Coop subcontracting reflection

notes.md

Coop sub-contracting

Notes from a conversation between Protozoa and Root Systems.

Piet (Protozoa) joined a 2-person contract that Root Systems won at the start of 2017. The contract only lasted for a month (the client cancelled the project), but we learnt a lot about coop sub-contracting.

Voices in the room are @dan from Root Systems, and @mix and @piet from Protozoa. We started with some general musing about working together:

Dan:

• what does success look like in this context?
• why are we talking about this?

Mix:

• it's really easy for working together to cost too much and be really unclear
• easy for there to be incorrect assumptions about:
  • money flows / shares
  • timelines
  • responsibility + ownership
• this can lead to breakdown of relationships
• put more positively - we want to work together:
  • it's a smart way to do bigger things as small groups
  • absorb overflow into values aligned systems
  • reliability

Mix: can we dive into how Piet (Protozoa) worked with Root Systems?

From the Root Systems' perspective

• we could depend on Piet as an external entity
  • self managing
• should have given clearer guidance about when Piet should escalate problems
  • "is this out of scope of my role?" > make this someone elses responsibility
• we didn't do a good job of onboarding Piet into the money side of processes:
  • specifically we need invoices within the first week after month of work, as we run on a small buffer
• we should have talked really explicitly about what our coop values
  • e.g. financial transparency!
• toggle tracking was awesome
  • time entries are connected to ticket numbers
    • this is excellent way to clarify client confusion e.g. "why is this bill so high?!"
  • github integration lets you go issues > detailed toggle entry

From Piet's perspective

• needed a clear single point of contact
• would have loved onboarding into coop process
  • money flows
    • am I negotiating rates or does this coop have a contractor process?
    • transaprency about money splits
      • what is this 35% : 65% split set up to fund?
        • who else is getting paid (e.g. sales)
      • what are members getting vs contractors
      • we sorted it out, but having these conversations earlier would be great for building trust
    • what guarentees are there about work?
      • minimum length (e.g. 6 weeks)
      • min / max billable hours per week
      • minimum notice of termination (e.g. not 'this project is finishing tmrw')
  • coops baseline project tools + flow
• contract with coop
• onboarding into project
  • really important to know who's holding specific roles

Future work between coops

Mix:

• we're talking about working with a couple of coops around the world
• one of the questions we're trying to figure out, is that if each coop is trying to set aside money as a buffer, and different parties are doing different amounts of work setting a contract up, what's a reasonable way to split money?

Dan's questions:

• how much is a lead worth?
  • I propose the value of a lead diminishes over time, or maybe should have a capped return
• what is a brand worth?
• what is a structure worth?
  • more applicable if you're a freelancer floating around

Piet:

• I think one of the coops in the UK is saving a quite diffent proportion that us

Dan:

• You can come up with radically different baselines depending on what you're assuming your employment:un-employment time looks like.
• I find as a bigger group, it's easier to assume less down time, because there's a smoothing effect from having people working on different projects.

Dan:

• With working with others, I'm a big fan of having rules up-front, so you're not constantly in negotiation

Mix:

• are you talking about rules forged between coops OR
• internal rules e.g. minimum rates you can live on?

Dan:

• both, we have a minimum rate for sure that we will not go under
• with a split with orgs, you can split on % or peg it at a fixed amount
• if you're offering a one-time heavily discounted rate, feel free to ask for things in return

Misc topics we covered

Conversation about a range of contracts more generally:

• interesting to note whether the clients append terms to contracts
• MOU's seem fine for some contexts

Conversation about pod ecosystem more generally ...

Dan:

• mmm what you kinda want in a pod ecosystem is jobs around that are low earners, but are kinda dependable and values aligned. Or are the right tech-stack, or aren't soul destroying