Communites of Practice - A brief Introduction

Communities of Practice (CoP)'s are formed by people who are engaged in collective learning in a shared domain of human endeavor. These people share a concern or a passion for something they do and lean how to do it better as they interact on a regular basis.

A learning organization actively creates, captures, transfers, and mobilizes knowledge to enable it to adapt to a changing environment. CoP's help to accelerate this since learning from experiences has a deeper impact than learning from concepts.

Some of the major objectives of most CoP's are:

• To enable colleagues to learn from one another through the sharing of issues, ideas, lessons learned, problems and their solutions, research findings and other relevant aspects of their mutual interest
• To leverage on the expertise by fostering learning, simulating interactions, creating knowledge base, identifying and sharing best practices. Re-use of knowledge and artifacts without re-inventing the wheel, enabling better insight into risks & mitigation, and better management.
• To generate tangible, measurable, value added benefits to the business

Organizations who give importance in developing and maintaining CoP's have benefited from a community's learning, knowledge and expertise.