Life Itself Hub Alumni network especially for Bergerac Hub [shaping - 50%]

[rufuspollock]

Originally Discussed in https://github.com/orgs/life-itself/discussions/1058 (now deleted) (26 Feb 2024 from earlier)

Proposal (v0.1 unfinished)

• Appetite: 1 month of 1 person's full time work

Problem statement

• job story: when people leave the hub, we want them to stay connected to each other and the hub, to support the growth of a second renaissance movement and pockets of pioneers

Situation

• No intentional structure to support people staying in touch and connnected to the hub, and to capitalise on connections to grow the community (we have whatsapp groups, which are not populated enough for continuity/connection following residences)

Complication

• ...

Questions

• How can we support people from the same residency staying in touch with each other?
• How can we foster connections / build a network of alumni who don't necessarily know each other (e.g. from different residencies)?
• How can we leverage alumni for promoting the hub? (e.g. people connecting with consenting alumni to discuss life at the Hub or the broader 2nd renaissance movement...) (having a CRM)
• How can we encourage / facilitate alumni to stay connected / involved with broader LI community (e.g. community calls, gathering, etc.)

Hypotheses

• Introducing catch-ups via zoom some amount of time after a given residency as a starting point of reconnection
• builidng a details eg. a spreadsheet where alumni can put their contact and
• enabling alumni to opt into being reached out automatically for promoting residencies, opportunities for work on other projects etc.
• page on website showing alumni to show types of people who come by

Elements

• database / CRM of alumni
  • (e.g. this which was done for the Berlin hub)
  • making it part of feedback form to ask for permission for info to be stored and/or to be contacted
• page on website for alummi and what they are up to
  • also a community / discussion forum?
• online / in-person catch-ups / reunions
• connecting with people on Linkedin

Rabbit Holes

• getting people on new systems (like github)
• contacting every single person who's stayed at the hub

Risks

48 hour version

• Add question to feedback form asking for permission to be contacted
• Organise a 6 month reunion for latest residency cohort
• Create a page on website for alumni, where people can add their details and what they're up to
• adding contacts on LinkedIn from residencies

[rufuspollock]

@martinprogrammer commented 27 Feb 2024

For people to have a reason to stay in touch it's necessary that "meaningful relationships" have been forged.

Maybe it's possible to keep them connected through LI-run projects and research meetings, but that's not self perpetuating and needs constant energy.

There's a lot of useful stuff in Simon's article - Intentional Coming Together.

Meaningful relationships:

• people liking each other,
• wanting to spend time together,
• seeing each other as a developmental gateway
• planning future where there's place for that person with an active part
• wanting to do projects together (co-create)

Rather than working on re-connecting people - it's better to build a strong framework for facilitation and birthing of "meaningful relationships" as one of the core features of the deliberately developmental spaces.