[Linux-aus] Refactoring Linux Australia

[Janet Hawtin]

Hi

I guess the threshold between moving la from vol to paid roles is about
how many days per week and what level of expertise it takes to do the
core roles and whether the group thinks thats a useful way to spend
funds. It may be?

There is always the risk that the paid folk end up in a tricky situation
as they often have tenure and the committee doesnt.
It is possible and seems common in student organisations that the paid
staff end up engineering the direction of the organisation for goals
which they deem useful as it is possible for elected committee members
to have trouble getting a full understanding of the finances and
secretarial aspect of the org. Especially if it is someone else's job
to do so. (..end flashback of student era)

On the other hand it is possible for a national org to reach a capacity
where these admin roles become more than a fair vol commitment.
It's hard to see what is handy from the cheap seats.

We are working on a group called Bettong doing community projects.
Our model is to have a small committee which basically just looks after
the entity. Treasurer and Secretary and someone to Chair meetings.
Any hands on project is run by project leaders.
Project leaders propose the things they want to run and the group talks
about projects and what they need to run well - la grants work
similarly? The whole thing is intended to be failry modular.

We took this model from Flinders Uni Clubs and Socs as they have a
Council to run overall stuff and then actual projects or clubs are run
by people who want those particular activities.

This means the committee would not run a conference or quiz night
a project leader and team would carry that. They would work with the
committee to make sure the money and interorg profile is right for
bettong/la. But the event or project is basically responsibility of
folks who propose it and the volunteers they can generate or attract to
that project. (ie no vols saying you, la, should do x, because they can
propose to do it themselves. The committee is vetting for specific
guidelines and not carrying the can for the projects which the group
would like to do.

This model means that you have the bare minimum of org admin
for the central team and the project folk have to be responsible for
admin aspects of the projects theyve initiated.
Project leaders are responsible for project admin.
Project leaders and official folk have to be financial members
general folk can be community members without being financial.

We are a small group and havent wrangled large numbers of critical
projects with this model but flinders uni clubs and socs seems pretty
tidy. I think they have more than 150 clubs and socs or individual
projects. In their case they pay and admin team to run the core sec and
finance roles, in ours we are volunteering.

Does that kind of model make the load for admin small enough for a vol
role? How many other national lugs of our size have paid folk doing
admin? Which other lugs are culturally similar in terms of activities
and focus and what do they do?

What else could we do with $40k per annum for linux advocacy?
I thought the project that Pia did in NT was great.
What about doing a linux for an aboriginal language.
That would get la the press it wants while doing something beneficial?

Cheers

Janet