Session: Network Organizing Branches & Communities of Practice

7:55PM Oct 14, 2022

Speakers:

Thad Kerosky

Mary Norris (Code for Fresno)

Sung Kim

Sierra Ramirez

Greg Jordan-Detamore

Shirley

Keywords:

branch

brigades

network

community

volunteers

practice

group

projects

people

imagining

organizing

question

civic tech

great

share

working

hear

chat

individuals

charter

Hey folks, it is three o'clock Central here in St. Louis. I'm gonna give folks a couple more minutes try to find us since there's a bit of links, rabbit hole but if y'all want to feel free to unmute and put on your video and introduce yourself see others well,

while we while we wait

Hello everybody my name is Joseph

How are you today? Great calling in from Joseph. California. Yeah,

it's a bright sunny day today. Actually. I thought I might even take this outside at some point

that depends solely under the sun. Yeah,

I got coffee. So at least there's that you know

I'm surely from Seattle, Washington. Hello. So also a good sunny day but smokey. Ah, oh,

I feel you there. Everyone, I

bet from Utah but I am in Sacramento today.

Hello, hello. Gee, I'm calling in from Orlando, Florida. Hello. Hi there. Hi, Steven.

We're just unmuting and introducing ourselves. As we wait for the others to find us.

Got what, California Utah, Seattle,

Orlando. Who else is represented here

in Denver, lovely.

To give people another two minutes feel free to unmute or video yourself. If you'd like to

share yourself if you'd like.

Say what else your drink coffee

coffee to you. You'd like

all right, lots of coffee.

Nice. What do you mean?

Sorry, go ahead. Oh, I'm seeing what what do you mean? What kind of coffee like

I just finished this one. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, that's really good. And then I have this one from think Louisiana.

Really excited about that one.

My favorite is Starbucks Sumatra. It's very rich.

I have to try that. I've never had that before. But I've heard good things about it.

Hi, Jennifer, welcome from the Carolinas. This is not a real background. This is a fake background because I'm sitting in my hotel room in St. Louis. So that I wouldn't have the background noise from the St. Louis folks in the ballroom. But I am also hailing from Seattle. So

definitely interested to connect on that with other folks. I

think we have a couple more folks coming in and I think then we can just dive in.

How's that? How's that sound?

Yeah. All right. Anyone else before we dive in want to introduce themselves and let us know where they are

or anything? Feel free to unmute that's if you'd like to know I'm not muted. I'm in Vermont. I come from from Vermont. Anyone else? All right. Once I start Oh, Boston did I hear another voice? No. Okay.

Great. Basically I'm doing I'm making sure because once I start sharing my screen, as many of you know, it gets very difficult to read the chat or anything else. So thank you for sharing and I will

go into my slideshow here just a moment.

Matthew Mitchell also here in St. Louis. Great. All right. You're seeing the slides. Good. Okay. So something great. So Code for America. I'm Sung Kim. I am from Seattle sitting in St. Louis with the rest of the network team from Code for America. I am new to CFA as of a few months ago, as the new Associate Director of network communities of practice. As as many of you already know, and probably know a heck of a lot better than I do. Code for America are a collection of people centered problem solvers, showing that with the mindful use of technology, government can work well forever. So just just a few things here I wanted to introduce some of my colleagues and teammates. Molina Stoney is also new I believe she might even be here. She is the new Senior Manager of Network partnerships. Gabrielle Solis and Micah new tricks. Were both are both on the network team as well and have been instrumental in drafting the project Sprich Charter, which we will go into at a later point. And Josie I'm sure many of you know has been organizing brigade Congress but laid pretty much all of the groundwork of what I will I'm about to share with you all around network organizing branches and communities of practice. Just wanted to share those faces. Hopefully you'll see us around as you continue this weekend. So today's plan, we're going to I'm just going to do a quick overview around values goal and mission, how we measure it, and then go into this proposal around network organizing branches, and break down kind of the infrastructure of what what we've designed and built around this idea of network organizing. branches. I want to be very, very clear that this is a proposal to the network. That was the network Well, it's the collective about everybody, all of you. And it will be entirely led and dependent on the network at large to decide whether or not they you want to adopt this structure that we're proposing. We've basically just taken the time to sketch out how we think it could work. And it will depend on folks across the network to determine whether or not that's actually how they would like to administrate and organize around across the network across brigades, etc. Alright, so I'll go into more of that as we go. I should also mention since this is a relatively small group of us, I am more than happy to have you stopped me at any point to interject, ask questions. I ask that you don't put it in the chat that you actually unmute because I can't see the chat very well when I'm presenting slides.

Sound okay.

All right. So then we'll go into the branch working groups communities of practice an overview of the of each of the branches, posed a potential timeline again, depending on whether or not the network decides to adopt and then if we have enough time and enough critical mass amongst you, I will put you into breakout rooms with some questions that we'd love to hear your answers for as we come back and share out and then discuss what's next. Alright, so let's please plan

our values. First, listen first,

to include those who've been excluded and three, act with intention. These are the values centered that we sent her at Code for America, and extend into the network in many ways. Our goal is a resilient government that effectively and equitably serves everyone I think we all know just how

aspirational that goal is.

Our mission is to use human centered technology to improve public services that reduce poverty and advance equity. And our measure that we've been using internally at Code for America that I'd like to share is that how many lives what is the exact number of how many lives have we actually made better through X project through X program? Through y effort? Alright. So what are network organizing branches? I apologize for the wall of text you do not need to read this. Basically, what the network organizing branches is, is a proposed response based on all the revisioning work that happened across the network over the last couple of years. How many of you just quick show of hands if possible. Were part of the revisionary effort and know what that is?

How many of you would like a quick, quick summary on that quick summary. All right.

So as many of you may know the network is this huge disparate collection collective of individual volunteers and organized Brigade's brigades that are have organized into their own 501 C threes at some at some scale and others that are simply groups of individuals who know that they have a mind and a heart for civic technology, and whatever that means to that, and over the last decade, or more that the network and vote for America has existed. There has been a lot of difficulty and trying to organize around the network around being able to keep institutional knowledge in the network to get give opportunities for instead of 50, some brigades, all trying to solve similar problems in parallel being able to share a little bit more effectively and across across those experiences, learning experiences, etc. Anyone who was here at that time want to interject their thought on revisiting.

Or at least fine if not just give me the option.

All right. So this revisioning effort happened over quite a bit of time basically trying to get as much information from across the network as humanly possible around what's worked what hasn't worked, what, what, how do we move forward and to a network that's actually truly impactful. And there were out of revisioning came this three pronged strategy of okay, we need to organize, we need to deliver impact through partnership. And we need to develop progress through practice.

And trying to

understand and develop that I'm sorry, is there a big gray square moving around your screen? Just curious because I keep moving the Okay, great. So what we're imagining for the branches is that the now these network organizing branches could be the mechanism for network governance, cross governance, cross network communication and training, infrastructure for building institutional knowledge and community building. Right? There's always been some questions around how can a volunteer learn about and sign up for opportunities with other projects? This for example, could happen in the projects branch of the network organism branches and what we're gonna go over here today, especially for those that are just have dropped it after my intro is go through a proposal of how we think this might be able to start if there's enough drive and interest from within the network. To to lead and deliver.

Search chat. Checking.

Jennifer Miller shared the revisioning get book, great, great resource and kind of goes through the entire

entire thing there. With a lot more detail. All right.

So what is a branch? What does a branch consist of? We imagined the branches consisting of a working groups, working groups that are accountable to carry out the activities specified in each branch charter. That'll be include branch governance, resource delivery. etc. We imagine each branch will have communities of practice, which will form in response to volunteer interests, and wrap branch activities in wider volunteer communities. So those I'll go into a little bit later, like what we imagined creative practices to be and what kind of activities we're talking about when we talk about communities of practice. Thirdly, we expect each branch to have some kind of public events, those could be in person or virtual, to share meaningful output of branch activities and relative relevant programming with network members and partners. Those events could also be workshops, for example, or other kinds of development opportunities. We also imagine each branch could host an open source resource repository. Now those could be resources for brigade organizers around how to do volunteer onboarding. That can be shared or adapted across the network,

etc. And

we're imagining the branch working groups to deliver that branch work. What does that mean? develop processes for brigades tracking outcomes, creating, curating, maintaining best practices, best resources for branch topic areas, initiate formation of specific communities of practice, and manage resources, whether that's shared curricula workshop content, learning opportunities, cross brigade, Discovery elements, shared

templates, etc. Does branch working groups makes sense? Vaguely. A very, very conceptual level. That'd be a question. Right ahead.

What's the relationship between the branch working groups and the brigades like are we replacing brigades with branch working groups or they just

so brigades are entirely

location based, right?

Yep, the branches the network organizing branches is meant not to be location based. So the idea though network organizing branches is that they are cross brigade cross network. So basically, an infrastructure a mechanisms for the entire network to self govern.

Okay. Does that make sense? shoolini. Yeah, I think this makes sense.

Sorry, excuse me. Could you could you explain that again

in a different way?

Could you repeat that once more? Sure. Um,

you mean about the brigades the difference between brigades and branches? Yeah. So brigades. The network is a collection of individuals and brigades. In some areas. Of course, there aren't brigades. So there are individual volunteers that have expressed an interest in being part of this network. This volunteer network across the country. There has not been great, a great mechanism for all of these brigades and individuals to actually connect, learn from one another, mentor one another. Share, share successes, share practices, etc. We are proposing network organizing branches as this overarching structure across the entire network, across brigades to do that, collectively, and to do that collective self governance.

Thank you.

Yeah. You'll also see a little bit more concrete in concretely what that means as I go into what each potential branches look like. Go ahead. Yeah, just

so I kind of imagined it like how, you know, you have the branch coming off the limb, and then from the branch, there's like, the twigs coming off the branch. So it's like, kind of like a, I just envisioned it all kind of like a tree, I guess. In terms of trying to understand it.

That's I think, point.

Think so. I think so. I definitely envision it kind of like this huge mother tree, and maybe all the different individual volunteers and brigades might be the my cilia under each of the trees connecting the entire forest as it were, we can take this metaphor many ways, in many directions, but yes, generally correct. I see your hand up.

Hi. I'm still a little bit confused about the difference between the branch branches, last branch working groups and the communities of practice, and maybe this will be answered by what you're about to see. Like I was like, it would be great to hear like names of like not, you know, official ones, but like things that could be so is that what you're about to do next.

That is exactly what I'm doing next. Thank you, Greg. Sorry,

that looks Can I ask a quick question?

I'm sorry, who is needs to be muted here. Is there anyone else hearing that or is that just me?

I think I was I just one second just put my hand up. I apologize. I think

just one moment, please. Sorry. My

brain is not working here okay

yep, sorry. That was my bad I was in gather. And I think somebody was next to me and gather and started talking so I had to desperately flatten my gathered out and sorry my bad.

Going back.

All right.

All right. So branch working groups, the difference to communities of practice. So we're imagining communities of practice as a group of practitioners who come together to build community, learn from one another and work to improve that practice. So those practices could include technical skills, solutions, engineering, data analysis, organizational skills, recruitment, facilitation, volunteer onboarding, etc. Leadership partnership development skills, or topic area practices. So like, if we're interested in digital equity and broadband equity that might be a community of practice around broadband equity, for example. Now these were imagining as different from working working groups and branches, because those working groups are actually delivering specific structures. processes, or needs of that branch. So we'll go a little bit into like what that means in different types of branches. Based on what

based on what we're proposing here okay, then move on.

So why communities of practice? Well, we believe in building community and that how necessary it is to build community and to have a sustainable community in order to not only keep volunteers interested and retained within the network, but also to build those networks for you personally and professionally, etc. Develop co learning experiences, whether that's peer to peer mentoring, collaborative learning, and share, develop and scale principles. practices and learnings across the network. So we're imagining communities of practices could work through specific to different types of activities and experiences that could be community meetings and events. That could mean cross network mentoring or other one to one support across the network, as webinars, workshops or courses related to a practice area, synchronous or asynchronous discussions about the practice. So again, if we go with a broadband equity example, that could look like you know, a monthly meeting across that community of practice if they so choose. Or maybe it's this maybe it's a thread where people post up over here shares this newest resource around broadband equity and being able to foster communication there, and the discussion thread etc. But we are proposing five different network organizing branches. This is actually what's going to happen. We don't know that depends on you interest across the network, etc. But I'm going to do a quick rundown of these five at a high level and then we're going to go into each one. All right. The collective leadership branch we need this branch would be responsible for the administration of the network community at large. The there would also be a DI leadership committee that sits within this collective leadership

branch. An impact partner

sprach we've heard of a need for space to build relationships and also opportunities for community partners to support each other and explore opportunities to expand their impact or civic tech in the network. This may or may not actually be a need across the network. This is a this is a proposed branch idea, right? civic tech organizers branch now this is something we've definitely heard a need for met time and time again across the network is opportunities for peer to peer Training and Resource Sharing. Across for brigade leaders to learn how to you know, transition, brigade leadership from, you know, one, one person, individual or to another group, et cetera, et cetera, and how to onboard volunteers and a one on one. civic tech one on one kind of a framework or anything else. A human centered technology branch. We imagined this to be a space for technical skill sharing and development across code for America's eight disciplines of human centered technology. We'll go into that again a little bit, a little bit there, but basically all the not all but the disciplines we believe it takes to develop

civic impact the technology

and network projects branch home for brigade projects impact Sprint's action teams, National Days of action to deliver the impact of the network and connect to volunteers to opportunities and vice versa.

So the collective leadership branch is what we're imagining as the governance structure for the network. This branch is dedicated to driving system wide accountability to networks primary outcomes, including network wide volunteer training and leadership opportunities such as brigade Congress, and strict strengthening network relationship tools, relationships through tools such as volunteer agreements or brigade mo use or other structures. This would also be the home of an overarching dei Leadership Committee. What we've heard from some of you all across brigades is that there is a need to better understand like what the role of D AI looks like, what a plying a DI lens to our work, or to brigades or to volunteer engagement in general looks like. And so this, the idea around the DEI leadership committee would then of course, be helping to support network leaders across the network. In an understanding that and building out goals related to that that makes sense in their communities.

Again, impact partners branch, a dedicated home for communities of practice for community partners of different individual brigades or groups, etc. I think you'll be able to learn more about potential partnership ideas, etc. In my colleague Molina's talk later today if you so choose. A civic tech organisers branch again, peer to peer training support resource sharing, and possible development opportunities right leadership development, facilitation training, partnership training, cross brigade, mentorship, etc. The human centered technology branches were were imagining as the home for communities of practice related to each of these disciplines, right qualitative research product management, Client Success Solutions Engineering Services, die design product engineering data science and engineering

operations and security.

These are the eight disciplines that Code for America. Central as it were. Believes necessary to develop that human civic social impact potential working group activities for within this branch could look like monitoring skills and gaps or needs or requests across the network. Identifying and vetting upskilling resources, potentially establishing a civic tech skill ladder of development for volunteers to engage with. And the network projects branch a one stop shop for brigade projects impact Sprint's action teams National Days of action, connecting volunteers to opportunities and vice versa this the projects branch you'll hear more you can hear more about directly from mica and Gabrielle later this weekend if you so choose to if you choose to attend to their session, but this is the most fleshed out branch we have put together so far right so this idea of this proposal around network organizing branches is proposal. We've spent some time to put together but we are presenting to the network at large to determine whether or not this could work as a self governance structure. In the network's projects branch is the branch that we've spent the time to think through, okay, what what working groups would be necessary from the start? And here's here's a detailed charter around what those working groups could do, and how that and how that work could happen and how that working group how those working groups could work together and then develop the next years working groups etc, etc, etc. So, the network project branches where we have kind of tested out all of those things that network branch charter draft is available to all of you and discourse if you're in St. Louis. There are physical copies in the ballroom you can even pick up and flip through if you so choose. We are looking for all sorts of feedback. So the these initial working groups for example, we're imagining the performance working group responsible for prioritization review, selection and evaluation of projects, the projects branch and some recommended skill sets for folks who, who might be part

of that working group. Okay, the

project development working group is responsible for processes and initiatives that help projects become the best versions of themselves. Some recommended skill sets for folks to be part of this working group include you know, informal learning and education. Writing, content management, event coordination, project management. And the participation Working Group. mobilizes volunteers helps project spy needed skills offers project volunteer organizing advice and support and those related recommended skill sets for working group

members. So, as I've been Oh, go ahead. Go ahead, Stephen. Joseph might have a question too. So if you go back to slides, are there projects being like work being done outside of brigades? Maybe one more. Or somewhere around here. I got the sense that Yeah, it's fine. Maybe. So.

The idea being that sometimes there are projects that different brigades have taken on that they actually need more support for them. They've been able to raise capacity locally. Sometimes there are projects that actually aren't locally limited, like the our 911 activities that were piloted as a national action team this year. So that's kind of what this the idea of this network projects branch could do, as well as support other brigades. That would like their projects to be maybe make more impact, maybe determine how to how to engage with different community partners to be sustainable. Past like having a minimum viable product, for example, etc.

Um, so I understand that, you know, the first node that you guys are activating is sort of there to I'd imagine like, you know, help people filter into the next, you know, branch that they're gonna go into, but you know, is there like a, is there a way to, like, float around to different branches and do like, just work? That would be good for a variety of skill. Sets, not just like maybe one or two? Absolutely. That's the short answer. Answer, short answer. Answers. Yes. I don't mind the long answer either. So no worries.

Okay, I'll get I'll get back to you, Matt. Yeah,

I guess I was just so is my audio coming through my Zoom is being weird. Yeah. Yeah. So I guess just the, as we're into the tree metaphor and kind of before the, the individual branch discussion, a point that kind of came up was maybe connecting brigades, or like maybe looking at, you know, similarities in projects or like, kind of connection on those, what branch would that kind of fall under because it feels like the network branch is maybe specific to volunteers that are looking for that but I was just wondering, like, where would you put identifying, saying, similar like mutual needs or like interests from brigades? Because it seemed like that kind of came up

in terms of like topic areas in terms of like problem solving, in the affordable housing space, how to get the hood of those brigades get connected, that kind of thing.

Yeah, yeah. Topic like that. Yeah.

Yeah. So that that kind of topic, topic based. community practice, I would imagine could develop under the Civic the civic tech organizers branch.

That's one example. Okay, great. Yeah. Thanks, Sierra. Yeah,

I just wanted to hear a little bit more about kind of which roles are anticipated to be for volunteers versus

staff kind of.

Great question. Great, great question. The short answer is we don't know. The longer answer is that this is this whole idea of network organizing. Branches is a potential like proposed structure. Because we know we have I mean, as I, as far as I understand, I've only been here a few months, but as far as I understand, the network has tried different types of leadership committees and and different types of structures to try to develop that kind of institutional knowledge and to develop the infrastructure for people to be able to do transitions or, or develop new brigades or develop projects and you know, all of those things and all those questions. And so this network organizing branches structure is something that we're proposing because we've just been able to spend the time to think about it and and sketch this out, based on with a lot of input from a number of different folks. And as far as who needs to take on the work is our initial basically test on whether or not this could even be a viable direction for the network at large is whether or not we get any nominations

for any of these working groups.

To determine like interest potential driver and all of that. So let's assume in two weeks time, like we don't have a single name and put it in any nomination process for any of these branches. That tells us pretty clearly that network organizing branches ain't gonna work.

That makes sense, Sarah

um, yeah, I mean, I think I think I mean, this is something that we've talked about a lot in the direct democracy pilot that like it's such an unusual thing to do like a collective leadership kind of, like model that in order to kind of shift to that kind of norm, like a ton of outreach is usually like the move if you really want it to work. And so I think I would like I guess my like, advice would be to not necessarily assume that if you get no nominees, that this is not a good idea. I think it is a good idea. But like, it's going to take a ton of work to build up that norm across the,

across the network. Yeah,

I hear that. It's really, really great feedback. Sarah, thank you. I see two hands. I'm gonna go with Mary first Joseph, and then let's discuss we haven't heard her voice yet. Go ahead, Mary.

Well, thank you appreciate it. Yeah, actually, to echo what Sarah was saying. Being I was a part of revisioning. On the council that was a very big one was having someone who was in a brigade to go ahead and kind of be like a liaison, so to say, and I really think that that would be a positive because sometimes don't get me wrong. We love our staff, of course, but they don't know sometimes some of the some of the hurdles that we're dealing with. So it would be nice to have somebody who could be related to that. Thank you. Joseph.

So, like if I wanted to, like go out and like on my own time, like teach people to code and stuff like, what I mean, am I having to organize it under a certain branch

like in terms of like,

are you with a brigade? Well, yeah, I'm in the,

the Chico branch. This is my first time doing a meeting like this honestly, in both regards in general. So yeah, so far, so good.

Gotcha, gotcha. So as far as doing something locally, with your brigade or with other volunteers in your area to go out and teach kids how to code or or you know, help support digital literacy events for elderly folks or whatever else that is entirely up to you. And we we are super happy to hear you dare you say that you have interest in that? But it wouldn't necessarily be part of the branch structure. Unless that's something that enough folks across brigades are like, hey, there should really be a community of practice around like, doing these digital literacy events and sharing like how they've done it and all of that. So that's that's where you know, that could I could see that being a community of practice within the civic tech organizers branch, for example. Right.

So it's like about communication. Definitely.

Okay, thank you.

Mary, did you have another question or was that an errand and

I never put it down. Sorry about that. Okay,

gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha.

And Steve, I read your question in the chat get answered.

Can somebody say that question out loud for me.

So, communities of practice, is it both that label like topics like teaching seniors how to code and also skill sets, like user research, database coding? You seem to be using it both ways. Yes.

Yes, I am imagining Communities of Practice practices to be include technical skills include organizational skills include leadership development and include topic area practices. Right so having having a community of practice around advocacy, for example, on how to do local state advocacy. could certainly be a civic tech organizers Community of Practice.

Thank you. There's just it was a little fuzzy coming across if it was development of skills with people or topics that kind of grow up and become big enough to need the support.

is big enough, like across brigades, that there's something to be gained from learning from one another? Yeah. And speaking to one another? Yeah.

Does that answer your question?

That tad that you are Yep,

exactly. So just kind of building off of what you were just saying, Stephen. When we were in revision a we were talking about these communities of practice, which they were still completely abstract. So it's hard to even like, corral anything. And thank you for doing this intermediate work that that we didn't have at that point. My concern about communities of practice in that very abstract stage was exactly what Stephen was just sort of ramming there is, it's it seems important as we grow this idea of community of practice out into the network, whatever form of adoption, or sort of kernel of like nucleus of formation that occurs. It seems important to talk about like the community the theory of change of these groups, and I guess whether they'll have diverse theories of change or sort of a unified theory of change across the groups. And if I'm taking your answer to, Stephen, that it's both there's a diverse, there's diverse series of changes it that's how I would I guess answer that, I guess, am I correct in like reading it that way? And that community that practices more about sort of create creating a lattice structure across the across the brigades that you're very local. Anyway, thank you.

I may need you to repeat a little bit of that, but as far as being being that lattice structure across brigades, yes. The the idea of the network organizing branches is exactly that. As far as theories of change and whether or not a particular community of practice would fit within a theory of change at large for the network. That is a question that everybody muted

okay. So there's no community practice not to change for the whole network, but just for the the Community of Practice themselves. Like what what did what can the participants expect to get out of? out of what the changes anyway, thank you. Sorry.

Oh, no, no, don't. Don't apologize for clarifying there. The theory of change for communities of practice is going to be different for each community of practice. Right? So the because when we're talking about particular technical skill set, right, the theory of change may very well be like, all of our the people who want to be part of this community of practice, get to a certain level of related to Solutions Engineering, right. Whereas when we're talking about a theory of change around broadband equity, depending on whether or not there's still any activity or projects happening across the games that's related to broadband equity that could live forever. If those projects then fold then that community practice would likely

fold. Right. Jennifer,

awesome, thanks. Yeah,

hi. Um, so when we were doing revisioning um, last year, I did make some attempts to make a generalized logic model showing a theory of change for communities of practice, which a I'm not sure that we all agreed that that actually was our theory of change for how they'd work. I think one of the great values of logic models is that they surface where people have different ideas about how a program will work. And certainly they could be tailored in a debt. The model can be tailored and adapted for a specific community. But I will, if folks are interested, I'll look around and see if I held on to that.

That'd be great. I'd love to see that. Jennifer. I'd also say that as far as a logic model goes and all of that

the staff,

network team myself, we wouldn't necessarily take ownership of that. Right. So the idea being that hopefully this network organizing branch structure, hopefully would be robust enough that either a working group within the branch or the collective leadership branch, would be able to work on a logic model that gets enough collective support consensus consensus across the network.

Okay, there there appears to be okay. I'm gonna keep moving on. Okay, all right.

Let me go find where I was. Thank you for all these questions. By the way, I love having this be a much more interactive and engagement effort, especially because

I'm new.

I was not part of a brigade at all. Before before this work with coach for America. And my my background and expertise is in community building and, and engagement of public audiences and public engagement. And so this is all really really cool stuff. And I'm really excited to work with you on so as I've been saying the network organizing branches are a proposal that we put to you, you being network, the network. Our hypothesis is that nominations will determine whether there's energy and potential drivers of this work. As folks have pointed out, that might not actually be a great hypothesis. To which we want to hear more after this after this session for sure. And the idea then also being if there are on nominations, that that group, though, those collective individuals could then bring enough people to the table to determine whether or not these branches could function in this way the infrastructure at large could function in this way. To lead and administrate

the network. So what we're looking for,

and what we're hoping and asking y'all to do on an immediate scale, which is you know, over the next couple of days, rather than, you know, over the next year, per se over the next few days, could we nominate network organizing trailblazers? Could we nominate people that we think would be appropriate that you think that you'd be appropriate for a particular working group or role or branch or you know that somebody else has that skill? Set and could be a really great leader in that space? Obviously, we're not volunteering those individuals necessarily we will be asking for their consensus around this process, but as far as just gathering those names, is something that we're looking to do

immediately see a few more Oh, just just

a good thing to share with people participating in a Congress because I think like that's, that's like a big portion of people that would maybe even vaguely consider doing it or be in that nomination space.

That's exactly why we're doing it here at brigade Congress. Yes. Mary

Yeah, thank you. I will say this is great. Fantastic, although my disappointment is that unfortunately, a lot of younger people and individuals one of their things with civic tech is that once it you have an idea going it takes too long to get it off the ground. Then once it gets going, then it we've already missed the boat. Because we've already moved forward. Everybody's at a fast pace. And it's just gotten so slow. So I'm disappointed because I would have been interested in this. But now I'm a grand jury member, and it's just took too long to do so. I just hope in the future that when we do something like this, that when we're ready to start doing some changes that we actually are ready to do them at that time, not wait a year to finally have things go into implementation. Yeah, thanks.

That totally makes sense, Mary, on so many levels, right and this so what I'm gonna go into here is kind of a proposed timeline to go along with the proposal of network organizing branches at large. Now, again, the likelihood of any of this is entirely dependent on the network at large, right, like if, if like you, there are too many leaders who just don't have the time right now. To invest. That totally makes sense. That's not something we can just we can just summon by by through goodwill. So that so that was my right now might not be the right time. But I wanted to make sure that we offered something more concrete in terms of this process, so that we could at least imagine, okay, what if we had these working group members in place before the end of the year?

One, I guess one thing too is compensation. Let's be realistic. When you're brigade leader, you really spend a lot of time doing that. And a lot of us have other jobs besides that, and families so it's would be worth more compensation than just a pat on the back was definitely my I

agree

I completely agree Mary. I do not have the power of budget, as it were. However, that is actually really, really helpful feedback that the more of you put in the reply related to the discourse thread about network organizing branches, and the more of you like or love that particular reply in that thread. The more ammunition we have to go to the CEO of CFA, who holds the money as it were, and be like, we weren't we we aren't just making things up. This is actually needed. Do you see what I'm saying? Like we need to be we need to have that evidence. Base.

Oh, no, do anything. Well, and that's what I thought that or revisioning document was supposed to be doing. So yeah, but I can completely agree yeah. Thank you.

Did I miss another hand? Go head back. Sorry,

I didn't mean to put my hand up, but I will say some things into that. I I totally agree. So I'm a new brigade captain. And our brigade is super, like inactive has been for a few years and we're just trying to figure out how to get things going. And it feels to me like that is almost like I want to say part time job but it could be a full time job. And where I hate to say oh, we need payment because this is supposed to be a volunteer organization. I also feel like maybe if the brigades could write a grant to get an executive director so that we could great you know, bring more volunteers on because it's not necessarily that people don't want to volunteer it so that we somebody has to be in charge kind of to organize it so that we can get a community belt, right. That's the full time part.

Does that make sense? Sorry.

I need to unmute. That totally makes sense. And I love that idea. There is there is potential like or the power around being able to come together as a group of brigades put together a grant application together and and try to try to find that money to be able to support some of that work is is ideal in many ways.

I'm gonna keep moving on.

But I really appreciate that response and then again, I point you to those discourse threads.

All right. So concept to work in branches. What could that look like?

And again, this this obviously depends a lot on appetite across the network. So we're here. We're asking for nominations of the trailblazers to, to kind of take leadership of this new type of structure infrastructure for the network. And we have in discourse under the participatory governance category, you'll see all the different ways in which we're asking for your participation. And some of those are going to be these Working Group nominations. There's also what you'll see there, the projects branch charter draft that's been drafted up mostly by Micah and Gabrielle who they will also be sharing and having a session about later this weekend.

So feel free to go there to learn more.

I see the chat blowing up but I can't see the chat. Exactly. Is there a question I should address?

I think we're okay. We're just chatting about some of the things from earlier. But it's great. These links to follow are in your slide deck.

Yes, and I will put them in the chat once I stop screen sharing. Unless unless I can ask if Molina or mica or someone has them handy. If you could throw them in the chat. That'd be great.

Thank you. Alright, so we're here.

So Nominations are open,

when will they close? We're not sure.

It kind of depends on critical mass. It kind of depends on how widely we managed to get this word out across brigades, etc. I was thinking initially when I proposed this, that it would be great if we could close it, you know, the the week and a half after brigade Congress. But again, not knowing how quickly we can, we can send spread this mesh message across the network. I'm not a very good person to make that decision. So certainly also looking for feedback there. Once we've gathered these nominations, we're hoping to connect with them all to be like, Hey, you were nominated for this? Are you cool with this? What do you think about this? What kind of time do you have and bring bring those individuals together and hopefully bring together also this di Leadership Committee, which also has nominations open to build consensus on who sits on these working groups. And then hopefully, after establishing that consensus, each working group could then introduce themselves to the network community and discourse.

Then, once

those working groups are established, then they could individually establish consensus on a draft of the charters for their branches and the work that they want to complete over the next year. Once they've drafted up those charters, those charters could be shared widely to the full network community. And we could have a vote to ratify that and discourse. And the recommendation I have here as for this proposal is a two thirds vote in favor of ratification, then the working group could commence their work based on that charter.

Again, I want to stress that this is a proposal then what could

how would we know what happens? Right? And what kind of accountability could there be from working groups to the network at large? Well, what at how quarterly progress is recorded would depend on each group, obviously, but that could be you know, a webinar that could be some kind of a meeting event along a style of this, that could be a discourse post. It really depends on that group, and honestly, the kind of work they're doing and how it would best be

communicated. Right.

Again, seeing the chapel up just doing a quick check. Do I need to look do I need to answer your question?

No seeing shaking heads, okay. Then, at the end of the year, the working group could

determine whether another year of the same working group is needed or if a new different type of working group is needed. If the branch isn't needed, it's a different kind of branch is needed. report out to the network community on their year one work impacts experience, draft a new bridge charter with clear tasks and responsibilities for the next year. Open. That working group could then open nominations to the network community for either the same Working Group, a new working group, same branch, new branch, depending on again, those needs that you've identified. Those nominees would then establish consensus on working group members and we bring in this whole cycle

again. The idea being that

these individuals in these working groups would not spend more than two or three years

in a group

so that there is some there's a little bit of offset there. So that there's some institutional knowledge from year to year. What did we decide that was one to two years you'll have to check the project spreads charter for like the particular what we ended up what we landed on

for that proposal, okay. All right. I'm going to propose

breakout sessions, so that y'all can chat amongst yourselves and talk about a very variety things I have. specific questions I'd like you all to discuss if possible.

Um, Are we cool with

heading into breakouts or are there questions that y'all would like to address your

first I'm gonna go with going to breakouts. Sounds good.

I'm gonna put the questions in the chat, Nick as your and y'all should be able to access that. Oh, sorry. I see a hand

Yeah. So

with all of the different branches in communities of practice, how is it how are we formally deciding when something becomes a community of practice? For example, is it something that the network team ratifies? Like we have this new this is official community practice? I mean, are we going to end up with a community of practice of people that are really good at making maps and then another that's like the map making community and then we're going to have somebody else who's all about community resource mapping, and they're gonna be like, kind of partitioning out not realizing that they exist, because people are distracted and have trouble navigating discourse or whatever. So how do how are the things going to become? I guess, more formal beyond the nomination process, like how is it finalized? And is it really just whatever the community decides and we end up kind of like Slack, where there's lots of different channels and some of them may seem duplicative or or not.

I would hope that it wouldn't be duplicative. I would hope that the working group for the branch, right like if it's a specific topic, area or skill set that's within the

the technical skills branch

for lack of a better term right now. Right? The hope would be that the working group for that branch would have the list of all the communities of practice or requested communities of practice. Right? And so if there is something that's similar enough that hopefully those two would be connected

Okay,

I'm gonna put you in breakout rooms. And you and I will pull you back in. We're running out of time. So 10 minutes, apologies. We took a little bit more time than expected.

Okay, off you go. I think Samsung for so. Gabriela Molina, I

assume you guys don't want to be a breakout room St. Louis stream would you like to be put in the breakout room? Sunday

May be for gather town.

I think that's the string going. I think that's us basically. All righty, man. This was this was good. You got a lot of really good insight some good questions. For lots of great Discussion Jerry,

we're in breakout rooms right now. Would you like me to throw you in one? Just to join for the last couple minutes. That's fine.

Thank you. This meeting is being recorded. Welcome back. I hope it wasn't too

too jarring to come back.

I'm good. Would folks

be open to sharing a little bit about what they chatted about their breakout rooms? Yeah, please, go for it.

So we, I mean, actually, it wasn't my idea to begin with, so maybe I shouldn't talk about it as much but just feel like part of what we talked about was, you know, a little bit into, you know, who to appoint in terms of, you know, in regards to communities, but they are, you know, who represents them and what they, you know, should not should, I feel like is the bad word but may learn to represent, you know, in terms of the group. At least I was part of what I was saying so, I don't want to like talk about the whole thing, but yeah.

Think the questions included? Oh, go ahead.

I was just gonna follow up from Joseph that we talked about who was going to represent and I think Paul was asking a bit more about how we were going to find the different working groups or communities of practice or whatever. To know which ones exists. It sounds like we were veering dangerously towards yet. Another one of our community databases that often take a lot of work to build. But yes, the there's there's the issue of of that as well. One thing our group was kind of talking about was, you know, the support that brigade leaders can give to this or join these groups, if a lot of them are kind of in a busy rebuilding time, but this could be an opportunity for people to be recruited or kind of joining brigades who are interested in kind of programmatic things to get some experience in that place to join these and kind of be connected to those because I think just the right now, the like brigade brigade support is really good and so people can get excited by sudo managing or helping support these large tech groups. That can be a way to pull in some other folks if we have an absence of leadership at the moment in Europe. We did.

Yeah, and I guess I was in the same group as Matthew and just to build off of that, I guess, I we've done this lattice structures type thing before and a lot of different cases. And I think it's important to not risking that build it and they will come type situation and also examining like the direct democracy the impact Sprint's the prior impact programs from previous years, the different Slack channels for tech skills, all of these sort of resonate in different ways with with some of the some of the proposed communities of practice, and just having a sense of what succeeded and what got stuck on each of those to inform sort of what the groundwork might be for each community to practice as they're vary a little bit anyway thinking.

And then making it relevant for those brigade leaders like Matthew is just saying, so that or other kinds of leaders so that they can uptake those things.

Surely,

I was gonna say in our group, um, well, I think we're trying to process the information because there's there's a lot of information and for me, it's new. I I was interviewed, you know, during the revisioning process and felt it was very exciting and had a lot of comments to make about my experience so far in Code for America. But then I again lost the forehead of what was going on and I wasn't involved and didn't read the plan when it came out or different documents. But what strikes me about this is I am involved in other communities of another community of practice, and it's entirely self organized around, you know, a common interest. And that definitely is something that can be great. But yeah, it's daunting in this structure that we already have that is so you know, complex. And so like when I see logic models, I start to get, you know, because they're so linear, and yet there's so many interactions between all these different parts and not just entities but all the different relationships and what's going on with projects. So yeah, for me, I'm a bit overwhelmed. That is very,

very fair. Definitely looking forward to hearing more as y'all managed to process a little more Jennifer.

I would say that it's going to be important for all of these branches and practices, even the ones that don't have brigade, in their specific charter to be run in ways that are brigade affirming and brigade enhancing, and not seen as competitive with brigades. Or the you will not get the buy in from brigade leadership.

Absolutely, in a lot of ways, imagining network organizing branches are is a brigade cross brigade support system however, not having been part of the network, it is optimistic for sure. I realized we're actually over time for my session. You have about 10 minutes till the next session begins. But I want to be very, very clear. As this I'm so so thankful for this discussion. It's super, super helpful to me personally. At the same time, I highly I highly, highly, highly request that you put these thoughts into writing into the discourse posts related to this topic area. And I'm going to just quickly if I can find that link for you all again. There should be a readme slash start here. Thread in in this link that I just put into the chat. Please, please take a look at that. Please. Put your thoughts into threads, read other people's replies. And make sure that you you know add on to whatever that you agree with or add different thoughts if you so wish. Ciara seeing your comment canceling about which branches would benefit them are the strategic interests in and then elect a committee of people to go represent the brigade and those branch roles? That's fabulous idea. Sarah Sarah fabulous. People could also nominate themselves as individuals as well, but if the gains have been shown interest in it, they might be able to more easily take worlds on. So that is actually a really, really great point. If y'all would like to nominate someone from PAC relay would be really, really good in this role, or in this working group. That's totally fine. Please feel free to nominate more generic groups rather than individuals if you so choose. Jennifer, do you still have a question or is that an errant hand? Thank you all so very much. I know I've tossed a lot in your direction. These slides will be available on online and this recording as well. And I really, really look forward to hearing from you all

y'all know how to find your next session. Right.

Thank you for your discussion panels. Amazing. Yeah. Do we stay here for the next discussion? In the ballroom? No. No,

okay. No, let me get you the schedule.

Okay. Yeah, no problem. Are you putting it

in the link in the chat is the brigade schedule you'll see your two up

three options.

One of them is missing a link. I will go ask about that.

And those will have different zoom links available. Okay, cool. Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you all. Hey, thank you.