A first cognitive instance receives information about other cognitive instances and from this compiles a cognitive community map that associates individual ones of the other cognitive instances with specific capabilities of said respective other cognitive instances. The first cognitive instance stores that map in a local memory of the first cognitive instance; and when the first cognitive instance executes a cognitive computing program it checks the cognitive community map for at least one of the specific capabilities relevant for executing that program to address/satisfy a user request that caused the program to execute. In various embodiment these cognitive instances share their respective cognitive capabilities via cognitive capability maps, which may be refreshed in their local memories for example by sending a broadcast message. Thus any given cognitive instance can identify cognitive peers with the capabilities most relevant to assist itself in solving a given problem/request.