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How to Start a Joymaker Club
If you want to become a better Joymaker, one of the best things you can do is surround yourself with people who are trying to do the same thing.
A Joymaker Club is a small, committed community of group leaders, facilitators, and community builders who meet every month to help each other become more courageous, capable, and impactful Joymakers.
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The heart of every club is simple: meet in person once a month. Reflect honestly. Coach each other. Set goals. Then go practice Joymaking in the real world. The format is yours to design.
What is Joymaking?
Joymaking is the practice of expanding your ability to create joy for other people. It includes three core competencies:
Developing the vitality, courage, and mindset needed to show up fully.
Helping individuals feel safe, seen, appreciated, and free to express themselves.
Bringing groups to life through participation, connection, play, leadership, and shared experience.
The ultimate goal of Joymaking is not simply personal growth. It is expanding your capacity to positively impact other people.
What is a Joymaker Club?
A Joymaker Club is a supportive environment for mutual coaching, self-improvement, accountability, friendship, leadership development, and community impact.
It exists to help Joymakers:
- become better group leaders
- become more courageous
- learn from their successes and failures
- stay accountable to practicing Joymaking
- encourage each other
- exchange leadership wisdom
- create real behavior change
- expand their positive impact in the world
The monthly gathering is the foundation of the club. Clubs can also attend events together, organize Joymaking experiences, visit retirement homes, go dancing, host gatherings, or collaborate on community projects. But they don't have to. If your club does one thing extremely well, make the monthly meeting extraordinary.
Who should join?
Joymaker Clubs are designed for people who are actively trying to create joy for others. Members should be practicing Group Activation in some form. They might be:
You don't need to be a professional facilitator or lead groups every week. But Joymaking should be something you're actively practicing in your life.
The commitment
Joymaker Clubs are intentionally small and committed. If someone cannot consistently prioritize the monthly meeting, they probably shouldn't join.
Life happens. Missing an occasional meeting is normal. But members should treat the gathering as something worth rearranging their schedules for.
If someone repeatedly misses meetings without communicating with the City Captains, the Captains should remove them from the club.
Club size
A Joymaker Club can start with just four people total, including the two City Captains.
The maximum recommended size is 20 members.
There can be as many Joymaker Clubs in a city as people want to create.
How to start a Joymaker Club
Meet with the Joymaking Board Chair
Before starting an official Joymaker Club, meet with the Chair of the Joymaking organization. This is partly an interview and partly an orientation. You'll talk about:
- whether you have the bandwidth to lead a club
- how much time the role requires
- what City Captains are responsible for
- whether the model is a good fit for you
- what is expected from an official Joymaker Club
Find your co-Captain
Every Joymaker Club should have two City Captains. Don't start alone. Look for somebody who is as passionate about Joymaking and self-improvement as you are. Ideally, both Captains already have some experience bringing groups together.
Choose someone you trust to:
- show up consistently
- take responsibility
- facilitate conversations
- care about the quality of the community
- challenge people while encouraging them
- practice Joymaking themselves
Recruit your first members
You only need four committed people to begin. Personal invitations are usually the best place to start. Try:
Invite people personally
Think of facilitators, organizers, community builders, and group leaders you respect and tell them why you think they'd contribute to the club.
Invite people from your communities
Look at people already attending or leading gatherings, workshops, community events, or Joymaking experiences.
Post publicly
Share that you're starting a small, application-based Joymaker Club for local group leaders who want to develop their Joymaking skills.
Quality matters more than quantity. You are not trying to build the largest WhatsApp group in your city. You're building a room people don't want to miss.
What City Captains do
The two City Captains are responsible for protecting the quality of the club. Together, they:
- facilitate the monthly meeting
- find the meeting location
- manage the WhatsApp group
- create the local membership application
- review membership applications
- approve new members
- decide who has access to the group
- approve guests
- maintain the culture of the club
City Captains should use authoritative facilitation when necessary. A great Joymaker Club is warm and playful, but it isn't directionless. Keep conversations useful. Interrupt rambling when necessary. Protect people's time. Help everyone participate.
Membership and guests
Joymaker Clubs are application-based. City Captains decide who joins their local club.
Someone interested in visiting a club as a guest should:
- 1.Contact the local City Captains.
- 2.Receive approval from the local club.
Guests can participate fully in the meeting. A guest can celebrate wins, share confessions, participate in coaching, set a goal, join the oath, and experience the club exactly as members do.
Cost
We recommend keeping Joymaker Clubs free. If the club has legitimate costs, such as renting a venue or providing something to members, City Captains can decide how those costs are shared.
Keep it simple. The value should come from the humans in the room rather than an elaborate event production.
Where to meet
A member's home is usually ideal. Look for somewhere:
- quiet
- private
- comfortable
- easy to talk in
- free from unnecessary distractions
Tea and simple beverages are great. Food generally isn't necessary and can distract from the meeting.
Phones should be put away during the gathering. For two hours, give each other your full attention.
Your club, your format
Monthly, in person
There is no single required way to run a Joymaker Club. Every club shares the same heartbeat — a monthly in-person gathering — but City Captains design a format that fits their people, their city, and their style. A few principles hold every club together:
The heartbeat of every club is a regular in-person gathering. Same rhythm, same commitment — the rest is up to you.
Celebrate wins and name where you fell short. Clubs work because members tell the truth about their Joymaking practice.
Members help each other grow as group leaders — sharing what's working, what isn't, and what they're learning.
Each member commits to practicing Joymaking in the real world between meetings — and the club holds them to it.
Close every gathering by making appreciation explicit. People should leave more alive than they arrived.
Want a ready-to-run starting point? Approved Captains get an optional turnkey meeting agenda — complete with word-for-word scripts, timing guides, and a closing ceremony — inside the Captains' Hub. Use it as-is, adapt it, or invent your own. What matters is that the room comes alive.
Between meetings
The club continues quietly throughout the month. Use the WhatsApp group primarily for accountability. Members can post:
- their monthly Joymaking goal
- photos or videos showing progress
- updates when they follow through
- celebrations
- invitations to physical events they're hosting or attending
The WhatsApp group supports the club. It does not replace it. The in-person meeting remains the center of the community.
Club culture
Joymaker Clubs should feel unusually alive while still being useful. A few principles help protect that culture:
Show up
Consistency creates trust.
Participate fully
Don't come just to observe.
Put your phone away
Give the room your attention.
Practice what you discuss
Joymaking happens outside the meeting.
Celebrate experimentation
Courage and learning matter more than flawless performance.
Give generously
Help other members become better Joymakers.
Stay curious
Ask before assuming.
Don't dominate the room
Make space for other voices.
Protect the purpose
Keep the conversation connected to Joymaking, leadership, behavior change, and impact.
Bring things to life
This is a Joymaker Club. It should actually contain joy.
What does a successful Joymaker Club look like?
Success isn't having hundreds of names on a membership list. It's having people who actually show up. A great Joymaker Club becomes a meeting its members genuinely value and prioritize.
Over time, members should:
- become more courageous
- follow through on more of their intentions
- become stronger group leaders
- experiment more
- learn from their failures faster
- invest more seriously in their ability to create joy
- lead better gatherings and experiences
- increase their positive impact on the people around them
The club should produce real behavior change. Month after month, its members should become more capable of bringing people and groups to life.
You don't need a huge movement to begin.
You need four people. Find your co-Captain. Find two more Joymakers. Put a date on the calendar. And start.
Or attend a Club as a guest first.