Team Building What strategies do you use to prevent cliques and division in your community? (1 Viewer)

[InMyOpinion]

As a forum owner, one of my goals is to maintain a welcoming and inclusive space for all members. However, I’ve found that balancing this can be tricky, especially when different user groups naturally form around shared interests, professions, or experience levels. On my forum, I have different member groups for industry workers, which helps categorize expertise, but I don’t want it to lead to division or exclusivity.

Cliques can make new or less active members feel like outsiders, and divisions can lead to unnecessary conflict. Some strategies I’ve considered (as my forum isnt open to the public yet) include:

• Encouraging Cross-Group Interactions – Creating threads and discussions that bring different groups together.
• Fair Moderation & Rule Enforcement – Ensuring no group feels above the rules.
• Community Events & Challenges – Activities where all members collaborate rather than separate by group.
• Highlighting Diverse Contributions – Making sure recognition isn’t just focused on the most vocal or established members.

For those of you managing communities, have you faced similar challenges? What strategies have worked for you in preventing cliques and keeping your community unified? I'm really wanting to make sure that my members all feel special and I don't want to encourage divisions or cliques so I'm really interested in hearing what you all have to say =)

 

[Cpvr]

Can’t say I’ve ever had to deal with cliques on any board that I’ve had to manage, but I’d stop them in their tracks before it ever it got out of hands.

Cliques can break a forum if they’re not resolved swift and fast in the beginning, especially if they’re treating new members wrong, which is something you don’t want to happen. As long as you have good rules in place and a valuable staff team, they won’t be able to run rampant.

 

[Bawse]

I've had members that disliked other members in the community. I won't remove anyone unless they break the rules, and enforce them when needed.

 

[Ravenfreak]

I've never had to deal with cliques on my forums. I will say it's probably best to keep political and religious topics at bay since these threads are usually the ones that tend to drive a wedge with people. This is easy to do on niche based forums, you can enforce a no politics/no religious rule. But if you do have these types of threads just keep an eye on them more often.