Teams Discussion Post Covid

Overview

We’d all like to see the space working as well as possible using the knowledge and skills of members.

Teams are a part of running the hackspace and are mentioned in the guide. Post Covid many teams have 0 or 1 members. This page was created to start a discussion with members to understand the current workings of teams and to see how to move forward.

This discussion is to create and share an understanding of how teams might function, not to produce more rules for teams.

There are 3 main areas teams are mentioned in the documentation for the space,

• The Guide https://guide.nottinghack.org.uk/organisation.html#teams
• The main wiki page https://wiki.nottinghack.org.uk/wiki/Teams
• Individual Teams wiki page https://wiki.nottinghack.org.uk/wiki/Team:Woodworking

From the Guide it's clear members manage the day to day running of the space and teams do specific things.

"The Hackspace is not a service and as a member you're expected to contribute to the running of the space when you visit." seems to be the stance.

https://guide.nottinghack.org.uk/organisation.html

Teams

The day-to-day running of the Hackspace is done by every one of our members. Even quick and simple things like tidying up or putting tools back into their proper storage are a great help.

More specific activites are managed by teams within the Hackspace, a list of which can be found below. Please remember the Hackspace is a community and not a service; we can’t guarantee tool uptime or material availability. The teams are all members like yourself, who volunteer their time to help make the space better.

Want to get involved in a team? Drop them an email, or ask them when they’re in the space. You can find more information about Teams on the wiki: https://wiki.nottinghack.org.uk/wiki/Teams

Governance of Teams

From the wiki

All teams in the Hackspace are ultimately responsible to the Trustees who have delegated certain powers and responsibilities to the teams.

This suggest that the trustees can undelegate powers and responsibilities.

There is a position of Team Leader in the wiki (woodworking is Bob for example). Other responsibilities are inductors and maintainers. It's not clear if the trustees delegate the choice of people to these positions to the team leader or not.

See Person Specification

Who can be on a team?

The guide says just ask about being on a team. There isn't any other info. Team membership is managed on HMS, and inductiors are given permissions on HMS. There is a person specification

Person Specification[edit] In order to be a CNC Team member, you need to be good at communicating with the membership, personable and easy to approach.

You should be visiting the space fortnightly to check on the CNC area.

Membership of a team would be something from the trustees, or delegated to the Team Lead.

What does it mean to be ‘on a team’?

The guide has lots of differing language for what teams do. Like

• The 3D Printing team are responsible for
• The CNC team looks after
• The Communications team look after
• Craft & Textiles team manage the
• The Electronics team is responsible for
• The Infrastructure team manage major ..
• The Laser team are responsible for
• The Membership team manage the & Membership team are present at ....to ensure visitors....
• the Metalwork team take care of
• The Network team are responsible for
• The Resources and Snackspace Team look after
• The Software team are responsible for & the Software team support the ...
• The Woodworking team manage the

The wiki has a more standard 'Teams look after...' scope although only the craft team is required to develop the facilities into an exciting, appealing area!!

what roles might there be?

Roles can be

• Team Leader
• Maintenance (requires some sort of skill)
• Induction (requires some machine skills and people skills)

There are also 'jobs'

• researching replacements for worn out tools
• buying consumables
• improving the layout of the agreed space
• going to the cash and carry
• stocking snackspace
• writing software
• running tours
• being at events
• creating advertising copy
• posting on social media
• writing newsletters
• updating the website
• helping at events
• listening to members suggestions
• taking tools/machionery to be serviced
• getting stuff from screw-fix

These might be done by team members maybe in addition to maintenance and inductions?

not mentioned online

There are some important things that don't appear to be mentioned

• finances. Most of the teams have cards that can be used to purchase consumables.
• inductions management (creating induction scripts and money from inductions), managing the queue of inductions
• presenting meeting reports
• answering questions at members meetings

There is a wiki page for most teams with more details of the roles required. Purchasing tools is not mentioned.

When should a team be formed or dissolved

The wiki mentions team awesome projects and events as occasional teams.

The events team is mentioned as