I’ve travelled the world and the seven seas… ok, ok, just North America, but since September of 2007 I’ve had the opportunity to visit nearly 100 community events from user group meetings, code camps, micro-conferences to major tradeshows such as Tech-Ed and PDC. During my travels I’ve been able to talk one on one with numerous user group leaders and influentials and there are widely varying views as to what community is. A lot of community leaders base their metrics on how many butts in a seat they were able to achieve at their latest meeting. I’m here to tell you my friends that this is not community. Not in the slightest. It’s an association, a club.

True community is what happens outside of organized events.

Here are a couple thoughts:

• How much time do you spend mentoring other developers? Jesse Riley has a great post spawned by a Jim Holmes talk on this. I’d recommend seeing Jim’s talk if you ever have the opportunity.
• Do you invite your attendees out for food and/or adult beverages after each event? This is a great way to not only build relationships, but to find motivated up-and-coming influentials and community leaders. Less than 10% of your attendees will regularly come out afterwards, but those that do tend to have the spark and can be mentored into strong community leaders themselves
• Is your Microsoft Developer Evangelist organizing all the events? Some of the best Developer Evangelists I’ve met rarely organize events themselves, rather they support those that are already organizing events. If folks in your local community aren’t organizing events however, that’s a great opportunity to step up and be a leader.
• Do you make yourself available? I make it a habit to freely share my personal contact info, and unless I’m overdue on a deadline (hypothetically speaking of course), I try to make myself available. For the record:
• Phone: (610) 883-7667
• Email and Live Messenger: steve [at] platinumbay [dot] com
• Twitter: SteveAndrews

To me, community is not about a place to hang my hat and pat myself on the back. It’s a place where I can both learn and teach, mentor and be mentored, and build meaningful and lasting relationships with my peers. I’d encourage you to do the same.