Free Geek Staff Structure Rethought

As Free Geek grows, the administrative and daily task are increasing to the point that it is becoming very difficult to prioritize, optimize and and coordinate tasks within and among areas of the building. Confusing factors such as doubts about ownership, fear of interpersonal conflicts and lack of communication prevent staff from feeling part of new changes and endeavors. Some job tasks are just not fun or interesting, but they need doing nonetheless. Without oversite and ownership, all to often, these tasks remain undone.

This rethink of our Staff Structure is an attempt at dealing with these types of issues. Its goal is to increase individual ownership and managerial-like over site of the various areas of Free Geek while maintaining an egalitarian consensus based workplace.

Departments

Production (Build, Advanced testing, recycling) 5 fte, 2 paid interns
Sales (ebay, bulk, comodies, retail) 3 fte, 1 paid intern
Operations (books,facilities, SysAdmin, payroll, receiving) 4 fte, 1 paid intern
D4 (Tech support, education, outreach, inreach, hardware grants) 4 fte, 1 paid intern

Department SubTasks

Tasks that currently have a very high administrative load would be spread more evenly over the entire collective by way of departmental structuring. Each department would be responsible for the following tasks within its area of operation: For some of these we would form working groups to help give support and help decide what is and is not in there bucket of tasks. These tasks would be rotated amongst the members

Scheduling
Basic books
Basic Facilities
Setting weekly priorities
Managing the group
HR Tasks: hire, fire, reviews

Managing

major + minor

Each staff member picks one main area of focus (major) and one minor area of focus (minor). The major is the staff members main job. The minor is a focus on a more narrow interest. Each staff member will participate as a floating manager for their major group. Staff members do not act as floating managers for their minor group. For minor group participation, staff members can be more focused on individual interests or talents and not have to worry so much about the big picture or the administrative back-end. The number of groups that a staff member may be a part of is purposefully limited to two to keep staff focused and to prevent individuals from being spread too thin.

floating manager

The floating manager prioritizes tasks for their group for the duration of their term. The responsibilities of the floating manager are:

More admin time, less floor coverage
Big picture oversight, coordiantion
Report to staff meeting (main meeting)
In charge of scheduling for the group

Transition

each staff picks major, minor
trainings for selected group members: bookkeeping, facilities function
scheduling and HR would need to split among all groups