And given this is my blog, I have an opinion too. And it’s that ‘communities’ is inaccurate for a completely different reason.

A community is traditionally a collective of people united by a common interest or trait. Seth Godin called them tribes to great effect in his book of the same name. Communities have a social hierarchy as well as a united view, and a universally accepted cultural set of rules. They are driven by passion and the desire to create a universally more rewarding experience for all members. And more often than not, they are anarchic, self-governing collectives. Which is why they aren’t what we’re looking for.

A closer term, in my view, is ‘congregation’. A group of people united by a common desire for information, who come together in a dedicated space to interact laterally and be educated by a pastoral figure. Within the congregation, there are accepted rules of entry that are set by the leader, about participation, protocol and etiquette. There are dedicated channels for interaction and a sense of ‘the one’ (pastor) talking to ‘the many’ (the congregation) for mutual benefit. The pastor offers information, insight and guidance about how their knowledge can improve the lives of the congregation. The congregation interacts both vertically and laterally to create both social and assistive interaction.

The reason that congregation seems a more appropriate word is that communities offer little scope for an externally ordained expertise. In a community, you’re an expert by universal acclaim – people know what you know through ongoing exposure to your viewpoint. As leader of a congregation, your expertise is established first, and you make yourself approachable. You are an authority figure first, separated from the community level of knowledge by virtue of position.

We can’t build talent communities because, as representatives of the company, we cannot be equals with those who are petitioning our employers for jobs. We are authority figures by default, as the gatekeepers of the kingdom they are trying to enter. We cannot participate in anarchic discussion – we can foster it, monitor it, report on it and correct it, but we as company faces cannot join it as equals.  We have something to sell, and communities aren’t about selling – they’re about the free exchange of opinion.

I’m not suggesting we start using ‘talent congregation’ as a term, but I think the difference between a community and a congregative model is important. As recruiters and employment marketers and HR people, we are (to use a quaint model that seems applicable) the priests and nuns and monks of the church of our brand’s religion. We are acolytes that serve a faith, a faith that our employment experience is real, tangible and deliverable. We believe in a vision, and our interaction with a community that wants to be educated in that vision (and how it can make their lives better) is not equal. Our authority exempts us from being included in their curiosity, and we are, as a result, separate.

People are unified by shared interest. And it’s that interest that makes them people we can hire, people we can talk to. However, unless we are personally interested in the same thing, we aren’t part of the community. We’re something else, and we must act accordingly, whatever the name we give them. Knowing this is more important than naming it.

It’s fun and relaxing and complex, and it’s taught me a few basic concepts completely outside the game itself.

It’s almost impossible to build a perfect solution.

In Chime, the building blocks are multiples of five units. The smallest possible active module you can build is nine blocks. So unless you manage to get the right sequence of parts and are fast enough to utilise them the right way, it’s almost impossible to build a solution which covers everything without needing to go back and fill in the empty spots later.

Every decision leaves artifacts behind that can hamper you later.

As the building blocks are different shapes, the creation of modules often means that afterwards, there are left-over artifacts from your previous solution. Often, these are either a good place to start making new plans, or something that gets in your way later on. And they often impact future plans in unforeseen ways when you’re building in a different area.

These artifacts become less important over time.

In Chime, the beat line of the song chases from left to right across the game arena, and every pass weakens the artifacts of previous modules, until they disappear (and take your multiplier with them), clearing the board. The colour changes as these get weaker as a signifier. Which means that, after a certain point, you stop trying to include the artifacts of past solutions into your new solution, and begin building from scratch. Factoring past consequences of your designs is only good up to a point – there comes a time when the remnants of a previous solution need to be ignored.

There’s a finite amount of time before you have to abandon a larger solution.

As you build modules, each module has a finite amount of time during which you can add to its overall size before it’s deployed. This timer resets whenever you add more volume (another full side) to the module. However, as modules become bigger, it’s harder to add a full side before the timer runs out, because there’s more ground to cover. At some point, you must decide a solution is finished before the effort of trying to add more to it becomes futile, and stops you capitalising elsewhere.

Looking beyond the primary function of a tool can lead to better results.

Most of the shapes seem to have an obvious application, but it’s surprising how many different combinations can be used to create differently-shaped modules. As the game progresses, you are required to adopt different sets of building blocks for differently shaped arenas. There’s a substantial difference in how well the game flows when you begin to look past the obvious application of shapes, and start looking at which gaps need filling, rather than how to combine your tools perfectly.

Repetition breeds unconscious competence.

I haven’t played this game to death, but I have played it a lot. Enough, certainly, to know that I’m faster now because I know how to create success from a score (and coverage) perspective. That didn’t come with study – it came with repetition, the ability to deploy solutions quickly and effectively. There’s an unconscious competence bias to games like this – the less you have to think about which actions are required (press X, move stick, press A, etc) the more you can focus on the big picture, and work faster.

It is either growth or decay – nothing is a constant solution.

In Chime, you’re either building a solution or waiting for one to embed in the background so you can build over it. The game is always a race against time, and your solutions are either in construction or in the background. Artefacts from previous solutions are either employed in a new solution, or they’re becoming obsolete. As soon as a solution is deployed, it becomes part of the established background, and new solutions, new problems need to be tackled to advance.

If you know your playing field well, you can fill in the tough spots first

The five arenas in Chime vary substantially in shape and size – including different corners and void areas. Once you realise that specific solutions are required to cover the trouble spots first, the game becomes a lot easier to plan and manager.

Everyone loves a showman. The two presentations which really stood out for me both came from charismatic, well-spoken presenters who combined data-heavy content with personal anecdotes and humour. In a room of more than 350, being able to make your audience members feel special and engaged remains a rare skill, and a valuable one.

Context is contrast. My favourite old issue. A lot of the information was shared like a chapter from a book – there was no prologue or epilogue, no sense of how this fits into other initiatives or histories. The focus was very operational, on small improvements people have made, without understanding what frameworks make these improvements possible. Case studies are great, but understanding what led to the case being so successful outside of just the data would have been more helpful in stimulating like-for-like comparisons.

Your mistakes can hang around. There were a few examples of people’s bad behaviour from previous conferences tarring them in the crowd. Every event has a back channel of rumour, and this one is no exception. In an industry with 50% annual turnover, I was amazed how many people had heard the same stories about some of the more flamboyant characters.

Alcohol and your personal brand don’t mix well. I’ve heard that alcohol amplifies your natural character, and I agree to an extent. And while I’m as guilty as any of having a few too many, it’s interesting to have seen the next-day repercussions in a room of industry types. Particularly for those who had indulged so heavily that they missed sessions their employers had paid for them to attend.

Negativity is anathema. Predominately, the discussions and questions around speaker topics (social media, testing, positive psychology and more) were positive and progressive. It was interesting to observe that, in a room full of people who were there to learn, just how often attendees would physically shy away from nearby attendees who were asking negative questions.

Social media is still eluding many. The informal discussions around social media continue to suggest that simply being on social media as an earnest participant are enough to guarantee at least a modest success. Which is the equivalent of saying if you turn up to the right clubs and dress nice, you’re bound to have fun. There wasn’t a lot of discussion about how to determine which channels suit your brand’s personality, or how to drive strategic use of these tools and options.

Tarred with the brand brush. In a room full of people who are good at their job, it’s interesting how much weight is lent to speaking for a brand. I found myself listening more intently to speakers once I knew what company they represented – the brand lent gravitas to their arguments. And I wondered how people drew the line between their personal opinions and their professional positions – I know I had trouble!

People make odd decisions. During the conference, someone tweeted that they had gatecrashed the event, and proceeded to dissect a presentation given by a reputable corporate brand in fairly harsh terms on Twitter. From this, I’ve learned three things. Firstly, don’t tweet that you’ve snuck into somewhere without paying (particularly don’t use the event hashtag!). Secondly, bagging out a presentation you haven’t paid to see, in a public forum, visible to your whole industry, isn’t likely to make you a welcome guest. Thirdly, don’t bag out a presenter if you’re already on a schedule to present alongside them at a conference in six months. Because they’ll probably know you did it, and you’re not likely to get the respect you’re looking for.

The industry doesn’t want high performers. Largely, because it makes everyone else’s job hard. No one wants to compete for talent with an organisation that’s doing it better than you – it’s like playing video games with a teenager. While there was a lot of sharing of technical information, there wasn’t a focus on creating game-changing programs or really kicking ass. My personal view is that this is because everyone in the industry knows that their organisation isn’t going to stump up the cash for something incredible when we can all get by doing roughly the same thing. More on this point later, but I felt very keenly that only one presentation was focused on innovation ‘because we can’.

People can be surprisingly awesome in the right setting. I met more than 100 new people in three days. I danced with strangers, drank with suppliers, traded cards and stories and tips with a host of rookies and veterans. I connected IRL with some people I knew online, put faces to usernames and build my network just a little more. I was impressed by the attitude of attendees – that we were united in a journey to make it easier for graduates to find the right job, and to make good choices for their futures. Like the other conferences I’ve been to this year, it was a great way to spend time and see the world from lots of different angles and through a myriad of different lenses. Bring on 2011.

Leadership is about knowing the path you’re walking, and being prepared to push a few branches out of the way to get there.  Leading an industry, or a market, or a sector, isn’t about comparison to everyone else – it’s about comparison between you and where you want to be. It’s working to reach an ideal, not to outpace a crowd.

Many businesses use competition to define success. “We’re better than XYZ, so we can’t be doing that badly.” “We’re in the top ten in our sector!” The internal picture of success is defined by other businesses, or through financial results. An average across the sector for service/price/skill is reached. The average experience then becomes the benchmark of a decent performance, and as long as the business does better than that, everything’s okay.

This is not leading. This is just running faster than the rest. This is being in front. In front of the curve. Of where you think everyone else is . And as long as your only goal is to be just a little cheaper, smarter or quicker than your nearest competitor, you’ll always find yourself scrabbling. And without knowing it, you’ll let the pack define where you go, rather than having a direction and following it.

If a client chooses another option over the one you’re selling, there are two things you can do.

The first is to attack the client directly – accuse them of being unprofessional, complain that you didn’t do your best and deserve another chance, bad-mouth the competitor, complain and use all your sales skills and existing knowledge of the client to try and guilt them into reversing the decision.

The second is to take it on the chin, to wish them well and tell them that the door is always open if there’s anything you can ever do for them. Keep it professional and objective, get feedback on what you could have done better, and stay in touch.

Guess which one means you might get the business back eventually? That’s right – the one most of us don’t do.

Criticism.

There’s a poster on my wall at work that says “If you’re tired of people exposing your mistakes, don’t attack the people. Attack the mistakes.” I’ve seen a few people in the industry respond to criticism by publicly attacking the critic. How does this make you look more credible? If you have issue with the review, address the review, not the reviewer. Attacking people, instead of issues, just weakens your argument. Or, just for something different, be confident enough in what you’re doing to ignore the criticism. If you don’t credit the reviewer, don’ respond publicly – just ignore it. Drawing attention to nasty things someone said about you on the internet doesn’t create anything but antipathy. And I’m pretty sure we’ve got enough of that already.

If it works, do it again. if it doesn’t, do it again. And don’t feed the trolls.