A community within communities

How to build a community that runs on roles, not on you

Alec Rios, founder and CEO, Austin Young Professionals Network. Interviewed by Connor Cullip at the Network of Directors room in Austin, Texas, on May 22, 2026.

Alec Rios and Connor Cullip on tall stools in front of a glass wall, Connor holding a microphone and a notebook

Play the talk

Recorded

May 22, 2026

At the room, Austin

Format

Fireside

Interviewed by Connor Cullip

Runtime

8 minutes

Filmed by Jacob Mizell

Open on YouTube

In short

Alec Rios runs Young Professionals Network in Austin. He told the room it has three parts: events, a media arm with a podcast, and a nonprofit side where 20 or 30 members support a local cause every month. All of it is building toward a business conference he wants to host during South by Southwest. He spent about a decade in finance, most of it with tunnel vision on work, before Austin showed him you could have fun and still get things done. His biggest struggle right now is not growth. It is giving a team of eight clear roles, so he is not in every meeting himself.

I'm on every single team for Young Professionals Network right now. I need to form better roles.
Alec Rios, on stage at the room

The three parts of Austin YPN

How Alec described the network to the room, in the order he named them.

Events

Events in Austin for young professionals and entrepreneurs.

In this talkThe front door. Their last event before the talk drew about 120 to 140 people, he said.

See events Media

Media and podcast

A media arm with a podcast and more in the works.

In this talkHow the network tells its story between events.

Instagram Nonprofit

Service

A monthly service day for a local cause.

In this talkTwenty or 30 members show up each month to back a cause in Austin.

About YPN

What to take from it

01Give people more than one reason to come.Events bring them in. Media keeps the story going. Service gives the group something to do together beyond trading cards.
02Fun and results can live together.Alec spent years blocking out anything that was not work. Austin showed him you can be highly effective and still have fun.
03If you are in every meeting, roles are missing.He found himself on every team. The fix is clear roles that let each person use their strengths.
04Own the gap first.He did not blame the team. He said the missing structure was his job, then went looking for how to build it.
05Ask everyone how they run theirs.Big communities, small clubs, people outside his world. If something works, he asks if he can use it.
06Optimism needs a plan.A team will buy a vision for a while. Without a plan and visible hard work behind it, they get tired of it.

Top three action items

Where to start this week, straight from what Alec told the room.

01

List the meetings you sit in

Write down every team or meeting you are in this week. Each one you do not need to be in is a role to hand to someone.

02

Write one role down

Pick one person on your team and write what they own, what they decide and what strength they bring. Alec called this a skills taxonomy.

03

Put a plan under the big goal

Take your biggest goal for the year and write the first three steps toward it, so your team can see the work behind the vision.

The short answer: give people a few real reasons to show up, then build a team where each person owns a clear part. Alec Rios built Austin Young Professionals Network on events, media and monthly service. His hardest lesson was that a team of eight still leaned on him for everything, so he is defining roles before he takes on a conference during South by Southwest.

Who is Alec Rios

Alec Rios is the founder and CEO of Austin Young Professionals Network, also called Austin YPN. Connor opened by saying Alec had told him how he felt about the Network of Directors event, and that Alec runs some really cool events of his own. Then he asked what Young Professionals Network is and what it does for Austin.

There's really three divisions of Young Professionals Network. Our goal is to host some of the best events in Austin for mostly entrepreneurs.
Alec Rios

What are the three parts of Young Professionals Network?

Alec named them in order. Events come first, and all of them are building toward one thing: a business conference he plans to host during South by Southwest. Second is a media arm, with a podcast and a few other projects. Third is the nonprofit side.

Every month we have maybe 20 or 30 of us that get together, basically rally around some local cause, and support some of the most amazing causes here in Austin.
Alec Rios

He said the idea came from looking at the crowd. Their last event had drawn about 120 to 140 people, and he thought: what if we rally all of these people to help out with something good?

Why build a community at all?

Connor asked what pulled Alec toward community. His answer started with work. He has been in finance for about a decade, and the first five years were all business.

If I got invited to anything and it didn't have to deal with success or career, I didn't have time for it. So I blocked everything out. I learned a lot through doing that, and it grew, but it was pretty empty.
Alec Rios

Then he moved to Austin and fell in with friends from the military and special operations who were highly effective and also a lot of fun: skydiving, shooting, a soccer team. Something was still missing. He found it through his church and nonprofits in Austin. That gave him the three things the network focuses on: being highly effective, having fun, and service.

This whole world's not about you. There's so much more out there. It feels good to serve and give back.
Alec Rios

What is the hardest part of building a community?

Connor asked for the number one struggle, and listed a few of his own: people who say they will come and do not, and helpers who show up distracted. Alec's answer was about his own team. There are eight of them, and the struggle is defining roles.

I'm on every single team for Young Professionals Network right now. I need to form better roles and, as a leader, help give them the structure to use their strengths and their giftedness.
Alec Rios

He told a story from a recent event they ran with the Association of Latino Professionals For America. He sat in their events meeting, then their media meeting, and realized he was in every single one. Then their president walked in at the end, shot a video with them, talked for a few minutes and left.

How do you develop the people on your team?

Connor said building a community is a little business you do most of the time for free, and asked what Alec was doing about it. Alec started by taking the blame.

First, I'm realizing it's my fault.
Alec Rios

He met with someone to learn about a skills taxonomy, which he had never heard of in almost a decade in finance. It means defining roles. He is also using AI, and asking everyone how they run their community, from people who have run large ones to friends with clubs of 20 or 30. If something works, he asks if he can use it. His word for it was curious.

Why does a big vision need a plan?

Connor asked how big the first event was. Alec said it was about 40 to 50 people, and that he walked in with a 10 page business plan and a goal of growing the network into a brand across the country. He also admitted he has not always planned that well.

Your team will eventually fatigue on the vision if there's no plan, if there's no momentum, if they don't see you actually working hard to try to achieve that.
Alec Rios

Connor laughed and called himself the king of optimism, the host who says 100 people are coming before anyone is invited. He closed by praising the depth Alec gives his community, and said he had taken a lot of lessons from it.

What comes next for Austin YPN?

At the time of the talk, Alec said the next event would be June 4 at Performance Golf Klub, the network's first there, in partnership with the Round Rock Chamber of Commerce. The bigger goal is the conference during South by Southwest, with sponsors already lined up, he said. Getting the right team and roles in place comes first. People can find the network on Instagram at @austin.ypn and at austinypn.com.

Quotes are from the recording, trimmed of filler. Nothing is added. The recording was cut short when the microphones died near the end.

Frequently asked questions

What is the main idea of Alec Rios's talk?

Build a community on more than one reason to show up, then give your team clear roles so the work does not all run through you. A big vision needs a plan behind it, or the team gets tired of it.

What is Austin Young Professionals Network?

A network in Austin that Alec Rios founded. He described three parts: events, a media arm with a podcast, and a nonprofit side that supports a local cause every month.

What was Alec Rios's biggest struggle building a community?

Defining roles. With a team of eight, he found himself in every meeting, and he is now working on clear roles that let each person use their strengths.

What is a skills taxonomy?

In Alec's words, it is defining roles: writing down what each person on the team owns, based on their strengths.

Who is Alec Rios?

Alec Rios is the founder and CEO of Austin Young Professionals Network. He spent about a decade in finance before building the network in Austin.

About Alec Rios

Founder and CEO of Austin Young Professionals Network, which runs events, a media arm and monthly service projects in Austin. About a decade in finance before that, by his own account.

Alec Rios's full profile Connor Cullip, who interviewed him