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This is no joke. If you’re going to assemble an organization that is
specifically oriented towards accomplishing a specific goal, you need
to give some consideration to what sort of structure will best get you
there. You don’t drive your Jeep in a drag race, and you don’t take
your Masserati off-roading!

Amy Kates and Jay R. Galbraith present a surprisingly lucid view into exactly how complex this process can become in Designing Your Organization.

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I attended TransparencyCamp here in DC on February 29th and March 1st. Much discussion about transparency got me thinking about a couple of things, specifically how to achieve sustainable transparency. My thinking breaks this down into two categories – first, what responsibilities fall to government actors and what fall to those outside of government and secondly, what does a realistic course of action towards sustainability actually look like?

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This excellent book by Leslie Crutchfield and Heather Grant studied 12 examples of high-impact nonprofits to determine what makes them effective. While they lay it out in a much more elaborate way, this is my take-away:

1. Form partnerships. Form partnerships with government, businesses, individuals, and other nonprofits. These partnerships should all work to expand your impact, and vary depending upon the type of partner:
   1. Advocate to government.
   2. Work with businesses so that you both benefit.
   3. Inspire individuals to promote your mission.
   4. Form networks of like-minded nonprofits.
2. Share. Share what you know with all of your partners. Share decision making with everyone in your organization. Empower those around you to take your mission farther than you could alone.
3. Adapt. Everything changes, build your organization so that you can adjust as that happens.
4. Sustain. There are three critical internal factors to ensure success in your mission. Shorting yourself in these areas will lessen your ability to sustain your programs and accomplish your mission:
   1. People. Take care of your people. Create a work environment that is attractive to top talent. Bring in people who believe in the mission, give them the tools, education, and compensation that they need to thrive. Give them the power to do so.
   2. Money. Find diverse sources of funding that will reliably support your mission.
   3. Infrastructure. Spend the time and money necessary to establish the organizational capacity required to manage your programs. This includes putting management systems, physical infrastructure such as offices or building, and technology such as computers and software in place.

Well it seems to be official that the internet is headed to the White House. This is great news for the American people and the world. Increased involvement of the populace in government improves government. FDR utilized radio to talk directly to the American people in his fireside chats. How will Obama utilize the internet to enable direct discussion with the American people? And even moreso, how will he utilize these capabilities to engage with the citizens around the rest of the world?

The expectations are high and whatever happens, it’s going to be exciting.

Not unlike the classic lol below, the Open Forum Foundation is fully operational.

We have determined our officers and approved the bylaws and organizing resolutions that make it possible for us to operate as a legal entity.

Also like the hamster above, it is going to take a lot of effort to get the organization up to full momentum in terms of fundraising, community building, and program development. I suppose that’s the sport of it, really!

I send congratulations and heart-felt gratitude out to the Directors of the Open Forum Foundation. They are the ones who have made this step possible, and it is their convictions and belief in the vision that have turned the Open Forum Foundation from an idea into a fully-operational reality (you can read more about them here).

President: Shadee Malaklou
Vice President: Ellen Williams
Secretary: Kristen Guskovict
Treasurer: Patrick Benz
Carolyn Kissane

It’s official! We are incorporated. On Monday, we’ll be having our first board meeting to approve the bylaws and set the Open Forum Foundation in motion as a legal entity, capable of making contracts and raising money and all the excitement that goes with it.

I’ll post the official paperwork next week or early the following, once it is all signed and approved and official.

Baby steps…

This post is way overdue, both in terms of being timely and also in terms of giving respect to the amazing conference put on by the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation in Austin from Oct 2 – 5.

I attended this conference to learn more about how to create an online discussion forum that moves beyond simplistic argument and flaming, and results in legitimate dialogue and deliberation that can actually move an issue forward. I got much more than that. I met a community of people that are working on similar issues, and we are forming a group to share ideas and resources and work together to create better software. This is wonderful news. I see the goal of the Open Forum Foundation as providing a service. I am excited to work with the best minds in the field and utilize already existing solutions as long as they can fit into a seamless solution that provides extraordinary functionality. This is an excellent step towards providing a portion of that functionality.

In addition, I finally met Mr. Lou Klepner from GatewaytoGov. I was aware that Lou was out there working on a vision similar to mine, but we had yet to connect and compare our perspectives. As it turns out, we are effectively in sync on every aspect of what we are trying to accomplish. I see this as basically cutting my workload in half. Hi Lou!

All in all, an amazing weekend that I’m sure will yield many results down the road.

I had a very interesting email conversation with a friend of mine last night (Thanks, Lenny!).

It was about the true value of open source, and why I’m always pursuing open source software. The realizations that I came to are worth conveying. They will help guide the creation of the Open Forum Foundation’s software projects as well as give some bearings when trying to figure out what software we should we be using in-house for our own needs – you know, which accounting package and which constituent relations manager, etc. Read more »

I’m almost ready to take the main website live. It’s very exciting! I am continuously amazed how long seemingly simple things take to accomplish well.

I think that the delays are good for me, however – the more people I talk to and the closer I get to going public, the more I am reminded that I do not have all the answers. My recent realization is that the currently critical component of this project is the creation of a community that is devoted to seeing this project through. This component is a little unique in that the community needs to be as all-inclusive of interested parties as possible. This means that my goal is rapidly becoming to establish the Open Forum Foundation as a framework within which the experts can discuss and create solutions.

Of course, I am offering Project One as the foundation for those solutions.

I am just struggling with email newsletter and blog post subscriptions. When that wraps up, I will take the WordPress portion of the site live.

In the meantime, I’ll continue to contact people in all the vital communities, get the legal foundation laid, and finish up the wiki so that it can go live when the time is right, also.