At this week's meeting I again proposed that we organize groups of members who want to work together on core functions like fixing, cleaning, and upgrading the facility, or managing the website. Based on that input, I want to clarify/amend my proposal.

I'm not proposing any change to our governing structure. These aren't committees which have first say on anything. What I'm making is honestly more of a suggestion on how to collaborate a bit better.

Currently, anyone can take any action to the space or the website that they want. And, if any of us wanted to we could do this as a partnership or after discussing it with three other people. I'm not suggesting any formal change to that. I'm just suggesting that people working on stuff announce it more clearly and and ask who else is interested in being CC'd on emails about relevant matters. Any decision which currently requires Consensus will still require it. But all the stuff that doesn't -- figuring out where to put a new 3D printer, managing social media accounts -- will be handled by a group that is easy to get in touch with and join, instead of either sharing it with everyone through the discuss channel or just one or two friends you regularly talk to.

These groups wouldn't be specified and immutable. I think we should have a new members/ outreach group, and I'm going to try to organize that with PWM. I also think the people working on the website (particularly the billing system) should identify themselves, since right now I pay money and have no idea where it's actually being sent or who has access to it. But anyone can really create or merge groups based on what's convenient and agreed upon.

Also, I'm just going to call these "groups" for short instead of working groups.

Does anyone have any problem with this? And more importantly, does anyone want to work with PWM and me on brainstorming some ways to make it easier for members to find ways to get more involved? Does anyone want to work together to discuss ways to make it easier to keep the space clean?


Andrew R Gross, (he/him)
412.657.5332    -   shrad.org


On Sat, Apr 9, 2022 at 10:50 PM Andrew R Gross <arg5029@gmail.com> wrote:
Should we establish working groups?

Currently, there appear to be no formal roles responsible for managing Sudoroom. I think this can lead to all critical functions falling onto a small number of people. At the same time, we've recently seen an increase in new members looking to contribute. If we were to define what functions need done and invite individuals to assume responsibility for these, we could share burdens more broadly by making it easier for willing volunteers to organize themselves and lend their support to the collective.

I think a good starting set of working group would be for membership, operations, and finances, although I think establishing or disbanding a working group should be at the whim of any member, rather than something formal.

I would propose that a working group consists of anyone (and everyone) who asks to participate in one. The groups would have no special formal power, they'd just be a way of identifying people who are offering to help manage a set of functions. If access to anything has to be limited to less than the entire working group (for instance banking access), the responsibility will be decided by consensus within the working group.

Thoughts? What working groups would you suggest? Are there any functions for which you'd like to volunteer?

Andrew R Gross, (he/him)
412.657.5332    -   shrad.org