It Is Rotating Leaders Who Build The Swarm: Social Network Determinants Of Growth For Healthcare Virtual Communities Of Practice (Term Paper Sample)

It is rotating leaders who build the swarm: social network determinants of growth for healthcare virtual communities of practice
This article sought to find out the factors that influence the growth and stability of healthcare virtual communities of practice “taking into account simultaneously the content, the structure and the longitudinal dynamics of community communication (Antonacci, Fronzetti Colladon, Stefanini, & Gloor, 2017, p. 1231).” Virtual communities, with the advent and advancement in technology have come in handy to advance research, innovation and sharing of knowledge. To this end, with the numbers increasing and sizes burgeoning especially with reference to professional virtual communities, there need to be a solid communication structure, interaction and leadership that appreciate the dynamics especially when the knowledge base is to be evidence-based practices and their impact on human life plus their practice with the professionals.
Thus this article proposes measures and necessary steps on the ways on creating and having successful VCoP platforms and enhancing participation and additionally, the key essential drivers in ensuring that there is a smooth and steady growth of the platforms. The authors opine that to growth of VCoP platforms are technological factors, individual factors and finally social factors. These are all essential to ensure usability of the platforms because technology ensures communication but it is important for the values, traits and character eschewed by individuals and also the correctness of the medium plus the ground rules which are socially acceptable. Thus for community growth, the three factors lead to good use of language, good connectivity and interactivity in the VCoP platforms.
The researchers on this subject thus concluded that the key factors that influence the sharing of knowledge through the virtual communities especially the healthcare VCoP are the language use which has its determinants, the degree of connectivity and degree of interactivity of the members. These are factors that are quintessentially under the control of the leaders in these platforms thus they concluded that “the growth of VCoPs is mostly related to the presence of leaders/experts and to their ability to rotate and foster a more democratic participation (Antonacci, Fronzetti Colladon, Stefanini, & Gloor, 2017, p. 1231).”
Fast forward, the researchers or authors of this article have set forth a valuable research that run over a period to come up with the determinants for growth of VCoPs, and not only that, it transcends virtually to almost all other virtual communities but as noted by the researchers, through testing. This is what makes me be in agreement with their findings. It must be noted therefore that essential in the VCoPs system is effective knowledge management, and these are well addressed by the authors. To add weight on this, Alali and Salim (2013) note that “effective knowledge management (KM) initiatives enable the healthcare organizations to develop health practitioners’ knowledge, rather than traditional and expensive learning channels, such as, face-to-face learning (Alali & Salim, 2013, p. 178).”
Therefore in order to manage knowledge efficiently and effectively then the use of language is vital. Language use instills confidence and social trust. Therefore the language must be punctuated with positive sentimentalism, emotionality in conversations, and finally a language that is less complex will seem to grow faster. This is to facilitate the faster growth and sharing of knowledge. This would therefore achieve “building mutual knowledge, trust among members, and the sense of belonging, which all increase the likelihood of comprehension, open exchange and sharing (Alali & Salim, 2013, p. 70)” among the members in the VCoPs platform or the CoPs.
VCoPs are heavily anchored on social interactions, and more often than ever, there always seems to be disconnects between the social network system and the individual. To this end there needs to be a strong connectivity between the members in the system and an expert approach to the operations of the system. That’s the essence of ensuring system quality and this is through having experts and qualified practitioners interacting in the system and also ensuring network centralization for easy connectivity.
It is imperative to note that rotating the leadership in the online platforms for the healthcare professionals has a very huge impact for the growth and stability of the system. For instance, VCoPs or CoPs largely depends on evidence-based practices and these are measures that one person can’t determine and control, thus it is a collective responsibility that needs leaders who are adept and can be able to enhance interactive knowledge sharing. This is because communication is essential in these online engagements and taking cognizance of the various segments and active discussions, it is essential for engagement with the right leadership to spur confidence in the system and attracting more members into the system. The leaders therefore have a role “to provide the overall guidance and management needed to build and maintain the community, its relevance and strategic importance in the organization and level of visibility (Bourh...