatory cultures. "It's incredibly important for futures to be opened up to a wider group of people because you can't have better futures just for one." Susan Cox-Smith Mentioned in this episode: Links to relevant materials mentioned during the episode About our guest(s):  Website:   Books:   Future Cultures:   Author Bios and Contact Information:       Call-to-Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: and Subscribe to the Cohere Podcast For more reflections about the intersection of community and design, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Leave a review of the Cohere Podcast Have you listened to the Cohere Podcast? We would love to hear your thoughts! Leave a review and let us know what you think about the show. Your feedback helps us improve and make the podcast even better. ADD EMAIL Share your thoughts about future guests / topics of exploration: ADD EMAIL Check out #BookDNA for a list of books, articles, and whitepapers featured on the Cohere Podcast  

In the latest thought-provoking episode of Cohere, hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas welcome two distinguished and returning guests. First up, we have Dr. Sharon Varney, a dynamic force in the realm of leadership and organizational development. With a rich background spanning complex organizations across manufacturing, utilities, travel, banking, oil and gas, Sharon's encounter with complexity theory in the early 2000s sparked a profound shift in her approach to leadership and change practice. Her academic journey, combined with her hands-on experience, has led to groundbreaking work in leadership and organizational development across various sectors. Sharon is also closely associated with Henley Business School, where she continues to advance the intersection of academia and practical application. Her book, ‘Leadership in Complexity and Change,' draws from her award-winning doctoral research and offers a hopeful, practical guide backed by a robust academic foundation. Joining Sharon, we have John Hovell, a visionary leader at the intersection of Knowledge Management (KM) and Organization Development (OD). As the Managing Director and co-founder of STRATactical, John is renowned for his innovative approaches to combining OD and KM strategies to address contemporary challenges. His work on creating conversational leadership through the synergy of Knowledge Management, Organization Development, and Diversity & Inclusion offers fresh insights into how organizations can foster more dynamic and inclusive environments. Today, we're eager to explore the nuances of Organization Development, or OD, and discuss how OD principles can shape community dynamics in a meaningful way. With Sharon's expertise in navigating the complexities of leadership in changing environments and John's forward-thinking strategies on knowledge management and organizational development, today's episode promises to be a rich tapestry of ideas and insights. So, stay tuned as we dive deep into these fascinating topics, offering you perspectives that are as enlightening as they are practical.

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, co-hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas interview Dave Gray, Chief Possibilitarian at School of the Possible. They delve into being a "possibilitarian," exploring how this mindset fosters innovation and openness to new ideas. Dave shares the  School of the Possible founding story, an experimental learning community that challenges conventional education models. The discussion covers how critical thinking and creativity are encouraged and the practical application of knowledge to solve real-world problems. Listeners will discover how embracing possibility can transform learning and personal growth. "Art school is very different than a lot of other types of education. It's focused on making and creating and doing things with your hands and making things happen in the real world. So, in one sense, there was a whole approach to learning that I picked up in art school. And also, when you graduate from art school, it's not like there's a lot of people waiting with jobs for you. You have to apply those creative thinking skills to designing your life, thinking about What is it that you want to create in the world? How are you going to make your way in the world? And it's really interesting to watch all of my peers and colleagues, all trained in creativity, all figuring it out in different ways. It all stems from this idea of "what are you going to create and what are you going to make?" In a lot of types of education, you can just solve the problem in a way that everyone before you solved the problem.  When you're in an art school, you're not allowed to solve problems in the way they've been solved before. You're required to think about a different way or a new way."  Mentioned in this episode: Links to relevant materials mentioned during the episode   About our guest(s):  Chief Possibilitarian at School of the Possible Author, and LinkedIn:   Call-to-Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: and Subscribe to the Cohere Podcast For more reflections about the intersection of community and design, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Leave a review of the Cohere Podcast  

As we begin 2024, Lauren and Bill would love to hear from you! Please send your suggestions, feedback, and ideas for topics and guests to .  Welcome to our special year-end 2023 review of the Cohere podcast. This year, we marked a significant shift in our approach. We moved away from the constraints of seasonal formats, embracing topical series that have allowed us to delve deeper into various themes, synchronizing seamlessly with our ongoing work and research. Let's walk down memory lane and revisit some of the most insightful moments from this year's episodes. Venessa Paech sheds light on the evolving definition of AI and its interplay with power dynamics. John Hovell joined us to discuss the essence of conversational leadership. A key part of this conversation was defining what conversation truly means. Meena Palaniappan's insights into impact measurement, resilience, and behavioral change in human-centered social networks were compelling. Esteban Kolsky joined us to discuss how we might navigate the customer experience landscape.  In our episode with Ed Finn,Ed Finn, the founding director of the Center for Science and the Imagination at Arizona State University we discuss how to build imaginative capacity. Social learning theorists, the Wenger-Trayners, joined us to help us explore the concept of learning partnerships in communities of practice. Dr. Mihaela Vorvoreanu came on the show to help us unpack trust and fabrication in large language models. This conversation is crucial for understanding generative AI. We explored the rich history and the exciting future of the Maker Movement with Dale Dougherty. Jeremiah Owyang helped us consider how we might navigate the AI surge. Jeremiah tackles the rapid evolution and acceleration of digital technology cycles. Dr. Rob Hopkins to help us imagine tomorrow and to teach us how to travel to a better future. We ended the year looking back at the hype of cryptocurrency and exploring what is still happening in this space with Reneé Barton. Reneé offers insights into cryptocurrency market trends. We thank our listeners for joining us on this enlightening journey and look forward to another year of engaging and insightful conversations in 2024. Stay tuned! Again, please send us your feedback, ideas and suggestions to hosts@coherepod.com.

In the last episode of 2023 for the Cohere podcast, co-hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas welcome Reneé Barton, Manager of Impact Research at the Crypto Council for Innovation. They delve into the CRADL report, the crypto industry's first in-depth ethnographic study, which illuminates the varied motivations behind crypto adoption and highlights opportunities for industry refinement. Barton elaborates on the meticulous research methodology that captures diverse user experiences, revealing overlooked use cases and challenging assumptions about crypto's role in equitable wealth distribution. The conversation also touches on the hurdles of user experience in crypto adoption, potential risks, and the practical application of the research for stakeholders. The episode concludes with insights on future explorations and where to access CRADL's pioneering work. Mentioned in this episode:    About our guest(s):  Renée Barton is passionate about connecting research and analysis to the design and implementation of policies, programs, and places that equitably leverage, distribute, and create access for all to the benefits of technology. She looks beyond data and econometric analysis to understand how people and communities engage with the policies, products, and places that shape their lives.    As the Manager of Impact Research at the (CCI), Renée leads research to provide evidence-based insights on the real-world value of crypto on the lives of people and their communities. By sharing insights, expertise, and facts about the global crypto ecosystem, CCI supports governments and institutions worldwide in efforts to shape inclusive policy and regulation that fosters innovation and grows access for all to a new ecosystem of tools and services. As a researcher and project lead at the , funded by the , Renée led primary ethnographic research to help organizations and policymakers understand why people are turning to crypto.   In her prior capacity as a consultant she has advised a range of public and private entities including governments, universities, philanthropic organizations, major tech companies, startups, and minority-serving venture funds, on topics including economic development, the structuring of policies and programs, and implementation strategy at the intersection of technology, communities, and inclusive growth.   Call-to-Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: and For more reflections about the intersection of community and exponential technologies, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Share about future guests / topics of exploration. Check out #BookDNA for a list of books, articles, and whitepapers featured on the Cohere Podcast.

 In this episode of the Cohere podcast, co-hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas interview Rob Hopkins, Ph.D., co-founder of Transition Network and author, on the power of community imagination in shaping our future. Dubbed a "guest from the future," Rob shares his insights on creating spaces for collective dreaming and the journey towards a healthier relationship with the internet. They discuss the ingredients for successful community initiatives, the role of imagination activists, and overcoming barriers to our creative potential. With storytelling as a pivotal theme, Rob also touches on the concept of 'embodied futuring.' The conversation concludes with a teaser into the intriguing research for his upcoming book.  

In this episode of the Cohere podcast, hosts Bill and Lauren engage in a reflective conversation about the ongoing transitions and emerging trends in community practice. Drawing from their extensive experience, they discuss the evolution of community roles, exploring how a broader approach to community ecosystem development is taking shape.  

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, co-hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas sit down with Silicon Valley veteran Jeremiah Owyang to discuss the evolution of digital technology and the rise of AI. Owyang traces his career back to community leadership roles in tech, emphasizing the importance of transferable skills acquired over decades-long technology cycles. He attributes his pivot to AI as a natural progression in tech, noting that we are amid a surge of interest in AI technologies. Owyang shares how he stays updated in the field, cultivates space for him and others to explore exponential technologies through gatherings like Lllama Lounge and discusses how businesses can leverage AI to improve communities and engagement. The conversation also touches on Owyang's recent collaboration on sensemaking tools, specifically an AI classification framework that ties into the theory of multiple intelligences. He addresses businesses' fundamental misconceptions about AI, which hinder its adoption and closes with advice for business leaders keen to transition from basic AI experiments to meaningful strategies. In this episode, we discuss the following:  [02:04] Introducing Jeremiah Owyang and tracing his career journey [03:37] Discussing the 10-year cycles of technology [09:01] Showcasing the power of gatherings like the Llama Lounge [14:20] Exploring the recent explosion of interest in AI [21:16] Considering how to make sense of AI [25:12] Examining the intersection of community and AI [37:18] Sharing advice for leaders who are ready to move beyond the “LLM 101” experiments   Mentioned in this episode:  Twitter / X:   LinkedIn:   Jeremiah's Tech + Business Newsletter  

In this episode of the Cohere podcast, co-hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas welcome Dale Dougherty, the founder of Make: Magazine and Maker Faire, and a person who played a key and critical role in the launch of the Maker Movement. Dougherty shares his career journey and his belief that everyone is inherently a maker. The conversation takes a deep dive into the history and future of the Maker Movement, discussing the importance of community in both digital and real-life maker experiences. Dougherty also outlines plans for the return of the Bay Area Maker Faire, revealing a new location and expanded schedule. For those new to making or interested in starting their own maker space, Dougherty offers advice and encouragement. Finally, he expresses his excitement about the current moment in the Maker Movement, hinting at the promising future of this global community of thinkers, builders, and dreamers. In this episode, we discuss the following:  [04:26] Introducing Dale Dougherty and discuss his career journey [08:55] Discussing the return of the Bay Area Maker Faire [12:56] Exploring the history of the Maker Movement [22:06] Examining the role of community [25:10] Showcasing the power of Makers  [29:39] Considering the role of technology and generative AI [36:32] Sharing advice for someone new to Maker Faire and Making Mentioned in this episode:  Purchase tickets to the About our guest:  DALE DOUGHERTY is the leading advocate of the Maker Movement. He founded Make: Magazine 2005, which first used the term “makers” to describe people who enjoyed “hands-on” work and play. He started Maker Faire in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2006, and this event has spread to nearly 200 locations in 40 countries, with over 1.5M attendees annually. He is President of Make:Community, which produces Make: and Maker Faire.   Call-to-Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: and For more reflections about the intersection of community and movements, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Share about future guests / topics of exploration. Check out #BookDNA for a list of books, articles, and whitepapers featured on the Cohere Podcast.  

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, co-hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas dive deep into AI ethics with Mihaela Vorvoreanu, Director of UX Research and RAI Education for Microsoft's Aether. The conversation primarily focuses on "appropriate trust" in AI, emphasizing the need for accountability in AI systems. Vorvoreanu boldly challenges listeners to rethink Large Language Models (LLMs) not merely as information retrieval systems but as systems of fabrication. She further confronts the exaggerated notion of AI as super capable and superhuman, shedding light on the common errors made by LLM-based systems and the implications for users. This episode offers invaluable perspectives on AI ethics, vigorously questioning the hyperbole surrounding AI and making the field more comprehensible to a broader audience. In this episode, we discuss the following:  [2:00] Introducing Mihaela VorVoreanu, PhD and Aether, Microsoft's initiative for AI Ethics and Effects in Engineering and Research [8:00] Discussing the concept of responsible AI [11:44] Challenging terms such as “hallucinogenic” [12:24] Reframing LLMs as systems of fabrication [30:48] Sharing information about the direction of Aether's research  Mentioned in this episode: Advancing human-centered AI: Updates on responsible AI research Microsoft HAX Toolkit Overreliance on AI: Literature Review Responsible AI Maturity Model https://aka.ms/raimm About our guest(s):  In her current role, Mihaela leads research and education aimed at advancing the practice of RAI. Before joining Microsoft, she had an accomplished academic career, most recently at Purdue University, where she established and led the undergraduate and graduate UX Design and research programs.  https://www.linkedin.com/in/mihaelavorvoreanu/  Call-to-Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: . For more reflections about the intersection of community and artificial intelligence, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Share your thoughts about future guests / topics of exploration. Check out #BookDNA for a list of books, articles, and whitepapers featured on the Cohere Podcast.

Episode Summary: In the latest episode of the Cohere podcast, social learning theorists Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner delve into an engaging discussion with co-hosts Dr. Lauren Vargas and Bill Johnston. The guests explore the evolution of communities of practice, their forthcoming CoP Guidebook, and their unique workshops and retreats. They provide insights into their ongoing research project, a tripartite book series designed to update and expand their social learning theory. The inaugural volume, published in 2020, focuses on value creation within social learning spaces. The subsequent volumes, currently in development, will concentrate on expanding social learning across temporal and spatial dimensions and the personal journey of actively participating in the learning process. Memorable Quote: “One thing I should say is, To be absolutely honest, I speak for myself, but who cares about communities of practice? Honestly, I don't, and I don't believe that Etienne does. I don't care about community practice, what we care about is developing social learning capability of people, of groups, of organizations, of our planet. Otherwise, sorry guys. We've had it. So what keeps us up at night or what drives this restless energy is wow, how can we speed up the learning loops if things are moving so fast? Everything's so unexpected. Unless we get so much better and quicker at developing learning loops into what's working and what's not working. Unless we get quicker at that, we're out mate. And so that's the driving restlessness and the communities of practice are one part of that." Beverly Wenger-Trayner   In this episode, we discuss the following:  [0:15] Introducing Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner [2:30] Defining Communities of Practice (CoP) [19:03] Discussing the role of AI in social learning [28:23] Moving beyond CoPs [36:45] Sharing information about upcoming books and events   Mentioned in this episode:  [Book] [Book]  by Etienne Wenger [Book] by Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner [Book] by Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner [Website] from Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner [Website] from Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner   About our guest(s):  Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner are internationally renowned social learning theorists and consultants. Their pioneering work in social learning is influential in such diverse fields as learning theory, business, government, international development, healthcare, and education. Their consulting practice specializes in contexts where there are large-scale social learning challenges. They founded the Social Learning Lab, where they host series of events oriented to theory, practice, and leadership. The co-edited volume Learning in landscapes of practice expands the theory beyond single communities. Systems convening sheds light on a crucial form of social-learning leadership. They are preparing a guidebook for communities of practice. They have started a book series called Learning to make a difference and recently published the first volume. It introduces the concept of social learning space as a new foundation for the theory, and their value-creation framework as a tool for both conceptualizing and cultivating social learning.       Call-to-Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: and . For more reflections about the intersection of community and social learning, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Have you recently discovered the Cohere Podcast? We would love to know your first impressions. Leave a review and tell us what you like about the show, and what you think could be improved. Share about future guests / topics of exploration. Check out #BookDNA for a list of books, articles, and whitepapers featured on the Cohere Podcast.

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, co-hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas chat with Ed Finn, the founding director of the Center for Science and the Imagination at Arizona State University. As an associate professor in the School for the Future of Innovation in Society and the School of Arts, Media, and Engineering, Finn provides fascinating insights into the Center's endeavors, the collaborative imagination and writing project 'Hieroglyph,' and the pioneering Imaginative Collaboration Framework. Throughout the discussion, Finn emphasizes the influential role of hopeful stories in shaping collective visions for the future and shares examples demonstrating how these narratives can drive innovation, learning, and societal transformation. Mentioned in this episode:  [Book] by a partnership of Slate, Arizona State University, and New America [Book] edited by David H. Guston and Ed Finn [Book] edited by Ed Finn and Kathryn Cramer [Book] by Ed Finn [Article] by Ed Finn and Ruth Wylie [Website] [Website] [Website] [Website] [Website]   About our guest(s):  Ed Finn is the founding director of the Center for Science and the Imagination at Arizona State University where he is an associate professor in the School for the Future of Innovation in Society and the School of Arts, Media and Engineering. He also serves as the academic director of Future Tense, a partnership between ASU, New America and Slate Magazine, and a co-director of Emerge, an annual festival of art, ideas and the future. Ed's research and teaching explore imagination, digital culture, creative collaboration, and the intersection of the humanities, arts and sciences. He is the author of What Algorithms Want: Imagination in the Age of Computing (MIT Press, spring 2017) and co-editor of Future Tense Fiction (Unnamed Press, 2019), Frankenstein: Annotated for Scientists, Engineers and Creators of All Kinds (MIT Press, 2017) and Hieroglyph: Stories and Visions for a Better Future (William Morrow, 2014), among other books. He completed his PhD in English and American Literature at Stanford University in 2011 and his bachelor's degree at Princeton University in 2002. Before graduate school, Ed worked as a journalist at Time, Slate, and Popular Science.   Call-to-Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: and For more reflections about the intersection of community and futures literacy, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Share about future guests / topics of exploration. Check out #BookDNA for a list of books, articles, and whitepapers featured on the Cohere Podcast.  

In this episode, Bill and Lauren engage chat with esteemed customer experience analyst and researcher Esteban Kolsky. They delve into the complex world of customer experience, discussing the importance of community, the hype around generative AI, and how to sift through the noise to identify critical signals, trends, and patterns. This conversation highlights what is needed to develop the mindset required for staying attuned to what matters in a constantly evolving customer experience landscape. Memorable Quote: “Organizations still have the idea that communities need to be managed and created by the organization. Mm-hmm. They don't understand the communities. They don't understand independent communities. They don't understand, even if they understand that they exist, they don't know what to do with information and with the people in there.” In this episode, we discuss:  [16:03] The Role of Community in Customer Experience [25:00] Generative AI: Cutting Through the Hype [44:20] Navigating Through the Noise   Mentioned in this episode:  [Book] by Peter Schwartz [Book] by Brian Christian About our guest(s):  With an impressive 30-year career in enterprise technology, Esteban Kolsy has done it all - from entry-level positions to executive roles. He's a veteran in the field, boasting 20 years of experience as an analyst and influencer. Having recently taken a step back from his role as a vendor executive, Esteban is now contemplating one more orbit later this year.       Call-to-Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: Link to other relevant Cohere episodes For more reflections about the intersection of community and customer experience, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Did Cohere Podcast inspire you to take action or change your perspective on something? If so, please share your experience by leaving a review. Your review will not only help us but also encourage others to tune in. Share about future guests / topics of exploration. Check out #BookDNA for a list of books, articles, and whitepapers featured on the Cohere Podcast.  

In this episode, Bill and Lauren engage in a conversation with Meena Palaniappan, the Founder, and CEO of Atma Connect, as she discusses her journey of building Atma Go, a tool for community change that operates on a hyperlocal level in Indonesia, Puerto Rico, and Ukraine. Palaniappan introduces the concept of the ‘plentiverse,' which contrasts the metaverse, and emphasizes the potential of technology in creating collective action and enabling every individual to become a change-maker in constructing a better world. This conversation showcases how Atma Connect is empowering individuals living in low income and vulnerable communities to take the lead in shaping their communities. Memorable Quote: “What we really need is an algorithm for cohesion and connection - this is what needs to be built. AtmaGo has been an incredible hyperlocal tool for community change. And, now we are focused on building a new infrastructure for global collective action that creates real measurable change in communities, and new ways for money to flow to this real world impact.” In this episode, we discuss:  [01:30] About Atma Connect [05:00] How Atma Connect served communities in Indonesia and Puerto Rico during the pandemic [08:29] How Atma Connect launched platform in Ukraine [13:49] How Atma Connect is helping communities measure impact [24:30] Meena introduces the concept of the ‘plentyierse' [34:03] Meena unpacks the components of the ‘plentiverse'   Mentioned in this episode:  [Report] [Article] [Article] [Impact Report / Dashboard] [Website] [Facebook] [Twitter]   Atma Connect's goal is to connect over a billion people around the world living in vulnerable communities, so they might take collective action, advocate with governments and lead the way to the future we need. Atma Connect is always looking for volunteers and advisors to work on product design and management challenges, as well as network business models. Atma Connect is an international non-profit. You can make a .  About our guest:  Meena Palaniappan is the Founder and CEO of Atma Connect, an award-winning organization building the infrastructure for impact at scale. She is an Ashoka Fellow, Fulbright Fellow, named in Ideas that are Changing the World, and an awardee of the Million Lives Club.      Call to Action(s): If you liked this episode, check out: and For more reflections about the intersection of community and human-centered design, subscribe to the Cohere Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Have you listened to the Cohere Podcast? We would love to hear your thoughts! Leave a review and let us know what you think about the show. Your feedback helps us improve and make the podcast even better.  

In this podcast episode, Lauren and Bill revisit their conversation from the beginning of the year and discuss the trends, drivers, and forces they are paying attention to as they enter a new season. They dive into the recently released , which covers 14 different areas impacting technology. They highlight the generative AI trend, which is becoming a force multiplier for technological progress and an enabler of other technologies. They discuss how generative AI is being incorporated into consumer applications, such as Canva, Microsoft's image creator applications, and Notion for assistive writing. They also explore the ethical implications of forcing humans to consume machine-generated content and how using these tools can help build more creative muscles and foster considered thinking.  Lastly, they announce Wave 3 of AI & Communities Research Project! You can participate here:  

The convergence of knowledge management and organizational development with conversational leadership and ‘communityship' As a leader in the convergence of Knowledge Management (KM) and Organization Development (OD), John Hovell is the Managing Director and co-founder of STRATactical. He is a practitioner, speaker, and author of OD/KM strategies and their application to current challenges. More specifically, John is the author of Creating Conversational Leadership: Combining and Expanding Knowledge Management, Organization Development, and Diversity & Inclusion. Lauren met John through one of our podcast's previous guests, Dr. Sharon Varney, as I attended their “Advancing your change and organizational development practice” course. - Welcome, John! KEY resource from this episode: by John Hovell   Books from this episode: , an online book by David Gurteen by Edgar H. Schein and Peter A. Schein by Edgar H. Schein and Peter A. Schein , published by De Gruyter Saur, Edited by Guy St. Clair by Henry Mintzberg by Stephen R. Covey by Dan Millman   Other resources from this episode: by Patricia Shaw by John Hagel by John Hagel by Dr. Mee Yan Cheung-Judge   Where to find John: LinkedIn:   : “Advancing your change and organisational development practice” course

Venessa Paech is an internationally regarded online community strategist with over 25 years of experience building community online. Venessa is also a PhD candidate studying the intersection of AI and community, and a global authority on communities and community management. In the first Cohere episode of 2023, Venessa joins Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas to discuss the quickly evolving role of AI in our digital experiences, how AI is currently playing a role in online communities, and what the future may hold regarding our collective relationship with AI. Key Quote: "It's still a relationship business. It's just we now have relationships with tools and machines in a new way:  in a more anthropomorphized way and in ways that mimic our own thinking and behavior sufficiently that we do need to recontextualize them. So how do we do that in a way that still prioritizes and centers the human work of what we're doing and brings us to those core community protocols of: How are we building a healthy, thriving, constructive space for constituents? is it accessible? Is it productive in meaningful ways? Is it relevant? And honoring the context, always honoring our context, which is one of the biggest problems we do see with so many different sorts of automated and or AI tools, is they tend to flatten and standardize context because that is how they operate. … But for community, which is typically a smaller, more intimate, and more nuanced sort of cluster of relations and ties, that does not work.”    Resources From This Episode: All things In Moderation Conference:   SWARM (Australia's Community Management Conference):   Australian Community Managers:   Books: by Kate Crawford by Carrie Melissa Jones and Charles Vogl by Howard Rheingold by Adrian Speyer by Howard Rheingold Venessa's scholarship:   Where to find Venessa:   

Hi everyone, welcome to 2023, and Lauren and I are here today to give you a quick update on our plans for the Cohere podcast!  This year we are breaking away from the concept (and constraints) of the idea of seasons. We will be pursuing topical series instead, which will help us cover a wider range of topics and synch more naturally with our work and research. Our new home for the podcast:  

Joi Podgorny returns to the Cohere podcast to discuss her unique perspective on the state of the Metaverse with hosts Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas. In season 1, in the early stages of the pandemic, Joi and Bill explored the part communities, and in particular VR-based communities, might play during the lockdown and socially-distanced period of the pandemic.  On this episode, Joi returns to revisit the conversation in Season 1, talk about her new role with Together Labs, and discuss how kids have weathered the pandemic in virtual worlds and in real life. Of particular note is Joi's perspective on the science of Friendship, and how the three pillars of Friendship (proximity, familiarity, and positivity) are guiding principles in her work.  

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas talk about the state of social media generally and twitter in particular. Discussing twitter as one of the canaries in the social media coal mine, Bill and Lauren look back to the dawn of social media and discuss the concerns that early community leaders expressed when "social media" sucked all of the oxygen out of the room in the mid 00's. We look at the longstanding and uneasy relationship between social media and community and discuss the ways our current circumstances might be an opportunity to evolve to better shared digital experiences.

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas chat with cultural professional Ed Rodley about innovative experience design. Ed shares how his experience as a museum technologist has prepared him to explore and challenge the concept of ‘immersion'. This season, we are identifying the critical mindsets, skill sets, and toolsets community professionals need to hone for the next iteration of the Internet. Ed introduces the concepts of the ‘magic circle' and ‘story worlds' to illustrate ‘immersion' is not a one-size-fits-all experience.      

On this post-Summer break episode of the Cohere podcast, Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas welcome design and strategy leader Melanie Kahl to discuss how we might design more comfortable shared digital spaces.  Using Melanie's recent article "" as a jumping off point, Bill and Lauren speak with Melanie about her career, her design and strategy practice, and how we might translate real-world customs, design patterns and affordances into the digital world to create more comfortable shared spaces.

Community pioneer Vincent Boone returns to the Cohere podcast to discuss his latest project with Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas - the OpenMeta DAO. The OpenMeta DAO is gathering a community to ensure the future of the metaverse is human-centered, fair, and interoperable. Both the overall mission of the OpenMeta DAO, as well as the OpenMeta DAO itself are fascinating.  In this episode, Vincent discusses the connection between online communities and the metaverse, the basics of DAOs, how the OpenMeta DAO operates, and what the future holds for community leaders in the Metaverse. Resources from this episode:

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, technologist and co-founder of OpenEXO Kent Langley joins Bill to discuss the current realities of crypto. Kent and Bill cover a range of topics, from the origin of blockchain, to how blockchains actually work, and current misconceptions about crypto. They then delve into questions about the relationship between crypto and communities and networks.

This week Lauren and I take a side trip from our Season 3 theme of Metaverse to talk about the cyclical (at least to date) nature of online community investment. In this unfiltered episode, we share how this cycle has helped shape our careers and explore questions that seem to come up in every cycle: With each subsequent era, why do we have to relearn and re-invent basics? Why do most organizations still struggle with community? Why haven't standards emerged? Why is the enterprise community platform space so static? Why do personalities and institutions almost immediately emerge during an upcycle that want to dominate vs develop  

In this episode of the Cohere podcast, Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas discuss the early promise (and obvious issues) with DAOs (Distributed Autonomous Organizations). Bill and Lauren have an in-depth discussion to try and separate the value and future utility of the DAO model vs. the current hype.  DAOs have been described as "digital flash mobs with money" by Raihan Anwar, manager of the Friends with Benefits DAO, and a "virtual entity that has a certain set of members or shareholders who have the right to spend the entity's funds and modify its code" by Vitalik Buterin, Founder of Ethereum. Bill and Lauren explore:  The definition of DAO Current examples and use cases The components, or key moving parts of a DAO What questions remain about DAOs? Resources from this episode:

Do organizations have the digital competence and skills to distinguish between a short-term trend (that might turn out to be a scam) and a long-term iteration of its digital activities? In this episode, we discuss why NFTs are a phenomenon, and the information and questions community builders may want to consider, including: NFTs are all the rage - what is the source of this phenomenon? What do we need to KNOW about NFTs? What issues do NFTs solve? How might NFTs be understood, used, managed, and/or created in an online community setting? What questions remain about NFTs?  

The current Metaverse is a mirage. The pursuit of the Metaverse vision could lead us to a better Internet. On the first episode of Season 3 of the Cohere podcast, we (Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas) frame of this season's topic: the Metaverse. As they did with “community”, Facebook's announcement of the company's move to focus on the Metaverse, and rebranding to “Meta”, , speculation, and investment. Made in a move remarkably similar to their 2017 announcement that Facebook was a “community” company, it remains to be seen if Meta follows through with creating their version of the Metaverse. It is interesting to note that Zuck's “Community” announcement from 2017 appears to have been taken down at some point in the past year (). But this season of Cohere isn't about Meta. It's also not (solely) about VR, AR, XR, or related Web3 technologies - it is about the combinatorial effects all of these technologies and trends interacting to shape the next generation of the Internet, and more importantly, how we create a better Internet that is safe, equitable, accessible and inspires the best of human nature instead of exploiting the worst.

Season 3 of the Cohere podcast is just around the corner. In Season 2, Dr. Lauren Vargas and Bill Johnston explored the role networks play in our lives - from the obvious to the subtle. In Season 3, Lauren and Bill focus on the topic dominating the discussion of our collective digital future: the Metaverse. The discussion will go beyond the hyperbolic (and eye roll-inducing) to have a forward-looking yet practical discussion of what our connected future looks like in a world of ambiently available digital networks - and what this means for us as individuals, citizens, societies, and as part of globally connected humanity. Stay tuned for new episodes starting the second week of February!

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, Lauren and Bill talk to Dr. Sharon Varney, author of the new book "Leadership in Complexity and Change", and leading researcher and practitioner in the field of Complexity Science.  In the early 2000s, Drd Varney came across complexity theory. "That's how the world really works", she thought! And so began her journey into academia as she explored what that meant for leadership and change practice. Now Sharon brings those insights into her leadership and organization development work in many different sectors. Sharon continues to enjoy a close working relationship with Henley Business School. Working at the interface of academia and practice, she is constantly striving to advance the leading edge of informed practice. Her new book, ‘Leadership in Complexity and Change' addresses complexity straightforwardly without dumbing it down. It draws on her award-winning doctoral research and the practical application of key ideas by a wide range of managers and professionals in diverse sectors from retail to healthcare, finance, charities and government bodies. It is unashamedly hopeful, ultimately practical, with a robust academic pedigree. In the episode, we discuss a working definition of complexity science, explore the nature of change as it relates to organizations, how anyone within an organization is actually participating in ongoing change (whether they realize it or not), and how we all can be more mindful and intentional about leadership in the midst of constant change. Key Quotes: “Drawing on complexity science helps us understand the world a bit more fully and that can help us make some different choices, perhaps more deliberate choices about what we say and do in our everyday lives.” “T​hose who are really inside-inside, are the ones who are making change happen. They are the ones who understand the context. They are the people who will either create change or, or not.” “You can't outsource change. We change from within organizations. So you can put in a new structure, that's actually the easy part, but whether the new structure will deliver the benefits that were hoped for, or different ways of working, or whether you are changing a whole team out and bringing in new people will actually change the culture - you don't know that. There are absolutely no guarantees for that. So, you've made a change. It cost a lot of money. It costs a lot of emotional energy and you may or may not have gotten any benefits from it. So insider actions and insider words are how change actually happens. It's actually quite mundane and sometimes we don't notice it because we're expecting it to come in a big, shiny, package with a large price tag attached to it.” “If we're trying to work on change in organizations, we need to ask ourselves who's in the conversation and who's in the community - they can be really helpful questions because then it draws attention to, and who's not who, whose voices are we not hearing?” “Diversity is really important because differences create novelty and innovation. That's what complexity science will tell us. It is micro-differences - coming in with a different experience of life of, of the world, just might cause us to react in a different way. It's differences that create something new.” Resources from this episode:   by Dr Sharon Varney Find Dr Sharon Varney online:      Website: General resources mentioned in this episode: by Dr Sharon Varney [Video]  Books mentioned in this episode: by Gareth Morgan by Bonnie A. Nardi and Vicki O'Day by Jean G. Boulton, Peter M. Allen, and Cliff Bowman by Melanie Mitchell

Kaliya Young is many things: an advocate for open Internet identity standards, a leader in the identity space - including hosting the Internet Identity Workshop, a published author, and a skilled Open Space facilitator. On this episode of the Cohere podcast, Kaliya joins Bill to discuss the history of online identity, what events led us to the consolidation of identity into a few centralized platforms, and what steps we need to take to recover and protect our online identities.

In this short and timely conversation, Bill and Lauren discuss the concept of the Metaverse, how thinking in the narrative structures of science fiction might help us understand the concept and a slew of great book recommendations. Enjoy! We'lll be back in early November with new episodes.

In this episode of the Cohere podcast, Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas welcome Nancy White back to the show. Nancy is a true polymath, involved in shaping the early online community and collaboration movement and also deeply versed in group facilitation. Nancy is the Founder of Full Circle Associates and has a long history of working with global NGOs and non-profits on large-scale collaboration and community initiatives. In the episode we talk to Nancy about her personal experiences during the pandemic, what changes she's observed in her communities and in her work, and explore how we might take what we have learned about collaboration and communities during the pandemic with us back into the world when we begin to emerge from the pandemic.

In this episode of the Cohere podcast, Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas discuss the future of communities with digital transformation and disruptive leadership expert Charlene Li. We speak with Charlene about her new book “The Disruption Mindset”, the evolving role of social technologies, and the pitfalls and opportunities of leading during periods of disruption (for instance, during a global pandemic.)

On this episode of the Cohere Podcast, Bill and Lauren review highlights from Season 2 guests, look back on formative roles in their respective careers and dig into the topic of transformational communities. From Bill:  The plan for this season of the Cohere podcast is for Lauren and me to use the podcast as a means to learn and make meaning in public. Our plan is to do a series of 3 interviews, followed by an interstitial episode to review and discuss the preceding series. This is our first interstitial session, and is a long-form conversation between myself and Lauren - and we cover a lot of ground! We begin with a look back at our respective early career experiences that led us into community development - Lauren at the Army and Air Force Exchange Service (part of the Gov 2.0 movement), and my first large role at TechRepublic.com. We then review and discuss the first four episodes of the podcast from this season: Episode 1 - where we tee up the concepts of network science and the potential value this discipline brings to community practitioners Episode 2 - we interview Gail Ann Williams, and discuss her long-standing relationship with The WELL, one of the longest-running commercial online communities Episode 3 - we interviewed Carrie Melissa Jones, in what Lauren describes as a "masterclass in community leadership" Episode 4 - Jim Cashel returns to update us on "The Great Connecting" and the implications of bringing the next 3 billion people online We end the episode by discussing my recent post about the end of the Social Boom and the coming era of transformational communities.

In this episode of the Cohere podcast, Bill and Lauren speak with returning guest Jim Cashel about the progress of the "Great Connecting" - the global rollout of broadband Internet - during the COVID19 pandemic.  The conversation covers a wide range of topics, including the role of the Internet during COVID lockdowns, having our realities largely mediated via screens and networks, the state of wireless and satellite broadband technologies, public policy surrounding Internet access, and much more. Jim is the Chairman of Forum One Communications, a former recent Visiting Fellow at the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, and author of the book, “The Great Connecting: The Emergence of Global Broadband, and How That Changes Everything”.

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, Lauren and Bill welcome author and community strategist Carrie Melissa Jones. Carrie has been managing online communities since the early 2000s. Over the course of her career, she has trained, advised, and coached leaders of thousands of online communities. Carrie is the coauthor of Building Brand Communities. She helps brands create new communities, select technology, envision community roadmaps, and think strategically. Prior to founding her own business, Carrie was the Founding Partner and COO for CMX Media, the ‘community for community builders' providing training, events, and programs for community builders around the world. In addition to helping companies build communities, Carrie is a passionate advocate for community professionals and believes that everyone deserves to belong and feel empowered.In their conversation, Lauren and Bill talk to Carrie about her latest community research insights, delve deeper into some of the concepts introduced in the book, Building Brand Communities, and discuss compassionate self-care and boundaries for community professionals. Show Hosts & Authors: Bill Johnston & Dr. Lauren Vargas

On this episode of the Cohere podcast, Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas are joined by pioneering community strategist and manager Gail Ann Williams. Gail watched the dawn of online communities through her participation and eventual leadership position at the WELL - one of the first successful large-scale online communities. Prior to any research studies, consultants or books about online communities Gail was navigating the challenges of community strategy, development, policy, and exploring the business models of community - more or less in real-time. Gail's journey at the WELL started as a conference manager in 1991, and she helped guide the community through several transformational changes, including an acquisition of the WELL by salon.com in 1999. And the eventual repurchase back from salon.com by a group of passionate members in 2012. In this episode, we discuss: The founding of the WELL and early community culture How the dawn of the Internet affected the WELL Experimenting with different community business models  How text-based community experiences can be sensory-rich experiences How privacy, even in private forums, can't be assumed How communities still provide a unique environment for compassion and empathy

In the first episode of Season 2 of the Cohere podcast, Bill Johnston and Dr. Lauren Vargas explore the concept of "network" as it relates to online and real-life communities. In the episode they cover: The many definitions of “Network” The technical infrastructure linking people and things The implicit and dynamic connections between people in a group (aka social graph) The activity of actively seeking connections Special places vs special people How a network relates to a community "The difference between a community and a network is that you belong to a community, but a network belongs to you."  Zygmund Bauman - as quoted in The Network Epochs Mobility & Transportation Networks Analog Communications (telegraph / phone / TV) The commercial Internet Internet + Social Graph (the dawn of Facebook) Internet + Social Graph + Algorithms (the dominance of Facebook) What’s next? Additional sources referenced in the show: "" - Joshua Cooper Ramo "" - Albert-Laszlo Barabasi "" - Niall Ferguson  "", Wired - Neal Stephenson  "" - Sinan Aral "" - Exponential View podcast host Azeem Azhar interviews Sinan Aral "" - Nicholas Christakis, James Fowler "" - Damon Centola

We are thrilled to announce Season 2 of the Cohere podcast! I say "we", because I'm joined this season by Dr. Lauren Vargas. Together, we will explore the role networks play in our lives, and the range of disciplines and range of research focused on the emerging field of network science. The reason for the focus on networks? Complex human networks are springing up everywhere, driven in large part by exponential technologies such as AI, automation, and ubiquitous internet. Imagine what will happen when three billion more people come online in the next five years! For organizations, a planet-wide network of logged-on human beings brings both limitless opportunities and unprecedented threats.  As we increasingly use social technologies to augment human experiences, the Cohere podcast asks, what’s the best path forward? What do we need to learn and understand? How might science and existing research guide us towards optimal norms and conditions?[ How should we navigate, evaluate, and administrate a complex technological landscape so we can protect, promote, and empower our human networks? How will we ensure that digital communities deliver on the promise of enhancing our lives, both individually and collectively? And what steps must we take to ensure our approach to community development is sustainable, equitable, and morally sound?  We look forward to taking this journey with you in the coming weeks and months! on LinkedIn on LinkedIn

In this episode of the Cohere podcast, I speak with Will Roberts, a data scientist at IBM, about the implications of data science and AI for online communities. Will and I talk through: A definition of AI / ML How machine learning is being applied in the enterprise More specifically, how ML & AI are / might be applied to customer experience generally, and community experiences specifically How we might use community data for models (and analytics) What the key opportunities and risks are for leveraging ML Will's advice on how the community team might approach and partner with a data scientist in their organization This episode is a complimentary conversation to our ongoing research at Structure3C. You can find Will online: Last, but not least, more info about the awesome Ian Banks Culture series Will mentions: (overview on Wikipedia) (Open Library)

Vincent Boon is a giant in the community space. A natural community leader, Vincent initially saw the power of community when hundreds of people began to show up to learn to play poker at his meetup. From there Vince went on to build pioneering communities in the gaming space, and create a fundamentally new model of community-powered business at GiffGaff.  In this episode, Vince talks about his early days in the community space, what it was like to develop the GiffGaff model and his work as Co-Founder of Standing on Giants. We learn about Vincen't new company, Giants Technology. The second half of the podcast is devoted to a discussion about his recent article "Six Key Principles to Building Healthy & Positive Communities"  Key Quotes: Learning About Virtual Communities from In-Person Communities "In my spare time, I set up the London poker meetup. That was to basically teach people the basics of playing poker. It started off with three other guys and eventually had about a hundred thousand people joining it. We were taking over complete pubs in London. Literally incredible and it was really fun. As I was doing this I was also the working on a (video) game. I said to the team "look guys, we have a whole bunch of fans out there that I'm sure would be love to see early versions of our games. It was so long ago that they'd never done this before. So I convinced the team to say look, let's just do a closed beta. Test and get our customers to test the games. We started off with a couple of hundred people eventually that grew to about 20,000 people testing this one game. We started a bit of a community as well. And these guys started building a lot off the leagues and the letters and newsletters and, you know, newspaper articles that could all be used within the game. So all of a sudden the game became a lot richer than it originally was intended. And, you know, when it launched, it was obviously an instant success because it already had a user base." Building GiffGaff With the Customer Community"We announced to the world "We're setting up this little MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator)and here is an idea of what we want to do. We want to run it with a community. We want to hear from people. We want to see what you guys have to say about what we're doing. And it started super simple. We were also being very open about the fact that it's just a couple of people here and we're just setting up this service. If you've got any ideas, let us know obviously. When we were launching, as we were starting and plenty of things went wrong and we would just talk about that and you put that out there. My view was always like, look, it's infinitely interesting.  Whatever it is that we're doing. That's why they're showing up." The Current View of Customer Experience At the moment I think customer experience is incredibly flat. I don't have any experience with a website and how I go through that. I understand the whole route and the need to make it easier for me to buy stuff. But it's not really an experience with the company. It's an experience of how I experienced that product. That's cool, but it's not an emotional experience. For me, an emotional experience happens on a basis where I actually am in contact with the company. And that's not at the moment I have a problem." Resources From This Episode Find Vincent online: Articles:  

Today the term "disruption" is commonly used in business to signal a wide range of disparate concepts - from new business initiatives to an individual or team pursuing seemingly innovative strategies. The concept of disruption comes from Clayton Christensen's theory of disruptive innovation, which he explored in his first book, "The Innovators Dilemma" in 1997.   On this episode of the Cohere podcast my guest is Karen Dillon,  former editor of Harvard Business Review and a coauthor of three books with Clayton Christensen, including the New York Times best-seller "How Will You Measure Your Life?" All three books extended the theory of disruptive innovation and explored various contexts in which the theory could be a useful lens. In our conversation, Karen shares her experiences editing both Inc. and Harvard Business Review, how she met and began collaborating with Clayton Christensen, and how she continues to carry their work forward today.

In the developed world, the promise of social media (including Facebook) to create positive change has fallen well short of the mark. Mass social media is becoming increasingly manipulative and toxic.  In the developing world, mass social media's negative effects are even more dangerous, as manipulation and misinformation can quickly lead to real-world violence.  Meena Palaniappan, CEO and Founder of Atma Connect wants to change this. Atma Connect's goal is to connect over a billion people around the world living in vulnerable communities in order for them to take collective action, advocate with governments and lead the way to the future we need. In this episode of the Cohere Podcast, Meena and I discuss the circumstances that led her to found Atma Connect, the positive impact her products like AtmaGo are making, and her vision for social networks like AtmaGo to help create more equitable and resilient communities, both online and in the real world.  Meena on Her Journey to Founding Atma Connect "I became an environmental engineer because I really wanted to develop scalable solutions to the challenges that we're facing globally. In doing this work there, it became clear that we, as a global community, need to focus more attention on building power in vulnerable communities to lead the way. One thing that just became apparent in my work, domestically and around the world was the fact that people who consume the least and have the least to do with environmental problems were the ones that were facing the biggest challenges, suffering the most, and had the least resources to overcome these challenges." Meena on Social Networks for Community Resilience  "It became apparent to me in working internationally on water and sanitation that the same communities that didn't have water and sanitation increasingly had mobile phones. This started me on a journey of asking how could we use this ubiquitous technology to make visible the invisible and put people on the map in unignorable ways to get their needs addressed. Virtual communities are incredible because they give people a way to more rapidly spread solutions to aggregate and amplify their voices to take collective action and to advocate with governments. I think that that's really fundamentally what the goal is, is to create these connections and build this power online that leads to real improvements in people's lives and where they live." Meena on the Impact of AtmaGo "People are sharing a lot of information about COVID, government resources, government restrictions, they're offering help and they're asking for help. People come to AtmaGo daily to find jobs, to build up entrepreneurship, to have community discussions about local needs, or to report problems to the government. Because of that, it becomes all the more powerful in disaster. So in a disaster, people are receiving early warnings on AtmaGo that are leading them to take early action. An independent evaluation found that people receiving early warnings on AtmaGo move valuables, they evacuated, they warn their neighbors. Quantified at a scale of a million users this is $106 million in avoided economic losses and over 6,000 years of healthy life saved and they're using it in the entire cycle of building resilience." Get involved: Atma Connect is always looking for volunteers and advisors to work on product design and management challenges, as well as network business models. Atma Connect is an international non-profit. You can make a .  Resources & Links Mentioned in the Episode: Atma Connect's Atma Connect on Atma Connect on

I spoke with Randy Farmer about the recent increase in virtual community participation triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this bonus episode (~15 min), I speak with virtual community pioneer Randy Farmer about this influx of new participants, how they are likely different from your current community cohort, how to understand their needs and engage them in helpful ways.  Highlights from our conversation: "We've got a bunch of people who otherwise probably would not have come to our communities. What we usually do is count engagement or number of posts. We have these various metrics (which) may no longer be telling the entire story. Are we asking the right questions?" "(Now) when you get a new member, you really need to understand a little more than just how active they are. Like how did they find you in the first place? What is it that got them to come to you. How can we serve their needs? How are they different than the existing community member base?" "I'm saying that depending upon the application you have, it's important to understand the new users are highly valuable. Make sure they don't bounce off just because they can't find the thing that you already have that they need. I applaud all efforts to capture the contexts that are important to new users and make them feel like they're welcome." You can find Randy online: Twitter: LinkedIn: Wikipedia: Clay Shirky's

This week, I sat down (virtually, of course) with Joi Podgorny, Founder of Good People Solutions.  Joi has had a very impressive and wide-ranging career, including developing and launching successful community business models for the wildly popular children's brands Animal Jam and Chuggington. In her work with Good People Solutions, she focuses on corporate diversity and inclusion training in VR. In this session of the Cohere podcast, Joi shares hard-won wisdom she has acquired from her impressive career, her guidance on building communities for children and families, and her point of view on the state of VR (hint: winter is not coming). She was also kind enough to council me on my son's excessive Roblox usage. Highlights from our conversation: On launching one of the first virtual worlds for children: "One of my favorite, diversions on that crazy roller coaster that is my career was working with a company called  Ludorum and launching the preschool cartoon Chuggington. I was able to build a virtual world, from the 3D models that the animation team were building. We built one of the very first virtual worlds inside of Unity back in 2007.  I was able to not only build one of those virtual worlds with really cool, beautifully made 3d models from the actual cartoon. I got to be part of the launch of a very successful, preschool cartoon series. I also got to manage a team out in China at the time, and learn about the globalization of teams." On including the community in product development: "A big part of community management is giving up the idea that you have all the answers. You're more of a guide and a facilitator. You're like a camp counselor who's like, "Hey, what are we going to do today? Oh, that doesn't sound exactly right. How about we rethink that a little bit" - (you take) feedback from the community itself and have that help guide you. I've been on so many teams, amazing, brilliant developers, and programmers working on those teams and had to gently, over the course of many months and sometimes years, guide them to the place where the community should be able to have some feedback into how this game or community is going to look. (It's about) really letting go of the idea that you as the company are the only person who can figure this out." On the hype around a "VR Winter": "if the only measure of success is whether you have mass-market penetration and dominance, that's a depressing world to live in and especially as a community person.  The idea that I can't get an Oculus Go or an Oculus Quest right now (is absurd). They have been sold out, and right when they get them back in stock, they sell out again. So this whole concept of like, no one's buying them - everyone's buying them! Doing diversity, equity, and inclusion training, and leveraging the research in academia that says immersive environments and the phenomena of presence within virtual reality, where your mind actually remembers the experiences that you have in virtual reality as a memory. You have a 75 to 90% higher retention rate rather than just reading something or watching a movie because you're remembering it as a lived experience. Leveraging that possible." Resources mentioned in the podcast:   

Leaders often use the word "transformation" to describe a small or incremental change, but the definition is "a thorough or dramatic change in form or appearance". When using the phrase "Transformational Communities", my intention is to define these communities as having a profound and thorough change effect on participating stakeholders. One of the most interesting examples I've encountered is the hybrid online & real-world community development model that uses for its UpTogether program. To date, families participating in FII's community-powered program have experienced a 27% lift in income, have established an average of $1,000 in personal savings, and have collectively established $2.5 million in home equity. Jorge Blandon, Executive Vice President at FII, joins me on the Cohere Podcast to talk about the mission of FII, to discuss their community model in detail, and to talk about the stories of some of the families who have collectively walked out of poverty together. Key Quotes From the Episode: "FII really is aiming for all people in the United States to be seen and invested in for their strengths and that they're able to build their social and financial assets. I think until today, there are systemic barriers that prevent a lot of low-income families from leveraging their assets, their strengths, and even community. FII wants to remove those barriers and really create a new environment where families are trusted as change agents and communities are collectively addressing the challenges that prevent them from pursuing their, their wellbeing." "FII's approach is really anchored in historic models of just how communities and families would come together to support each other from barn raisings to examples of the Chinatowns throughout the country, the Black wall street and in Tulsa, or the fact that there are over 1500 donut shops owned and run by Cambodians. These are people, that are coming together, leading the way, showing a path forward. This country has a rich history of, of people just pooling their resources, their money, their time, and collective strength and, and, and wisdom." "So UpTogether is an online community-building platform. It's a place where low-income families can take their offline conversations and bring them online to connect with other UpTogether members. They may live in their same neighborhood, in the same city, or connect with other families, experiencing similar challenges across, across the country. It's really the place where social and financial capital is exchanged and ultimately accelerated. On UpTogether families can, can share news around accomplishments, like paying off debt, buying a home, sending their kids to college, eating healthier. They can curate groups to share ideas around parenting, children with special needs, starting a business, or even being civically engaged. It's really a platform that recognizes that we all bring something to the table." Key Resources From This Episode Lastly, low-income families have been hit especially hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. Please consider making a donation to , a campaign that FII families benefit directly from.

Too often the deployment of digital strategies and tools begins humans conforming to technology limitations instead of technology being deployed intentionally in the service of human needs and opportunities - a human-centered approach. Dr. Lauren Vargas joins me on the Cohere podcast to discuss bringing humans back into the center of the "digital transformation" conversation and provides the CALM framework and specific examples for leaders to draw from. Lauren is particularly well suited to give guidance here, as she is one of the most experienced and widely practiced digital strategists I know. She's had an impressive range of experiences in both the public and private sectors, including senior roles at Radian6, Aetna, and Fidelity. In private practice now, she’s most recently been focused on helping museums around the globe with digital transformation. We recently reconnected in London where I also got to walk through the AMAZING at the Museum of London with her to see some of her work first hand. Key Quotes: "it's talking like technology with heart, right. So it's, it's when we talk about it being embedded in, in an organization, and we talk about being embedded in an ecosystem, in the DNA, it's how do we have technology with a pulse? How do, how are we having conversations and using and understanding, managing and creating digital, and technology in a way that is, is human-centered." On Culture as Terroir "I think culture is having a common language. It's having a shared belief and value system, implicit and explicit practices. You know, those conditions, those contexts are different for every single organization. Every organization has its own terrior. Each, each organization has its own unique fingerprint, contextual characteristics unique to that certain place that can influence and shape its character. So when we think about terroir, an agricultural and an ecological term, it's the soil. It's the topography. It's the climate that collectively gives and produces a particular characteristic. For organizations, terroir might be attributed to the type and size of the organization and the industry it is anchored in, it's visitor or customer demographics. It's physical locations and all forms of media that terroir, it's complex and it is comprised of internal and external forces that are unique to the organization. And, those forces ebb and flow. They adapt and adopt over time." The CALM Approach to Digital Leadership "Taking a CALM approach to digital leadership, to digital transformation, is incredibly powerful. And when I say calm, it's an acronym. C — Collaborative A — Anticipatory L — Letting go of Command and Control Leadership and Embracing Collective Leadership M — Mindful How do we, how do we think about a collaborative first environment? How do we embed, an anticipatory rhythm of practice and ritual? How do we let go of command and control leadership and how do we create the space to reflect?" Resources From This Episode Find Lauren online:   Articles mentioned in this episode:   Books Lauren mentioned in this episode: "Anything by Ursula K Le Guin" - by NK Jemisin ASU's Project Hieroglyph - & .  

During the COVID19 crisis, digital networks have played a critical part in keep humanity connected and informed. The adoption of networked experiences has scaled exponentially, seemingly overnight. In most cases, these designed experiences were crafted for very different contexts than what they are being used for. In our new, digitally connected yet physically isolated future, we will need new design mindsets and methods to account for hyper-connectivity, data-enriched experiences, and participation by non-human actors in the network.  joins me on this episode of the Cohere podcast to discuss the history of experience design, the opportunities for a more holistic method of design, and what the near-term future of our designed world might look like. Patrick is an expert on design methodologies and implementation, the Co-Founder of Method, and the author of the book "".   Key quotes from the episode: "I think in design, a lot of times the education focuses more on what I call kind of the formal aspects of design. So it is more of the components and the aesthetics and the way in which design can communicate and evoke a kind of emotion and response.  One of the things that I read early on in my research into what design was about was the history of the Bauhaus. (I) was really struck by two things:  number one, the general sense of removing the artifice and the subjectivity of design as a goal of the movement;  the other was thinking about people like Jan Tschichold and the approach to book design which was really predicated on both economic efficiency as well as aesthetic value." "As I practice today, I look at design from three different different perspectives: 1. Pragmatic Design: What are the requirements of kind of the product or the service definition? What are the, what are the goals that the designer is being asked to solve for? What are the kinds of formal aspects of design that you play with? What is the strategy around how to do this efficiently? 2. System / Reference Design: Design for the business has to address a lot of things that may not be product or services. Any single product or service is probably part of an overall ecosystem of value that is being delivered to the customer. So you take a different view on the stages of relationships, the touchpoints that are used, how they cohere together, where those flexibility needed in thinking about how you're really trying to help design. 3. Strategic Design: Which is really looking at what is changing for a business. Why will tomorrow be different? How do, trends in emerging technology and trends in economics or social-cultural context. Change the kinds of products and services or even business models that the business will need to have in the future." "I think we should realize that everything that we're doing right now and everything that we're thinking about right now is really very early-stage and naive in terms of thinking about what is possible with designing technology. There's been so much change in the past two decades that it's really difficult to kind of keep in mind that there's not enough history yet for us to understand what really are best practices and what makes the most sense in terms of design in business, and that as we look at the arc of technology things are going to continue to change and whatever we think now next decade, we're going to look back and say, "Oh, that was a little naive. We didn't anticipate this coming." What excites me about things in general though is I think the ability for us to actually begin to think more in terms of data and information, because I think data and information are key to the design process. If we begin to think "where can we create value or, better resiliency, better ability to have things be regenerative in terms of value creation, specifically around things like climate change or, or health care?" To date, we've largely looked at a lot of these solutions or approach these problems from an economic perspective as opposed to a systems perspective." Resources:

The primary purpose of the Cohere Project (and podcast) is to explore the future of human networks, especially tools that increase human and group agency in a network. I believe Nilofer Merchant's concept of "Onlyness' is one such tool. We discuss Onlyness, and much more, in one of the most fun, informative and unfiltered conversations we've had on the Cohere podcast. Nilofer Merchant is a pioneer in the use of social technologies and has written extensively about how businesses can leverage social networks and communities to shape strategy, improve performance and become more purposeful. In her new book "The Power of Onlyness", Nilofer brings forward the idea of Onlyness as a means of claiming your distinct place in the world and using networks as a catalyst for actualizing your purpose.   In this episode of the Cohere Podcast, Nilofer and I discuss: The evolution of social media Managing corporate innovation and the role of communities The concept of Onlyness, as it relates to "you, us and together" How your network shapes your self-image, role, and personal agency The natural reaction of hierarchies to resist networks The benefits of taking a radically different path Resources: - Book - Book - Book