After many months of preparation, I am thrilled to announce our launch of the Connexions Community, powered by Higher Logic!
This launch represents a significant milestone in our commitment to fostering meaningful relationships and leveraging the knowledge and expertise that lies with you in the CFA Society® network.
The absence of easy society-to-society sharing has been a common theme over the years. Although we have many means to communicate with you, until now, you haven’t had a reliable means to connect and collaborate directly with each other. So much of our success comes from the quality of relationships and collaborations we forge, and investing in the Connexions Community is one big way to meet this need.
From its inception, we’ve envisioned the Connexions Community to be a secure, interactive virtual space where you could come together, exchange ideas, share your passion, and work collectively towards common goals with other society leaders across borders and boundaries. In developing this experience, we kept a few of our Principles of Partnership—our mutual commitments—at the forefront:
- We value our diversity, differences, and relative strengths; we create opportunities to learn from each other.
- We nurture the sense of community that is unique to our membership and global network.
- We challenge and inspire each other with new ideas and innovation.
As exciting as this launch may be, we recognize that building a community that fulfills these principles will take time. As more of you start using the site, it will take on its own form—what it looks like and how societies use it today may be very different from how you use it a year from now. For now, you will see members of CFA Institute staff in the community as moderators, who will take a supporting role to review and encourage content. But because this platform is about enabling society-to-society collaboration, we envision the moderators will remain in the background to allow for society connections to thrive.
We will observe how you interact with the platform and make adjustments to the experience as we go along. With the launch of anything new, there will always be bumps in the road. When we do inevitably meet them, we’ll communicate with transparency and will rely on your feedback to help inform how we make improvements. Finally, we will do our part to cultivate a positive, collaborative environment and will rely on your thoughtfulness and professionalism to help make it so.
This launch would not have been possible without the input and engagement of those in our network. My sincerest thanks go to representatives from the societies who gave feedback during the beta testing phase to improve the experience: Boston, Canada, Chengdu, Indonesia, Malaysia, New York, Netherlands, Nigeria, Pakistan, Shanghai, Vancouver, and Washington, DC. The individuals who submitted feedback earned an “Early Adopter” ribbon on their profiles. You can see some of their thoughts on the experience below.
More information about how to log in and get started is also available below.
I encourage you all to explore our Connexions Community, connect with fellow societies, and keep the positive momentum going!
Randi Tolber, CFA
Managing Director, Global Member and Society Relations
PROCESS
LOG IN
Go to https://community.cfainstitute.org/
The link to sign in is at the top right of the page. Sign in using your CFA Institute credentials (the same information you use to access other platforms such as Society Center and your CFA Institute account).
Agree to the Terms and Conditions (if you haven’t already)
CUSTOMIZE YOUR PROFILE
Taking a few minutes to customize the information and preferences in your profile will make the experience better for everyone. Navigate to your profile, where you can:
- Upload a picture, edit your bio, and add your education and job experience to complete your profile.
- Adjust your privacy settings and manage the types of community notifications the platform sends you.
START COLLABORATING IN THE COMMUNITY
Navigate to “My Communities” and find the “Connexions Community.” (Note that there may be up to a 60-minute lag between accepting the terms and conditions and seeing this community in your list.) Explore the tabs, and take a few actions while you’re there:
- Reply to Randi’s welcome thread! Doing so will not only give you the opportunity to introduce yourself and learn more about each other; it will also give you better idea of how to interact with others’ posts on the site.
- Go to the Members tab to make connections with other community members. Browse the list, add contacts, and send messages.
- Review recently-posted blog entries and events.
- Start your own discussion thread. What would you like to discuss with other societies?
FAQS AND USER GUIDES
- General FAQs about using the site are available here.
- You can access the CFA Institute Community Standards of Practice Manual in the library.
- FAQs specific to the society leader community are available here.
- Contact us at societysupport@cfainstitute.org if you have issues accessing the site.
WHAT YOUR PEERS ARE SAYING ABOUT THE CONNEXIONS COMMUNITY
"Ease of communication, easy grouping, and a vast selection of topics. The CFA Institute Higher Logic community is here; let’s use it to collaborate more." - Rahmat Halim, CFA, Executive Director, CFA Society Indonesia
"This platform provides an opportunity for society staff around the world to exchange ideas and learn from each other. The design of its webpage is concise and clear, which makes it easy and quick to get started." - Yvonne Wang, Administrator, CFA Society Shanghai
"The Higher Logic Society Leader Community platform is a brilliant initiative that fosters stronger connections among societies, both regionally and globally, with easy navigation too." - Syn Nee Chow, Executive Director, CFA Society Malaysia
"This will be a great tool to find and help connect our societies together in a cohesive ecosystem to share information and learn from each other." – Arun Manansingh, Executive Director, CFA Society New York
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