Thank you for sharing this so openly, and for your work on this project over the years! As a fellow community builder, I really recognise how hard this work can be, especially when it comes to funding and impact uncertainty.
I can confirm that what you describe matches the reality for many community builders. I’ve been running Hive on a paid basis for almost three years, and funding has consistently been one of our biggest challenges. Tracking and evidencing impact is also genuinely difficult in community building, even when the work feels clearly valuable on the ground.
Given that context, your decision to transition feels thoughtful and solid. I appreciate you taking the time to reflect on this publicly. I think pieces like this are really important for setting more realistic expectations about what long-term community building actually looks like!
Thanks for this, Sofia. This really helps. The “valuable on the ground but hard to prove” tension has been the story of my (admittedly short) CB career. Eight months in and I was already feeling that friction constantly. How do you show that someone’s entire trajectory shifted because of a conversation you had? Or that a community exists because you showed up every week?
I’m glad we wrote this openly. I hope more CBs write openly about this reality. The work matters, but the system around it needs rethinking.
Thanks a lot for sharing your own experience which feels genuinely validating of ours, Sofía. We really admire the work Hive and other communities are doing, and hope that by being more open about the many obstacles community builders face, we can help bring about a more constructive and transparent dialogue between CBs and funders.
Thank you for sharing this so openly, and for your work on this project over the years! As a fellow community builder, I really recognise how hard this work can be, especially when it comes to funding and impact uncertainty.
I can confirm that what you describe matches the reality for many community builders. I’ve been running Hive on a paid basis for almost three years, and funding has consistently been one of our biggest challenges. Tracking and evidencing impact is also genuinely difficult in community building, even when the work feels clearly valuable on the ground.
Given that context, your decision to transition feels thoughtful and solid. I appreciate you taking the time to reflect on this publicly. I think pieces like this are really important for setting more realistic expectations about what long-term community building actually looks like!
Thanks for this, Sofia. This really helps. The “valuable on the ground but hard to prove” tension has been the story of my (admittedly short) CB career. Eight months in and I was already feeling that friction constantly. How do you show that someone’s entire trajectory shifted because of a conversation you had? Or that a community exists because you showed up every week?
I’m glad we wrote this openly. I hope more CBs write openly about this reality. The work matters, but the system around it needs rethinking.
Thanks a lot for sharing your own experience which feels genuinely validating of ours, Sofía. We really admire the work Hive and other communities are doing, and hope that by being more open about the many obstacles community builders face, we can help bring about a more constructive and transparent dialogue between CBs and funders.