Floating an idea [Money to Committees after Completing Improvements]

DMS General
#9

In theory, full blown Communism “should” work. Any Communists reading this? Sorry.

Let’s look at a specific issue, say the light bulbs. How much would an outside contractor cost? Is there a committee(s) that would do it for less than that. I bet so if the Board otherwise turns off the spigot or ramps it down a bit. This system now brings the added bonus of incentivizing DMS as whole to save money. In the instance of a light bulb changing contest that also offers a 2nd and 3rd place price, I’d bet those bulbs get changed in a week and for less than hiring a contractor.

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#10

I see your point, but that provides a perverse incentive for a volunteer to put off tasks until they age to crisis level and there is compensation.

Either a volunteer does it or we pay an outsider to do it.

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#11

Committees with a veiled appearance of being in crisis can be denied eligibility if projects for which they’ve received Board money are unfinished. Bang!

#12

I would fear lowest bidder problems and we’d end up with some half-assed solution (not saying that a contractor would be any different but at least you could hold them accountable with a bad review or BBB). It’s a good idea to introduce competition into the space but I feel like it might ruin some people’s makerspace experiences if it got out of hand.

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#13

Well if DMS has taught me anything, it’s that if you want to be active in having your say here, you’d better have thick skin. So even if things did start to get out of hand within this framework, it’d be nothing new. If things we’re to start get hyper competitive within this system though it’d only mean things getting done faster for cheaper. Evaluation of faulty or crappy work would ultimately be the responsibility of the Board to vet before dispensing monies.

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#14

Would we not have issues with enurement with this?

#15

I’m not sure, but I believe enurement pertains to transfer of monies into a member’s private account. Also, a competitive bidding system ensures transfer of money at or most likely well below outside market rates. I believe this is one of the stipulations to avoid enurement in the cases of transfer of money to a member’s private account.

#16

Correct (I think). If monies went to a committee for something like this (and IMO they should! never to a member directly) it wouldn’t be an issue.

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#17

Enurement is special treatment for an individual.

The theoretical bonus system only benefits a committee, not an individual.

Examples:
#1 Members 1-9 get paid $50 per laser class taught. Member 10 get paid $300 for the same laser class.

#2 Member John Smith gets permanent use of the the small conference room which he converts into a personal office, he pays no rent on the space, and it is labeled with a sign saying “exclusively for the use of John Smith.”

#3 Member needs a special compound that costs $500 per gallon. DMS buys it for that person and no one else is allowed to use that product.

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#18

hmmm this got out of hand quickly.

when I read it, the payment went to a committees fund. never a person.

lets make an example using the light replacement.

-The board places a “bounty” on the bounty board something like
“whatever committee replaces 25 sets of old fluorescent bulbs with new LEDs by (date/deadline) gets $(some amount) for the committee”
-The laser chair drums up enough people to get the job done through leadership or some kind of commitment to use the funds for a specific item.
-The laser committee replaces the 25 sets of bulbs before the deadline.
-the board awards the laser committee the funds.

in this case the bounty could be set up to be possible to be taken multiple times until the lights are replaced.

lets not shut something like this down by immediately jumping to the “PEOPLE ARE EVIL AND WILL TAKE ALL THE MONEY”

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#19

I agree this has a perverse incentive to delay not doing something hoping a bounty will be put up.

What if two committees start to replace lights, who gets it? It’s a novel idea and if can be worked out, then it needs to be explored.

I wouldn’t make the bounty really high though. If it becomes a lot of money probably cheaper to have a contract maintenance guy just doing things as they are needed. @ say $20/hr, 20 hours a week, would be $1,600/mo. If that person changed the A/C filters that we pay $250/mo for then that’s a savings plus they’d be changed more often as needed. Could do lots of the small repairs and maintenance schedules for machines could be set-up resulting in higher up times for members use of the machines.

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#20

i just used arbitrary numbers, lets not get tied up in those

#21

I’m not, this is something I’ve been thinking about.

People talk about getting an “executive” - it’s the number small jobs that we have to send out for labor on that would make a maintenance person a better choice, IMO. I’m not sure what this “executive” would do except call someone to do it. I can’t imagine this person telling committees how to operate. We’re open 168 hours a week.

#22

“Executive”, at least in the organizational sense, doesn’t refer to a single person - rather it refers to “Persons delegated various authorities and tasks, who serve at the pleasure of the Board, and who manage the day to day affairs of the Space”. It could be 5, 10, or a 100 individuals, as are needed to perform these functions. They don’t have to be paid positions, and I would expect that they handle the routine stuff - like gathering estimates, supervising contractors, bringing problems to the Boards attention, dealing with bad behavior, handling emergency repairs, inspections, calling plumbers, etc. These people would have titles and specific responsibilities, and would be selected for their abilities and character.

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#23

I will note that we already have executives who are empowered by the board to perform those functions. We call them committee chairs. Further, they don’t have to personally do much of that work and are further empowered to delegate to other volunteers to help spread the work around.

Most of these responsibilities fall upon our two most internally focused committee chair persons; infrastructure and logistics, but some aspects fall to other chairs or even procurement officers. All of which serve executive functions within DMS. When board members act as volunteers to handle some of these functions, such as gathering estimates, they are doing so as volunteers working for the respective committee chairs who have the ultimate responsibility.

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#25

If everybody will kindly provide the following information, I’ll do a total analysis breakdown estimate on savings and write up the proposal. Please keep your replies succinct.

How much money has been delegated by the Board to all committees or individuals for equipment and projects in the last 12 months?
How much money is given to all Committees for their monthly disposables budget?
What is DMS’s current monthly allotment towards long-term savings?
What are our long-term goals for savings and amounts?

@Tapper In this hypothetical system, how much would you recommend tempting Committees with for your work installing those electrical outlets?
@ESmith Do you have a ballpark estimate for a contractor to change all light bulbs?
How much money would anyone be personally tempted into accepting towards their chosen Committee for attending Robert’s award ceremony?

I’ve compiled a list of Robert’s, Brandon’s and Erik’s job titles from the Volunteer Opportunities category. If Directors, Candidates, and Volunteers would also compile and post a bullet point list of tasks they’d like done we can knock this out by next Board Meeting and watch the invisible hand of the market at work.

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#26

I think that we need incentives to increase the rate of volunteers and bounties is just one possibility.

I have an impression that of the 1,500 or so members the number of people who volunteer and do work for the space is low, wish we had data on that. Wish we also had data on how many members think the space is really a business and all these issues are SEP. (Somebody Else’s Problem)

For classes we “solved” this with honorarium. Committee always benefits, individuals can benefit, etc.

I could see some potential with a Maintenance person.

Maybe we could do more to recognize volunteers?

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#27

Great Idea! We have wall space…

And the need/expectation for volunteerism, even if it just 10 minutes per visit to the 'Space of something/anything, needs to be more clearly communicated and emphasized at Open House tours, New Member Orientation, and any other general on-boarding activities/events. Simply repeating in a rote manner that “we are an all volunteer organization” just doesn’t seem sufficient to me.

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#28

OK, this prompted a google and top hit was this: https://www.trackitforward.com/ - 0-25 volunteers is free, 26-100 is $15/month, etc. (pricing) - might be something worth investigating.

If we had a volunteer tracking system like this, who would own the account? Logistics chair maybe?

Anyway, think it might be something worth checking out and I may have hijacked this thread here, might want a fork.

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#29

The last PR chair recently started a volunteer /member spotlight on the front bulletin. I think he only had a chance to focus on one person so far but it might be something the next chair, @Adam_Oas would be interested in continuing.

There was also some talk at a recent meeting of having a volunteer development group.

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