Defining “success” within communities

What does a “successful community” look like?

For some people, it means having a safe space where they can share a common purpose and values with like-minded individuals—think of a group of board game enthusiasts who play a couple of rounds of Dungeons & Dragons on weekends. For others, it’s about having healthy and diverse participation under good leadership. You can see this in professional societies and civic groups in Singapore. These examples underscore the fact that community success is a fluid concept—one with many faces depending on your community.

Whatever the case, it’s clear that defining the success of a community ultimately rests in the hands of its members and key stakeholders (more on this later). If you’re a community developer, your challenge is to figure out what goals and objectives your community should achieve for it to be “successful.”

Generally speaking, there are two ways to go about doing this:

• External — You can look outside the community for goals you can work on as a whole. For example, a group of bike commuters can petition the government to have more bike lanes in the city. Achieving this goal provides community members with a clear target they can focus their efforts on.
• Internal — You can also look inside your community for worthwhile outcomes. For example, your objective might be to strengthen your community members’ relationships with each other. You could also focus on engendering a culture of member contribution.

In this series of articles on defining community success, we’ll be talking about what the developers behind some of Singapore’s thriving communities think success means, why community success is so subjective, and how to measure success within your own communities.