Hey friends,

I feel kind of torn right now — on the one hand, I like when things slow down a bit during the summer (in the northern hemisphere). Then again, things are moving nicely right now — for example, our two upcoming classes are sold out!

General Circle worked on the budget for Q3, and I want to share one of the visualizations that helped us wrap our heads around finances. Where does our money come from? And where does it go?

To study this infographic or ask questions about it, go to this forum post.

A lot of time has gone into budgeting clarity, as this diagram shows, to make sure circles can take responsibility. This doesn’t happen overnight but I think we have made a huge step in the right direction.

Have a good 2 weeks!

In this broadcast: 

• New members
• Upcoming member events
• Circle reports
• Announcements
• SoMBu feedback

New members

• Renee Carrelo (Argentina) SoPra, Círculo de Nuevas Economías

• Lorraine Margherita (France) SoFra

Upcoming member events

• TUE, June 28 @ 11:00 – 12:30 EDT
  Community of Practice: facilitators of sociocratic circles
  A community of practice for people holding the role of facilitator in their organizations. Meets monthly.
• WED, June 29 @ 14:00 – 16:00 GMT
  Co-working: Accountability, fun, and getting things done
  Join Sociocracy for All members on Wednesdays to co-work. We create a space that’s accountable and fun so that we can all get our Sociocracy For All work done! Session […]
• TUE, July 5 @ 11:00 – 12:30 EDT
  July-August SoFA Writer’s Workshop
  SoFA is offering a Writer’s Workshop! Join a small group of other writers for mutual support in writing articles to be published on the SoFA website.
• WED, July 6 @ 11:00 – 12:30 EDT
  Community of Practice: Schools and Education
  A community of practice for mutual support for school sociocratic practitioners.
• MON, July 11 @ 13:00 – 14:30 EDT
  @Work Community of Practice
  @Work Community of Practice is a mutual support group for people practicing sociocracy at work. This community of practice is a space for people to share experiences or potential situations […]
• THU, July 21 @ 18:30 – 19:30 UTC
  Community of Practice for Mixed Sociocracy Topics
  A community of practice for mutual support for people experienced with sociocracy. Meets monthly on different topics.

Circle reports

Mission Circle

• The members of Mission Circle have consented to the SoFA Document Retention and Destruction Policy, and started a discussion around the Conflict Engagement Policy. They have continued their work in exploring needs around SoFA’s theory of change.

notes::mission circle

General Circle

• The members consented to the Language Equity Statement submitted by the Language Equity Helping Circle!  “As peers, we seek to understand each other across any language divide.” This is one of several commitments in the statement. The full text will be widely available very soon. That helping circle also submitted strategies around several objectives with respect to language equity, and General Circle is working through a process of responding to those suggestions.
• General Circle has consented to the 2022 Q3 12-month budget!  The circle members are continuing to explore the need to have increased clarity on how our various departments use their portion of the budget, and how we all can use our funds with a high level of effectiveness.

notes::general circle

Content Circle

• The members of this circle are focused on branding and representing the voice of SoFA, and the new emphasis on the customer journey model is providing the circle and the department with new ways to focus their content development. There are a lot of content projects happening in this circle and its sub-circles!
• The whole department is working actively on various aspects of social media engagement.

notes::content circle

Ecosystem Circle

• The second annual Sociocracy In Cooperatives Conference happened on Thursday, June 23rd! A unifying theme in the conference will be the struggle in cooperatives to center on Diversity, Inclusion, Equity, and Justice.

notes::ecosystem circle

Membership Circle

• This circle has done work on a new membership page and a new membership agreement. The new membership agreement emphasizes our request of each other that, as members, we commit to engaging with the work of SoFA beyond our participation in meetings.
• The members of this circle are planning to work on updating the description of the circle leader role to emphasize how circle leaders can encourage their circle members to follow through on this standard of participation.

notes::membership circle

International Circle

• The members of the International Circle have consented to their circle budget for the first time, and the circle is exploring working with Open Collective Europe to help meet the legal needs around activities such as applying for grants in Europe.
• A Dutch circle is taking the first steps towards forming, and many of the specific language circles are engaging with a wide array of work such as continuing with book translations, setting up their web pages, and training and certifying people in various language communities. 

notes::international circle

New & Improved SoFA Zoom URLs

To address the slow zoom redirects and high traffic stability issues, we’ve changed the zoom redirects.

They work exactly as they did before, but the subdomain is different: 

• NOT www.sociocracyforall.org/room-name
• BUT zoom.sociocracyforall.org/room-name

The cheat sheet and venues on the website are all up to date and transitioned over.

To experience the speed benefits yourself and reduce the load on the main website please update all past calendar invites and begin using the new address when you type them in manually.

The previous URLs will still be active for a while, but make the transition soon to prevent broken links in the future.

Our Zoom capacity continues to grow. For example, a dedicated Zoom room has been set up for SoFA’s Portuguese-speaking community known as SoTes, from “sociocracia para todes” meaning “sociocracy for all” in Portuguese.

If you want to learn more about booking SoFA’s zoom rooms, please find instructions on the Member Dashboard.

Questions? Contact the IT Circle at [email protected]. 

July-August SoFA Writer’s Workshop

Tuesday, July 5, 2022

Want to brush up on your writing skills and have a chance to be published? SoFA is offering a Writer’s Workshop! Join a small group of other writers for mutual support in writing articles to be published on the SoFA website. We will do fun writing exercises, give each other feedback, hold each other accountable to our goals, and have time to write together.

Job posting: Rol de Creación de Contenidos (Content Creation in Spanish)

Sociocracia Práctica announces an opening for a role paying $315 per month to create sociocracy-related content in Spanish.

SoMBu feedback

[email protected]

Additional notices from role holders or circles are welcome. Submissions are due on the day when General Circle meets: July 5 | July 19 | August 2 | August 16 | August 30 — all Tuesdays.