<html><body><div style="color:#000; background-color:#fff; font-family:times new roman, new york, times, serif;font-size:12pt"><div><span>* I think majority rule is awful. And consensus works better if you do it as win-win, which means everyone wins. With win-win you get each person or side to say what their main concern is. If there are any opposing concerns, you ask everyone to see if they can think of a solution that would satisfy both or all concerns. If no other solution comes up, make a temporary decision, if needed, then wait till next time and see if anyone has thought of a solution that would satisfy all concerns. You can get help from outsiders, like on the net, to think of solutions too, if needed.</span></div> <div>- Good Day. Lloyd<br><a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://nhc.lefora.com"></a><a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://nhc.lefora.com">nhc.lefora.com</a><br><br></div><div style="font-family: times new roman,
new york, times, serif; font-size: 12pt;"><div style="font-family: times new roman, new york, times, serif; font-size: 12pt;"><font face="Arial" size="2"><hr size="1"><b><span style="font-weight:bold;">From:</span></b> Far McKon <farmckon@gmail.com><br><b><span style="font-weight: bold;">To:</span></b> Hackerspaces General Discussion List <discuss@lists.hackerspaces.org><br><b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sent:</span></b> Monday, August 29, 2011 5:16 PM<br><b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Subject:</span></b> Re: [hackerspaces] How is that consensus thing working out?<br></font><br>1) Consensus, when used by intelligent adults with good understanding<br>of the practice, beats out any other decision making process.<br>Unfortunately in my work with hackerspaces (of course your mileage may<br>vary) I've found that hackers are particularly bad at some of the<br>requisite skills to make consensus work.<br><br>Mostly what I think is missing
is a realization that they may in fact<br>be wrong, and/or (egads!) someone else may have more<br>knowledge/experience than they do. I've watched people with *zero*<br>organizational experience block solid group management ideas without<br>ever thinking about their relative skill set. I've watched morons with<br>one week of IT experience act like they know the *only right way* to<br>configure an Apache server. Also, many seem unable to separate their<br>own opinion from objective fact. Then tend to confuse "I think Emacs<br>sucks"* with "Emacs Sucks" I could go on, but IMHO those are the top<br>two issues which I've seen repeatedly.<br><br>2) In other non-hackerspace projects, we have done 'fallback to<br>voting'. If after an hour of discussion a consensus can't be reached,<br>1/3 of the group can call for a simple majority vote. A 5 minute<br>break happens, then a ballot or a thumbs-up/thumbs-down vote.<br><br>3) In my
hackerspace experience**, no I don't think many members<br>understood (or agreed) with the consensus pattern. I think if they<br>understood it they may have liked it. I've seen it work well (without<br>tools) in groups of 3-5, but above that (IMHO) it takes some agreement<br>and some formal consensus tools for it to work. That said, again,<br>I've used it very successfully in other organizations.<br><br>4) If you don't use consensus, I'd go for 'notify and do' and simple<br>Majority Voting. Notify and do is along the lines of "if you are<br>doing it in the groups name, send an email out, wait 24 hours. Unless<br>someone is calling for a vote to stop you, do it." Majority Voting is<br>plain old vanilla majority voting.<br><br><br>If you can a group to stop and actually learn the skill (and it is a<br>skill, and one that can be taught) consensus is awesome. But make<br>sure the group has done some reading*** and
know how to use the tool<br>before the pick it up, and cut their arms off, consensus is great.<br>Otherwise, I'd stick to simple majority voting.<br><br>Hack on,<br>- Far McKon<br><br>* Face it, it does :)<br>** My experience is mostly int the north-east USA. In Europe I see a<br>lot more consensus among hackers, even informally. True Story: At<br>27C3 I watched a group of Dutch hackers get a consensus to find a<br>place everyone wanted to eat. A cigarette later on the same block, I<br>watched some American from the same conference try to find a place to<br>eat. They bicker, broke into 3 groups, and went to different places.<br>It was a great microcosm example.<br>*** NASCO has some good literature on this, behind their login amoung<br>their training stuff.<br><br><br>On Mon, Aug 29, 2011 at 7:38 AM, Hans Fraiponts <<a ymailto="mailto:fraiponts@gmail.com" href="mailto:fraiponts@gmail.com">fraiponts@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br>> Hey,<br>><br>> Just interested, does the consensus pattern[1] work in your space?<br>><br>> 1) do you use the consensus pattern? For some or all decisions?<br>> 2) what happens when someone blocks consensus? Is this member expected<br>> to reach consensus (by compromise) by next meeting,? Does this ever<br>> happen?<br>> 3) do you have the impression most members agree with the consensus pattern?<br>> 4) Did you develop an alternative for the consensus model?<br>><br>> Thanks for your input,<br>><br>> Hans F.<br>><br>> 1) <a href="http://hackerspaces.org/wiki/The_Consensus_Pattern" target="_blank">http://hackerspaces.org/wiki/The_Consensus_Pattern</a><br>> _______________________________________________<br>> Discuss mailing list<br>> <a ymailto="mailto:Discuss@lists.hackerspaces.org" href="mailto:Discuss@lists.hackerspaces.org">Discuss@lists.hackerspaces.org</a><br>> <a
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