The other day I let my dog outside and I told him to come in; instead, he ran around in circles, like it was a game.
Fast forward to today, I left the gate open and went inside. Minutes later, Monty was waiting by the back door, ready to come in on his own.
I needed him to do something, but instead of demanding, I simply gave him space to make the decision on his own. Turns out, community work isn’t all that different: less direction, more space.
In most environments, we’re taught that effectiveness means control: set the direction, manage the variables, produce the outcome. But community doesn’t always work that way because the tighter we hold on and the more we direct, the more people pull away.
We can’t mandate trust or force belonging, which means a different kind of efficacy is required. Enter Dark Efficacy.
.webp)
Dark Efficacy is a Daoist philosophy, also referred to as “mysterious virtue.” It's a form of influence that is powerful, not because it controls, but because it is subtle and caring and allows things to grow and develop without force. Dark Efficacy is the invisible force that allows life to unfold. It’s about a quiet influence and supportive presence, not overt control. In short, it’s about letting things emerge organically.
In practice, Dark Efficacy runs directly against how most organizations define effectiveness. We’ve all got metrics to hit, goals to reach, and people expecting results. And often, those expectations assume a level of control that doesn’t actually exist. And chances are, you’ve also got people looking to you to fix something, change something, or produce something (or a TON of things). Perhaps one of these sounds familiar?
I’m exhausted just writing those.
Within Dark Efficacy, I’ve found that the moments I’m most “effective” are rarely my loudest ones. They are the moments when I resist the urge to fix, to steer, to prove, or to control, and instead create the conditions for others to step forward. In community work, this often looks unremarkable from the outside:
None of those moments belong to me. And that is precisely the point. These acts rarely show up in dashboards or performance reviews. But, they are often the difference between a group that simply participates and a community that endures. Within Dark Efficacy, the role of the community leader is not to dominate the space but to generate it, nourish it, protect it, and gradually become less central to it.
There are three central tenets:
Generating without possessing means creating the conditions for ideas and relationships to take shape without claiming them once they do. In your community, this means you're creating momentum without owning the outcome.
What this looks like:
Members might set up spontaneous meetups with other community members or create and share helpful product resources. Instead of looking for opportunities to capitalize on these by formalizing it, rebranding it, or folding it into official programming, you let it be, resist the urge to over-curate, celebrate or reward contributing members, and ensure credit lands where it belongs, internally and externally. Under this element of Dark Efficacy, we generate space, not evidence.
I find that conference season is where this gets tested most. There’s often pressure (both internal and external) to turn every gathering into something structured—official meetups, hosted dinners, curated experiences.
I’ve felt that pull too: to generate something that feels organized and owned. But in following dark efficacy, instead I created a simple shared digital space where attendees could post their presentation details, share informal plans and general timeframes, and find others who were already going to be in the same place. Nothing was formalized or centralized. And, it was a great way for me to show up for community members at their presentations, not just for them to find times to present at our booth. And, honestly, I wouldn’t have it any other way because people found each other. Small groups formed in hotel lobbies, bars, and hallways without me orchestrating any of it.
My role wasn’t to generate the meetups. It was to make it easier for people to see each other—and act on it themselves.
Acting without depending means creating systems that don’t require you for everything to work. So you can support your community without becoming a bottleneck.
What this looks like:
The goal here is absolutely not to work yourself out of a job. But it does require stealth mode. You may not be answering community questions immediately, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t working in the background to find someone who can. The next level is to curate and produce events that feel completely unproduced, that provide space for community members to connect with each other with only simple facilitation, perhaps even community member facilitation, and light structure and differentiation.
Oftentimes, I find this element the hardest. It can be difficult to refrain from over-producing community events, but in large, highly matrixed networks, it can be equally as difficult to resist the urge to create internal programming and systems that can function without you, especially when community teams are large and sprawling across multiple sub-communities. I’ve found myself caught in the trap of over-planning and over-strategizing when what I really needed to do was share resources, open the floor for discussion, create a light weight plan together, and then try and iterate.
Rearing without ordaining means creating the conditions for people to contribute and lead without being told how or where to do it. So you're supporting growth without assigning direction.
What this looks like:
This element of Dark Efficacy is the one we often think we’re the best at: letting go. To rear is to care for. And, sometimes, the best way to care for a community is to let it go. Over the course of any community’s lifespan, leaders emerge, roles change, engagement varies, but the only way to truly fulfil this element is to listen, read between the lines, and make difficult decisions.
Every community I’ve ever supported, I inherited. And, all were in varying stages. But, one thing they all had in common is that they will all end one day. One community in particular comes to mind. It had been passed between multiple caregivers, pivoted purposes several times, changed platforms, shifted funding streams. You name it. I gave that community all the love and care I could, I strategized, I acquired funding, I hosted large events, I delivered on what the community had asked for. And, yet, there was no amount of order that could make the community something it was not. And, that meant that the best way to care for it, was to sunset it.
We don’t plan for this direction and we may fight it at first, but when we follow the lead of the community, it tells us exactly what it needs and there’s no stopping it once space is created and all the levers are pulled.
Things change whether we want them to or not, so “control” isn’t real... not really. Everything is fluid, which means we need to let go of the belief that we’re in control in the first place and find ways to lead through the lens of Dark Efficacy.
This means doing less to do more, setting the stage instead of being on it, and challenging what it means to be “effective.”
Whether it's dog rearing, or building a community, the Dào Dé Jīng teaches us not to control, but to create the conditions where people can generate and carry meaningful activity on their own.
.webp)
Starian Porchia is Founder & Chief Community Officer of Community & Beyond and the Learning and Engagement Manager at Crisis Text Line. She’s a community architect with a background in education designing community engagement systems for others educators and volunteers.
