The Community Roundtable

Empowering global community leaders with research-backed resources, training, and tools.

Community Leadership Awards 2021

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Since 2016, our annual online community industry awards have recognized and rewarded excellence in community management.

We are lucky to have visibility into some of the most creative, innovative and effective community work being done today. From non-profit organizations building community on a budget to massive global community programs, members of TheCR Network generously share their successes and challenges with each other. Over the last five years TheCR Awards has spotlighted their successes, and helped global community professionals model their progams after proven examples.

Added bonus? Our winners find that being recognized helps secure executive sponsorship, increased budgets, and wider awareness for their community initiatives. (Literally a win-win situation!)

We’re excited to announce that the awards are back and open for submissions in 2021 – with a new name.

Community Leadership Awards
Community Leadership Awards

To better reflect the true purpose of our long-standing online community awards program and to support our goal of recognizing and rewarding excellence in online community management leadership, TheCR Awards are now the Community Leadership Awards.

The Community Leadership Awards 2021 are now open and accepting submissions and nominations from members of TheCR Network and their organizations in seven categories: Community Champion, Community MVP, Outstanding Recognition + Reward Program, Outstanding Community Dashboard, Outstanding Community Program: New Member Programs, Outstanding Community Design Element, and Outstanding Community ROI.

Community ROI
Community MVP
Outstanding Community Design Element
Outstanding Recognition + Reward Program
Outstanding Community Program
Outstanding Community Dashboard
TheCRAwards_Icon_Champion
Community Champion

Learn more and submit your community program, or nominate a peer or champion here. Call for submissions closes on July 31, 2021.

Recognizing Excellence in Community Management

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We’re coming to the end of the traditional award season – but our annual community management awards are just ramping up. Now in their third year, TheCR Awards recognize excellence in community management.

Last year we had the honor of presenting four global community programs with awards in recognition of their community efforts – American Express (Best Community Design Element), Electronic Arts (Best Reward and Recognition Program) Autodesk (Winning Welcome Wagon), Carbon Black (Outstanding Community ROI) and six individual community managers with additional awards ranging from Power User to The Community MVP.

The Awards are back for 2018 with exciting new categories like Best Community Dashboard, Outstanding Community Playbook, and Outstanding Community Change Agent. You can learn more here. TheCR Awards will be open for 2018 submission in the following categories starting June 1, 2018. More details and award criteria will be released shortly.

 

#thankitforward – On community, collaboration and creativity.

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By Maggie Tunning, Learning and Culture Manager at The Community Roundtable.

Thank you to Shannon for highlighting the #thankitforward series again this year! My three picks:

#thankitforward

  1. TheCR Network members. Their experience and insight improves our research and programs. This year I especially enjoyed watching the leaders of our community maturity assessment working group apply the Community Maturity Model to create a roadmap and for internal consulting. They later contributed to a pilot training program for new members learning to apply the model, and not only shared their experiences but helped others working on new ideas for applications.

  2. Co-working spaces that encourage creativity and community. Two of my favorite spots to camp out for a morning or afternoon are the Kaneko Library and the Pilgrimer. The Kaneko Library is a speciality library dedicated to creativity, and in addition to shelves of journals and books in fields that thrive on creative input – science, engineering, advertising, business, design, architecture, the humanities and the arts – they have other resources to fuel creative minds like coffee, Scrabble and Legos. The Pilgrimer is a gathering space supporting local entrepreneurs, makers, artists and non-profit organizations that hosts a retail store for handmade goods and serves amazing pour over coffee.

  3. TheCR team. I feel lucky to collaborate with smart and supportive colleagues every day. One of our traditions that I appreciate this time of year is a Secret Santa gift exchange – the gift of giving and surprising another team member is as much fun as being surprised and receiving gifts, too.

Who are you thankful for this year? We’d love to hear who made a difference in your work and life – just tag it #thankitforward!

Thank It Forward 2014 – Looking Back and Giving Thanks in Your Community

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By Shannon Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

snoopygratefulLast year we explored the idea of #thankitforward here on TheCR blog, and in TheCR Network and we loved the outcome so much we’re back for year two. This is our official kick off to our second year of looking back and giving thanks to those that helped us work, grow and thrive in the past year!

In the spirit of reflection and gratitude we encourage you to look back at 2014 and identify three (or more!) people who made a difference in your work and life this past year and send them a thank you via email, snail mail, or Twitter, (or whatever medium works best for you.) 

Think about:

  • Who inspired you? Brought on a “aha moment”?
  • Who was unwavering in their support of your work?
  • Which exec made a difference with their sponsorship or participation?
  • Which community member or advocate showed up in a big way?
  • Who covered you so you could unplug for a vacation — whether a day or a week?
  • Who talked you through a tough situation?
  • Whose blog posts or Twitter handle kept you well informed? Or laughing!

You get the idea! We’d love if you tag any social thanks #thankitforward so we can see the gratitude spread. Of course – some thanks yous are private and we 100% encourage those as well. Our goal is to inspire reflection on your journey this past year, and help identify those that helped make it possible.

So tell us. Who will you be thanking it forward to this year? We’ll be sharing our #thankitforward posts over the next three weeks and we can’t wait to see yours!