Building Powerful Communities

Introducing Jono Bacon Jono Bacon is today's guest joining us on the Join Up Dots podcast is a community and collaboration strategy consultant, author, advisor, and speaker. He was born in Northallerton, North Yorkshire in England. He lived in Bedfordshire and the West Midlands before relocating to California in 2008 to live with his wife, Erica. While he has always had an interest in technology, the seed change happened in 1998 when Jono's older brother, Simon, introduced him to Open Source. Jono was captivated by the notion of people around the world working together to produce technology that they all shared and benefited from. This created a lifelong passion to understand every nuance of how to build productive, engaging communities where a network of minds, experience, and time can produce value together. Just imagine what is possible if we can crack the code for doing this well? He started dipping his toes into various technology communities, writing extensively for magazines and online outlets, and then joining a new government initiative called OpenAdvantage that provided Open Source training and consulting. His career then took him to XPRIZE where he helped launch incentive competitions that solve major challenges (such as the $15million dollar Global Learning XPRIZE to build technology that teaches kids literacy without a teach) and then he went to lead community strategy at GitHub where most of the world's technology is created. How The Dots Joined Up For Jono At this point in his career, Jono wanted to apply the power of building communities to broader range of industries and challenges and he started consulting for a variety range of organizations about community and collaboration strategy. This includes industries such as financial services, entertainment, professional services, non-profits, consumer products, security, and beyond. His clients have included Deutsche Bank, The Executive Centre, Google, Mattermost, Glorious Games, Santander, and more. Which is the perfect starting point to today's episode. So growing up in Yorkshire, his path could have been very much like the majority of his colleagues - did he always think he was going to be different? And where do people go wrong with making communities really work for them? Well let's find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Jono Bacon Show Highlights During the show we discussed such deep weighty subjects with Jono Bacon such as: Why we all have different definitions of what is a community for us.....but you have to understand your audience big Jono shares his rocking chair moment and why he now has a huge pull to his Northern past. Jono breaks down the first five steps that we all have to take to build a community that truly works. and lastly...... We cover the big failing point of all new communities due to the founder focusing in on what they get and not the group.