Perhaps it should be reworded as “VHS cannot scale on individual do-ocracy alone”. I like to think that do-ocracy still has a place but it’s not going to help VHS grow in the current state.
You want a larger space or better tools? VHS needs to grow and you cannot do long term planning with do-ocracy alone especially with caveats such as the 4 hour undo rule.
I would suggest that we encourage the formation of smaller groups to handle projects that take more than 4 hours to undo.
Here is a hypothetical case: We have a new space that has an intercom access system, we need to provide member access somehow.
Current way of addressing the problem: People post their two cents to talk and people talk about how it should be done and if we are lucky someone will volunteer to do the work and it goes off without a hitch. If we are unlucky the solution will be bikeshedded to death or no one will actually do the work, or the person that volunteered has issues that came up and leaves the project 50% complete.
But what if we did it this way?:
We state the problem here on talk and ask if anyone would like to be part of the solution either as a technical advisor, implementor or spectator. When you have a bunch of volunteers then it’s up to your group to come up with a plan and deliver the first iteration and provide some basic documentation for future iterations.
What I’m aiming for is this, a solution where you get:
- Redundancy of volunteers
- Better collaboration and reduced bike shedding
- Encouragement for people that want to learn to get involved
So that is for dealing with specific problems and tasks but what about growth and operational tasks? Form groups for different areas of space or interest and have the group come up with long term goals and strategies.
Another hypothetical problem (although not very hypothetical), the workshop.
There is no direction in the workshop right now, no planning and generally little to no maintenance for the majority of tools there. I think areas like these should also have a group responsible for growth and maintenance, something that just can’t be done with do-ocracy alone.
Other potential groups or committees (some already exist):
- 3D printers
- CNC mills or routing
- Soldering
- Grant Applications
- Membership management
- Cleanup
TL;DR: So basically what I’m suggesting is we split off in to different working groups to tackle the larger problems at the space. Do-ocracy by individuals gets upgraded to do-ocracy by group or committee where they can work in a bikeshed free environment. You want a say in xyz area, then you become part of the group and contribute.