The future of work is community powered
- Luisa Covaria
- Apr 10
- 5 min read
EVERYBODY
WANTS TO BELONG
Humans inherently crave belonging and being part of something bigger than themselves. In fact, collaborating makes us more productive and creates the foundation for innovation and competitiveness. In this era of profound transformation to our social fabric, leaders should strive to incentivize community building within their companies and support new ways of working that enable genuine connection and knowledge sharing.
Let me share 4 tenets that have emerged as key ingredients in my work building healthy communities within traditional and non-traditional structures:
1. A SENSE OF PURPOSE LEADS TO GREATER BENEFITS
In 2023, I joined the talent startup Neol. We attracted some of the world's best creative talent who had been laid off or worked independently by choice. The startup's appeal lies in the recurring need for a community to learn from each other and gain access to centralized resources. It’s simple, it’s why humans have gathered in groups since the neolithic time when agriculture was born. We crave community, we build it and we grow.
I have also seen this need amongst people in corporations. I currently work with a large conglomerate to tackle how to embed AI and Gen AI into their portfolio strategy. In this journey, we found that executives are less intimidated by the uncertainty of what GenAI means for their industries than by the sheer workload of going at it alone. They receive pressure from the C-suite, from their teams and from the market. Our response was to design a community of AI leaders who would be the pioneers to share the value of Gen AI within their businesses. The community allows them to share learnings, access centralized tools and resources and gain support and accountability through a buddy system. This has proven to be not only more cost-effective but also has built resilience in how the conglomerate approaches this second wave of digital transformation.
HOW MIGHT YOU ALIGN PEOPLE IN YOUR COMPANY AND/OR INDUSTRY AROUND A SHARED NEED AND PURPOSE?
2. CLOSE CONNECTIONS LEAD TO RESILIENCE
During my time at OpenIDEO we supported communities evolve into resilient ecosystems. We brought together people from all over the world to work on challenging problems generating not only thousands of ideas and solutions but also networks that collaborated over time.
As an example, we launched many challenges on Circular Design with sponsors like the Ellen McArthur Foundation, Closed Loop Partners and Nike. We were intentionally working with different types of sponsors: philanthropy, corporations and venture funds. We also brought mentors and reached out to participants at different stages of their maturity. Many organizations that won some of these challenges, got access to funding, accelerators and design support. Many continued with pilots and some carried on collaborations with sponsors. But even more interesting is knowing that some people hired co- founders,, continued to mentor each other and strengthened networks that help them scale their reach and get other funding sources. This served all participants and not only the official winners. OpenIDEO’s focus on certain topic areas and intentional inclusion of different types of actors over time allowed for networks to strengthen and grow.
HOW MIGHT YOU INTENTIONALLY INVITE DIFFERENT ACTORS INTO A COMMUNITY THAT WILL SUPPORT EACH OTHER OVER TIME AND EVOLVE INTO AN ECOSYSTEM?
3. COLLABORATION LEADS TO FASTER LEARNING AND RESILIENCE
Together we can respond more quickly to shifts. During natural disasters and emergencies communities with close ties are more resilient, effective and faster at helping each other.
When the pandemic hit, OpenIDEO launched over four challenges from how to bridge the learning gap to how to support small businesses. At the time OpenIDEO had been running for 10 years. There was a closely knitted community worldwide ready to respond and trusted sponsors we could reach out as implementation partners. We mobilizedthe network in no time and not only connected resources to where they were needed most but gave a container for the world to pitch in and leverage the community to process the chaos we were experiencing as a human society. When people trust each other they feel safe, learn faster and achieve bold and necessary goals.
HOW MIGHT YOU LEVERAGE AND CONNECT WITH EXISTING NETWORKS OF TRUSTED COLLABORATORS?
4. COMMUNITIES- WHEN NURTURED PROPERLY - CAN RETAIN UNDERREPRESENTED TALENT
As an immigrant from Colombia, half indigenous, a mother and a woman, I have found in communities the support and nurturing to get to where I am today.
Early in my career, I almost got fired while on a work visa, fresh out of my masters studies and with no savings. At the time, I had to cling on to the job so I was not sent back to Colombia in a span of weeks, because if you do not have a sponsor for your work visa it gets voided. In that scenario, I would have found myself back in Bogota, a city in which I had not lived since my teenage years, in a struggling economy and with no business contacts. This would have made it harder for me to grow professionally.
The reason to fire me was not related to my performance, it was due to leaders not aligning on what they wanted for the program I was managing. In the end it was my performance and potential and the support of my family, husband and friends that kept me on the job and helped me learn to manage corporate politics.
As I became more senior, I made a promise to not let this happen to others that came after me. There was no one in a leadership role who looked like me or was in my vulnerable position. Neither were there systems in place for managers to know how to support talent like me. I had no one inside the company to approach for advice. So a year later, I started a breakfast series for women. This event series allowed for younger talent and leaders to learn from each other in a safe space. We could talk about career advancement and challenging questions like dealing with childcare and work, give feedback to managers and ask for raises. Later I worked together with a new manager, an incredible ally, who helped me intentionally hire people from diverse races, gender, sexual orientation and educational backgrounds. We created a unique team and pushed to evolve systems that helped hiring more diverse talent. One of our hires then created a fellowship for talent of color to have internships.
Parallel to my own efforts, employee resource groups emerged. The first one targeted people of color, which gave me a safe space to talk about my challenges, and gave me opportunities to speak publicly, be seen and get recognized. I even told this story at a leadership retreat once I became a leader.
HOW ARE YOU UPLIFTING THE LEAST REPRESENTED COMMUNITIES AND FACILITATING SAFE SPACES?
Whether your focus for the rest of the year is to grow your talent, figure out the role of Gen AI in your industry, launch a new product or service or step into a new personal or professional chapter: nurturing an intentional community with aligned incentives will get you there more effectively and within a nurturing environment to deal with the unexpected.
WHAT COMMUNITIES ARE YOU NURTURING TODAY?
A champion of women, gender equity and those traditionally marginalized. Innate storyteller, community builder and systems thinker. Luisa helps brands and organizations create a lasting impact, engage their audience, and maintain cultural relevance. Mom to Aria.
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