Signed up. Woo Hoo. Jeannine
On Oct 4, 4:39 pm, Alex Hillman <[email protected]> wrote: > Hello Coworking World! > > As promised, we've returned from the weekend in Santa Monica with some tasks > and topics for further discussion. Our #1 priority for holding this weekend > was to have some focused discussion on what the global coworking community > wasn't doing - what the biggest opportunities to work together to further > coworking for everyone are. > > We're consolidating everybody's notes (and lots of photos as well) because a > LOT of amazing information was shared and we want you to have access to as > much of that as possible. > > In the mean time, want to share an overview of the weekend and some of the > results in the form of a call to action! > > *Here is the "fast-forward" summary of the actionable results of the > weekend.* > > *More background on how we got there is included below. The "directors cut" > below provides more background and insight. If you have questions, please be > sure to read that as well before replying.* > > 1. Coworking's "ad-hoc" community has generated great projects in the past, > but we never had a consistent method in place to maintain them. The > following is what we've come up to address that: > > - help people build a team first, then execute tasks and topics. > - we'll have a group of 'coordinators' (initially, myself Jerome and > Jacob), and teams of managers and volunteers. coordinators are a resource > to > the teams, and teams focus on their topics/projects > > 2. We came up with a few goals to achieve, and some people have stepped up > to work on them already. Some of these topic focuses are awareness, > research, group buying/leverage, best practices documentation. This is not > all-encompassing, it's just a start. > > Additionally, coworking.com leaves room for improvement as a tool to house > high-value material that's currently buried in the wiki, google group, etc. > This means we need to both determine the [CMS] platform, and migrate that > content via the above mentioned teams. > > This form will allow you to sign up for a team, either as a volunteer or a > manager:https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dGQxdVhHVzBGQVlG... > > 3. While we do *not* at all plan to incorporate an association at this time, > we have recognized the importance of some functional entity just to be able > to hold funds, as we now have leftover "community funds" from projects being > held by multiple members of the community without any clear path to > distribution for services such as hosting coworking.com, etc. A team is > heading up the work to determine what options we have and what remaining > questions exist before we come back to the group. That working group is > researching solutions, not making an autonomous decision. > > *Directors Cut Weekend Summary* > > The attendance was diverse, and a lot of the topics raised tense > conversations. What we all agreed was that there were common goals that we > could work on together even considering our differences of opinion. Apart > from dense sharing of our experiences and knowledge, this weekend generated > the need for two primary tools: > > 1) an easy & common organizational structure - not an organization, though - > for tactical teams to form and execute coworking related projects. > > Many new projects form and quickly die, and others run because of the > ongoing effort of contributors. We want to make sure that any time a new > coworking project (not a space, but a resource or tool to help the coworking > community) is forming, people can do it in a way so that an effort has a > chance to survive. > > 2) an effort to improve our living repository of knowledge at coworking.com > and > related properties (like the google group, the wiki, the blog) > > The biggest underutilized toolset we have is coworking.com, etc, and we want > to make it a rallying point for all of the things we have to share. It's a > big task, but more then big *it's continuous and will never be "finished".* > > Again, each team needs a manager that will take on the responsibility of > being accountable for the team as a whole. Consider this very carefully > before taking on this commitment. How the individual teams are organized is > left up to that team. We'll work together to learn from and develop a plan > for how the teams come together and how everything is presented on the > website as information is gathered and shared. > > *What it's Not* > > This tactical model lets small teams form that contain leadership and > volunteers. That's it. There was a lot of discussion around a "coworking > association" or an organization. While this model provides organization, it > is not THE organization. It is simply a mechanism for people to get more > done, and that benefits everybody who contributes and participates - just > like this group always has operated, but with more action & orientation. > > We did, however, determine that it would be universally valuable to > consolidate the now "leftover" funds from things like the > coworking.comfundraiser and even this weekend's event to make that > available for topic > projects. A team is heading up the work to determine what options we have > and what remaining questions exist before we come back to the group. That > working group (myself, Jerome, Bill Jacobson, Iris Kavanagh) is researching > solutions, not making an autonomous decision. > > *The First Topics* > > Some of our initial projects are broken out by "topic" leaders. Each topic > group will contain a topic "manager" as well as a team of volunteers. In > order for a topic team to form, there needs to be one person who "owns" the > topic as well as supporting people to help contribute to working on the > topic. > > To get started we want to take on a few specific topics and improve the > coworking.com website by the Coworking Unconference in Austin during SXSW in > March. This isn't all of the teams, or all of the work, nor is it an > indication of priority - it's simply what self selected during our > discussions! The intention is to learn as much as we can from the formation > and execution of these first few teams before we take on more ambitious > projects. > > There's a lot of ambition in this community, and that's a great problem to > have. Baby steps take us closer to our goals! > > *How You Can Get Involved!* > > So who's in? We are learning from experience and building the teams before > we tackle each project. A few of them have topic managers that have already > stepped up and need volunteers. Others need topic managers. And clearly, we > haven't thought of everything. > > In addition the ongoing teams, we need a technology team to evaluate the > system(s) we'll use for publishing and commit to helping us maintain it. > > We've got a quick form that can give you an idea of some of the topics that > need working on. > > SIGN UP > HERE<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dGQxdVhHVzBGQVlG...> > if > you would like to act as a volunteer or a topic manager, or suggest a new > topic team that you'd like to manage or be a part of. > > Myself, Jacob, and Jerome are working together as "coordinators" to keep > teams moving, assisting in communicating cross teams, helping identify teams > that need help, and help managers/volunteers through issues as we learn what > works and what doesn't. > > More than anything, we're here to help teams achieve their self-determined > objectives. This "meta-team" is also volunteers representing ourselves, not > our respective spaces, so please understand that we're here to help, not to > control. > > Onward and upward, coworking friends. We've got a lot of work ahead of us! > > SIGN UP > HERE<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dGQxdVhHVzBGQVlG...> > to > be a part of a topic team, or of course, let us know if you have any > questions. > > -Alex, Jacob, and Jerome > /ah > indyhall.org > coworking in philadelphia -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en.
