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European Commission
Knowledge4Policy (K4P)

The Community Digital Compass

Community Platform Solutions for People and Policy

  • Publication | 2025
Organisational Transformation
Communities of Practice Compass

Communities play a critical role in bridging the gap between policy and people, and knowledge and action. Yet digital community platforms often fail to meet real-world needs. This report identifies four challenges - fragmented platform ecosystems, trustworthy human interaction, digital skills gaps, and over-engineered tools - and offers guidance to offer human-centered public community services.

Included are 39 platform selection questions and game cards in the areas of access, platform ambitions, engagement, user experience, integrations, security and privacy, and budget as well as scoping tools and checklists designed to help policymakers and community leaders select the right digital solutions. These materials enable decision-makers to understand and explore both the social and technical dimensions of platform design, align policy and IT perspectives, and define community management functions through detailed feature exploration.

Note: This publication is the third one in a communities series (also including the ‘communities of practice checklist’ and ‘the communities of practice barometer’, cf. European Commission 2024e,f) concluding the add-ons to the Communities of Practice Playbook (European Commission 2021). It is intended for an audience at the intersection of technical and social concerns focused on translating knowledge valorisation and community engagement into fitting digital platforms.

Resources
More information and links
Authors
Susanne SZKOLA
Frederic WILLIQUET
Available from

10 Oct 2025

Related project & activitiesCommunities for Collaborative Policymaking
Related organisation(s)JRC - Joint Research CentreEC - European Commission
Knowledge service | MetadataOrganisational Transformation
Digital Europa Thesaurus (DET)information societyparticipatory democracy
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