Building a team

Make sure that your core project team includes people who know the audience and are passionate about the project. Cultivate the enthusiasm of the people delivering the project and it will rub off on your users. It may be better to recruit people with a can-do attitude and preparedness to experiment, than those who have technology experience but aren’t strongly committed to what you are trying to achieve.

You can find people in all sorts of places, but online is a good place to start. If you’re looking for people who are enthusiastic and experienced at using new technologies, you will find them by using those technologies yourself. The Colalife project gathered a large community of volunteers by using a wide range of online spaces to recruit and engage people, holding social events, and creating a short video for distribution on YouTube.

You may get all the skills you need in your team, or you may need outside support from consultants, mentors or partners. We suggest you recruit some or all of the following roles – perhaps with some doubling up on who does what:

  • Project leader – responsible for overall planning and direction.
  • Technology steward – helps everyone choose, understand, install and use the right tools.
  • Executive sponsor – champions your project within the organisation (if you have one) or with funders or partner organisations.
  • User evangelist – stands on the side of users and helps them get more out of the tools.
  • Community manager – recruits users to the technologies, and then acts as host and facilitator.

 

Recruit people who are good communicators, writers and people-handlers first, and good with technology second (although people who can’t even work a computer may slow you down). In the early stages of a project, when you are trying to engage with a wide range of partners, funders and users, it is important to be able to explain what you are trying to do. The technology skills can be brought in when they’re needed; the success of your project relies more on how you explain and communicate it.

(Read more about the Emerging roles later.)