Great leaders create communities

According to Michael Hyatt, every great leader needs a community or people to lead. Whether it’s a community culture as the CEO of a company or a community-based business as a thought leader or content creator, leadership is all about community. Great leaders know how to build and maintain strong communities.

1. Provide meaningful content

Community starts with understanding your target audience and providing valuable content and resources. That looks different for each leader. For a CEO of a large company, their audience is their employees and potential employees, who can benefit from a strong culture and transparent communication. An online thought leader's audience may be entrepreneurs or young professionals who could benefit from advice, blog content, and mentoring.

Michael Hyatt, founder of Full Focus, put it this way: “Figure out the people in your target audience, what they aspire to, what they dream about accomplishing, and what they wish they had. Then, figure out what obstacles keep them from getting that, and you can help them remove those obstacles and progress toward their goals.”

2. Interact with your community

Great leaders engage and interact with their communities authentically, transparently, and regularly. Interacting with members of your community strengthens relationships and builds trust and loyalty. Engaging also means listening and receiving feedback, which helps you stay connected to people.

Engaging with people means that the conversation isn’t just one-sided. Engaged leaders ask questions and invite participation. They spend time with people—virtually or in person—to understand their perspectives and unique challenges. Engaging and interacting can look like asking questions online, posting a survey, holding an all-employee town hall, being open for in-person questions, visiting employees at work, or inviting people to join a focus group—the possibilities are endless based on your leadership role and the needs of the community.

3. Collaborate

Community-building is a lot like networking. To build a strong community, you need to collaborate with others and build strong partnerships. This often requires working with other leaders with similar audiences or areas of expertise that align with yours. Collaborating can help develop and strengthen your community and provide more value to its members by tapping into resources they may not be able to access independently. Invite another leader to speak at an event, share their content on your blog, or interview them on a podcast. The goal is to leverage connections and provide more value to your community.

4. Adapt and evolve

Like all areas of leadership, building and maintaining a community requires agility and a willingness to adapt and evolve. Your community's needs will likely change over time, especially as membership grows or changes. By listening and staying engaged with the community, you can tailor your approach to meet these changing needs.

For example, you may build a strong community culture within your company through regular in-person events. However, as the company grows and employees start working remotely, you may need to change your approach to interacting virtually in smaller groups. For community thought leaders, your specialty or expertise may change over time. You may need to change the content you produce or the channels you use, such as by creating videos or podcasts to better connect with members. No matter the type of community, the key is to pay attention to the members’ needs and strategically adjust to stay engaged.