Margaux Miller is the Global Director of Community at Toptal, a podcast host, emcee, and remote professional. She is focused on engaging Toptal’s fully remote worldwide network of freelance talent. Margaux has much experience building networks and leading community engagement—including her passionate involvement supporting women in tech. Margaux shares insights about the importance of community to create connection and belonging—across fully remote and hybrid teams and organizations. She explains how to build strong community engagement without competition and meet core human relationship needs.     KEY TAKEAWAYS   [02:20] Margaux enjoys voice acting as the voice of a cartoon for two years while at university.   [05:17] Recording all your lines alone can be challenging!   [06:28] Margaux starts in experiential marketing, quickly leading large teams.   [07:39] Empathy without explanation plays an integral role in building and maintaining community.   [09:13] Margaux describes the broad set of skills required for effective community building.   [10:42] The benefits of a hiring practices baseline.   [14:04] Creating a thriving community requires 4 elements to build and cycle through.   [16:43] Building distributed communities is helped during the pandemic as behaviors change.   [18:36] How to maintain a community at a completely remote company.   [20:13] The “fit” interview Toptal uses to screen for culture fit all builds a clear identity.   [22:03] The differentiating factor between a community and a mob!   [23:26] How Margaux keeps the community engaged to retain Toptal’s talent network.   [25:32] Connecting people with similar skill sets but in non-competitive ways yields beneficial results.   [27:56] How Margaux manages a 140-country diverse community in its diversity and the tools she uses.   [31:24] Margaux advises how create a level playing field and not widen the divide with a hybrid model.   [36:34] The biggest benefit is to reinforce existing relationships.   [39:18] In the face of the loneliness pandemic, Margaux offers local avenues for the future.   [43:08] Where does culture end and community begin?   [44:13]  IMMEDIATE ACTION TIP: To build and strengthen community and belonging, create occasions and environments that are open and accessible for everyone to get involved: design events and spaces where people are encouraged to have fun and build connections. Generate activity with multi-level stakeholders on board, joining in to show it’s safe to share, and reward participation.     RESOURCES   Margaux Miller on LinkedIn Margaux on X @MargauxAMiller Margaux on Instagram, Margaux on YouTube      QUOTES (edited)   “For it to be truly a community, there has to be a mutual concern for one another's welfare. Or you could frame it another way to say, a community is a group of people who care about each other and feel they belong together.”   “It goes identity, trust, and participation. When you get people to trust you they're going to come and do the thing: come to the mixer or the event or whatever, be part of the online chat. And then you need to reward them for that behavior.”   “I think that people would be surprised by how much humans want to connect with one another in non-competitive ways. People do truly want human connection, even introverts.”   “People stay with companies so often because of their managers or because of the team that they're on, not necessarily the company, but it's often that group that they're within, that micro-community.”   “Everyone has to be equal at the official event. If you cannot have a level playing field, don't do it. I've seen bosses of small companies take people out for a big dinner and just give everyone a gift card if they can't come. It's not equivalent, you've created a hierarchy now of how people can connect with you as the boss.”