Part 1 of 2 - What should an effective Produsage Community look like?

For the first part of today's series of posts, I'd like to introduce to you a book that I've read written by Daniel Coyle (2018) called "The culture code". This week, we've been mostly reading about web 2.0 technologies that facilitate a user-centric environment where users are both the producers of knowledge and users of it (produsers). I however, have been attracted to the notion of community. For produsage to work, it is essential that a community in which collaboration and not self-aggrandizement is cultivated. 

This lead me to the culture code's examination of key facets of successful groups. In one of the studies listed in the book, it noted that in a simple experiment where groups of business students and kindergartners (all groups were homogenous) were told to build the highest tower with twenty pieces of uncooked spaghetti, one yard of transparent tape, one yard of string and one standard-size marshmallow (to be put on top of the obelisk), the kindergartners almost always beat out the business students. This was despite the fact that the business students were strategizing, examining and generating ideas as compared to the kindergartners' haphazard material selection and almost trial and error like approach. 

The key success factor of the kindergartners however, was their ability to collaborate in a smart and efficient way - it involved little amounts of discussing, but rather a collaborative almost hive mind approach of solutioning with risk-taking, observation of outcomes and mutual assistance. On the other hand, the book notes that the business students were actually engaged in status management - figuring out the leaders and followers of the group, protecting their image as opposed to committing to the success of the group's endeavor. 

Now at this juncture, anyone would be wondering why I'm rambling about this book. My thinking is that an effective produsage community should resemble the kindergartners' behavior - the outcome is treasured over personal ambitions, indeed all personal actions are enacted to engineer the success of the group's objective. However, this kind of behavior emerges under a specific set of conditions. In this case, Daniel Coyle (2018) argues that it is necessary for the community to represent a safe environment. This safe environment facilitates - trust, cooperation, risk-taking and self-sacrifice for the purposes of meeting the group's objective. Now, if every individual of the produsage community  displayed these characteristics, the community would be capable of accruing quite a few excellent products under its belt. 

The question now is: How does one create such a community? Daniel Coyle (2018) posits three broad areas of focus: (1) Creating a safe environment; (2) Sharing Vulnerabilities; and, (3) Establishing Purpose. Creating a safe environment involves establishing connection (physical and emotional) to create belonging and a communal identity. Sharing vulnerabilities is about creating a culture of mutual risk and risk-taking that compels trust and cooperation. Finally, establishing purpose is about using narratives to create a shared enterprise/ goal and values, both of which are critical to a collaborative culture. 

Having said that, the key assumption here is that there is some manner of leadership/ facilitator in the group to enact the areas of focus. Not all produsage communities are necessarily organized in this way. In my next post, I will be looking at some of the difficulties of facilitating/ moderating online communities let alone produsage one. 

Here is a video introduction I found on youtube on the culture code. Enjoy!

References:

Coyle, Daniel. (2018). The culture code. Bantam Books.