Source Strategic Planning Series

Hi Members,

This discussion group is for discussing and developing ideas about how to / if we need to restructure Source.

We are planning a series of workshops in 2018 to work though and make decisions around this (you are invited). This discussion group will be groundwork for these workshops.

Source is working better than it ever has before. We are more established, more stable, paying our staff more, and closer to breaking even. We are paying our Brewster more and are selling coffee that it more in alignment with Sources Values. Arguably we are also more inclusive than before, and we still have a thriving vibrant community. There is of course further to go on all these fronts.

There are also perennial issues that surface again and again. One of these issues is around some of our members feeling overworked, underappreciated, and/ or insufficiently remunerated. People who feel this are most often the Shop Managers and volunteers holding key responsibilities (Garden Manager, Volunteer Manager, Events Manager, Board Members, etc).

Key volunteer roles are also very hard to fill. Many years we have had / ended up with vacancies in these positions.

Can we do this better through restructuring? How and what would we restructure? Join the conversation!

The conversation is arranged around 4 broad approaches to the problem:

1) Organisation restructure.

2) Increasing profitability to be able to pay people more for there efforts.

3) Restructuring the discount system: to reward people more equitably, and perhaps increase Sources Profitability.

4) Source takes time - supporting people to prioritize / organise their lives around Source.

In addition to that, there are 2 other discussions on the go:

1) Sources Visions and Goals: what we are trying to achieve? Visions and goals to help guide any potential restructure.

2) Identifying the issues. What our analysis and thinking shows the issues to be will have a lot to do with what solutions we come up with. This is a space to discuss what the issues really are.