Developing a

Community of Practice

Daniel Stevens
EDAE 624
Colorado State University
 Intro

• Many organizations recognize that allowing groups of employees to

collaborate and share knowledge toward a goal of professional growth,
benefits the individuals and the company as a whole.
• These groups are informal at times, or can be a deliberate construct to
allow people to learn, and problem solve in a cross-functional way.
• Referred to as a Community of Practice in scholarly writing (Hara, 2009:
Pyrko, Dorfler, Eden, 2017; Wenger, McDermott & Snyder, 2002), these
groups have many names, but share the common goal of passion for
growth and learning around a specific area of mutual interest
Developing a C of P
• Cook Medical LLC is a 53-year-old, privately held medical device
company with a worldwide distribution reach.
• There are two primary divisions at Cook
• Vascular division, which produces medical devices used in veins and arteries
• Med-Surg division, which is subdivided into: Surgery, Critical Care,
Reproductive Health, Urology, and Ear/ Nose and Throat.

• The foundational knowledge base in Adult Education best practices

in the training and education personnel is widely variable.
• A noted shortcoming with training personnel is that educational
theory and adult education best practices are not taught, or developed
within the training personnel. This has led to widely variable
quality, continuity, and learning retention in the aftermath of
training events
 Developing a C of P- components

• Communities of Practice (C of P’s) as described by Wenger, McDermott, &

Snyder (2002) are professionals working in a common area of interest toward
common goals.
• The 3 primary components, according to Wenger, McDermott, & Snyder, are
domain, community, and practice.
• Domain: the common ground for sharing knowledge within the context of the workplace
• Community: creates a social structure for the interactions
• Practice: specific knowledge that is shared, developed and maintained by the community

• Other key elements for success are mutual engagement (how and what people do
together as part of practice), joint enterprise (a set of problems and topics that
they care about), and a shared repertoire (the concepts and artifacts that they
create) (Pyrko, Dörfler, & Eden, 2017).
 Developing a C of P- core principles

• There are seven core principles for successful C of P’s according to Wenger,
et al. (2002)
• Design for evolution
• Open dialogue between inside and outside perspectives
• Invite different levels of participation
• Develop both public and private community spaces
• Focus on value
• Combine familiarity with excitement
• Create a rhythm for the community
Developing a C of P- structure

• The Bullseye Model

• The center is the core group that is consistently present and helps maintain normal
function of the group and the meeting agendas.

• The next layer out from the center of the bullseye are members who actively
participate, but perhaps not as frequently, or have other work obligations temporarily

• On the farthest layer out on the bullseye are participants on

the periphery. These may be members who are new to the
group, or only have a passing interest in a certain subject
 Developing a C of P- methods

• The success of the C of P requires a workplace that allows for some social
dynamics, such as deference to opinions based on seniority, to be set aside to allow
for an interactive learning environment.
• Methods of structuring meetings
• Initiate a “What would you do?” scenario
• Analyze a case study
• Problem-based learning scenario , or “Here is a problem I have. . . “

• For greatest success, the “safe” social dynamic needs to be established early so that
knowledge, or perspective sharing, is shared openly, without fear of reprisal.
 Developing a C of P
• My proposal is to develop the first in an ongoing series of educational
events to develop a Community of Practice for training and education
personnel of Cook Medical.
• This would be a monthly, 1-hour training event done over WebEx due to
the geographic spread of all of the personnel involved.
• Topics: Curriculum Development, Game Theory, Adult Learning Theory, Assessments

• For each of the sessions the members will be provided follow-on references
and resources to use in their daily work, and as a reinforcement of the
lesson
 Developing a C of P

• As we are geographically spread over the U.S.A., I will hold the

meetings via WebEx, an internet based chat room that allows for screen
sharing.
• One of the first classes, per the Director of Training’s request, will focus
on curriculum design.
• Pre-work assignment- each of my colleagues will have one of their training
PowerPoints open on their desktops so that they can do some of the work in real
time.
• The first principle will be how, and why, to establish the learning objectives at the
beginning of the course of instruction. This will be a real-time exercise in how to use
Bloom’s Taxonomy, and apply it to a lesson of immediate relevance.
 Developing a C of P

• This will then be followed by a sharing of each other’s work in an

open forum with the intention of supporting, improving each
other’s work, and holding each other accountable.
• This first exercise will be an important one in establishing trust
within the group, which is a critical element for long term C of P
success.
• For the first sessions, I will insist on keeping this a closed group,
only allowing the other training managers to participate.
Developing a C of P

• For the first few WebEx sessions, I see more than enough content to
be informational, interactive, and immediately applicable.
• The nature of C of P’s change over time, which is a natural process
of socially interactive groups.
• To ensure long term success, I plan on requesting, and inviting, my
colleagues to lead sessions of their personal interest or expertise.
With a targeted goal of one per month, this seems like an
obtainable objective.
• The intention of stepping back is also to demonstrate to the group
that this is a communal effort for knowledge growth, not just one
man’s crusade.
 Developing a C of P
• In conclusion, Communities of Practice are organizations of people within a
common area of interest who meet at regular intervals so share and develop
knowledge.
• The size and specialty can vary based on the area of interest, geographic
spread, and the individual group needs.
• Collaboration between different specialties of Cook Medical has been
lacking for several years due to the previous internal structure. With recent
changes to the division structure, the need for best practices sharing within
the division, and cross-collaboration, has become apparent.
• With time I am optimistic that an established rhythm can be established
within the Community of Practice that won’t require one specific person to
initiate, but will be self-sustaining.
References

Abigail, L. (2016). Do communities of practice enhance faculty development? Health Professions

Education, 2(2), 61-74.

Hara, N.(Ed.). (2009). Communities of practice fostering peer-to-peer learning and

informal knowledge sharing in the work place. Information Science and Knowledge Management, 13
7-31.

Jaye, C., Egan, T., & Smith-Han, K. (2010). Communities of clinical practice and normalizing
technologies of self: learning to fit in on the surgical ward. Anthropology and Medicine, 17(1), 59-73.

Li, L., Grimshaw, J, Nielsen, C., Judd, M., Coyte, P., & Graham, I. (2009). Use of communities of
practice in business and healthcare sectors: A systematic review. Implementation Science, 4(27), 1-9.
References

Pyrko, I., Dörfler, V., & Eden, C. (2017). Thinking together: What makes
Communities of Practice work? Human Relations, 70(4), 389-409.

Sims, J. (2018). Communities of practice: Telemedicine and online medical

communities. Technological Forecasting & Social Change, 126, 53-63.

Wenger, E., McDermott, R., & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating communities of practice:
A guide to managing knowledge. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.