Add mechanism for setting partner agreements

brianjrobertson commented 8 years ago

As a partner or a role-filler, I'd like an effective and simple mechanism to define agreements I'd like from partners, including a way to make some agreements required for partnership, so that I can more easily process tensions that are beyond the scope of organizational governance to resolve, and which require partner-to-partner or partner-to-organization agreements to effectively handle.

cassus commented 8 years ago

:+1:

LouisChiquet commented 6 years ago

Do you have some concrete examples to help (of agreements you'd like for instance)?

brianjrobertson commented 6 years ago

Some partner-level agreements we have in HolacracyOne:

I will prioritize attending the organization's official partner retreats in-person, even over competing personal preferences or events (except emergencies). This agreement does not apply to personal events that were on my calendar and committed to before I was invited to an overlapping partner retreat, however in those cases I agree to do my best to find a balance that maximizes the greatest overall good for everyone involved.
I will travel as-needed for my roles, up to _____.
I will use a personal credit or debit card to cover reimbursable expenses required to serve as a productive Partner of the organization or to support specific Roles I fill, and I will manage my available cash or credit to provide a sufficient buffer for these expenses.
I agree to prioritize my attention however is needed to get a GTD-style Weekly Review done every week in most weeks, and to miss no more than one week in a row in any case short of major personal or cripple-the-company emergencies.
When planning to take time off from work and I can reasonably expect that others may be impacted by my absence, then I agree to notify all relevant partners in advance.
I will pre-process my own "charge" about a partnership issue before engaging other partners about it.
I will use the tribal mediator to facilitate a difficult feedback conversation upon request of another partner.
I will set a context for "pushing"/offering feedback, and if not a good time, not share the feedback then.

brianjrobertson commented 6 years ago

Hi Folks - I'd really love some more eyes on this change: Does it make sense? Could it be simpler? Anything I'm missing? Any concerns or concerning scenarios you can think of?

margauxchiquet commented 6 years ago

For me, what is missing is how you can make a working agreement. Is it a policy? Is it a note published? Do it have the same weight as governance and if you break it it becomes a broken rule? I am not clear about this weight and place of this in the whole.

chourie2 commented 6 years ago

Hi,

I really like the proposal, as someone one who really want to challenge myself on my behavior, theses Working Agreements offers me a way to clarify some goals for me and for others who might be able to rely on thanks to them! Really nice and it really make sense to me 👍

Like @margauxchiquet I'm curious about the definition of theses Working Agreements. It's doesn't seems to be governance because it look like something anyone can add on himself as a Partner and not as a Role / Circle. Should the constitution clearly explain that it's not Governance if it's the right way of seeing it? Same question in the other case. And if so, I'm probably missing a point here!

I'm also not sure about the consequence of breaking such agreement. But if I'm right by seeing it as "Not Governance", I think that the only result might be that it may raise Tension to others Partners who relies on the disrespected agreements ? If so, I don't see any concern on that matter.

I also think that, to be usefull it needs to be published, just like governance, and even if it's not governance. Every Partner should be able to know the working agreements of others Partners, right? And if so, maybe it also need to be said in the constitution ?

@margauxchiquet, what do you think about a new section "Working Agreements" on the Partner page (your profil in glassfrog for example), on which you can only see Roles filled by the Partners and eventually tags I think currently? This new section would work almost exactly the same way the Note section work for a Role / Circle (I just don't think there is a need for a title for each Working Agreements).

chourie2 commented 6 years ago

Hey, it’s me again!

Shower thoughts : Why call it « Working » Agreements if it include Partners to Partners agreements? IMO, these category of agreements could be (or systematically is?) in the human relation space, outside of the actual work, but still relevant for the organization.

Maybe something like Personnal, Individual or Partner Agreements might more reflect that you make the agreement as a Person / an Individual / a Partner, and whitout looking to determine the recipient which could be your Organization, Roles, other Partners or even yourself (let’s be crazy here!), if it make sense for you!

klaas1979 commented 6 years ago

I got a question:

Working Agreements are for shaping Partner behaviors that underpin Role-based work, and may not define expectations only relevant when a Partner is already energizing a specific Role, nor expectations around how a Partner will prioritize across different Roles.

What is the interpretation of the 'may not define' part? Example: Is it possible to define working hours for call center roles with a working agreement or not? The office hours are only relevant to a single role of the person.

brianjrobertson commented 6 years ago

Yes, that's possible - that's about defining an expectation of when someone will energize the role, not defining an expectation relevant when they're already energizing the role.

brianjrobertson commented 5 years ago

I was just reviewing all the feedback above - thanks folks! I'm reopening this issue just to explore better names than "Working Agreement", per @chourie2's point. Any ideas? I'm not a fan of Personal or Individual; "Partner Agreement" or "Partnership Agreement" could work, although I'm not sure it's better or less confusing. Any thoughts about that one, or any alternate ideas?

LouisChiquet commented 5 years ago

I quite like “Partner's Agreement”, will need to put some pedagogy to make understand that it's not for “ruling Humans” as they also have to give their consent, as the French laws are rather strict on expected behaviours (they need to be defined in Rule Book or job description legally speaking), but I believe it's the “easiest” for people to integrate. Knowing that “Partner” is generally replaced by a term of the company to designated all the individuals employed by the company (for instance Nonpareil), this generic but very specific term being also used in Governance, would make sense in my opinion.

julianeroell commented 5 years ago

"Partner Agreement" speaks better to me than "Working Agreement". A "working agreement" IMO could also be between between Roles, whereas a "Partner Agreement" is clearly between Partners.

brianjrobertson commented 5 years ago

Hmm, the intent is that these agreements are sometimes between a Partner and the org (via a Role)...

LouisChiquet commented 5 years ago

Those would be weird, knowing that relation between a partner and the company needs to be legally clarified through Rule Book or job description in France (Labour laws are rather strict), and would potentially create confusion in HR (because of negotiations the Partners can have with the HR). But what you said wasn't my interpretation of 2.5. So maybe I should bring another issue on this if there is one, so we keep on the name in this issue.

chrcowan commented 5 years ago

@brianjrobertson Random options that pop into my head...

Expectations Agreement Relational Agreement Partnering Agreement Collaboration Agreement Coworker/Coworking Agreement Association Agreement Alliance Agreement Partnership Protocol Partnership Charter Behavioral Agreement Praxis Agreement Partnership Praxis Partnership Guidelines Relational Rules

oliviercp commented 5 years ago

@brianjrobertson As I'm reflecting on the terminology, the main difficulty I encounter is in trying to name a construct that encompasses two distinct types of agreements. As you mentioned in the original post, there can be partner-to-partner or partner-to-organization agreements. I wonder if it would be simpler to differentiate the two and give them different names, e.g. Working Agreement and Partner Agreement?

(I looked at the section of the dev version of the constitution on that, and you have two paragraphs distinguishing the two types of agreements already)

brianjrobertson commented 5 years ago

I originally considered "behavioral agreement", and there's a lot I like about that. And I still like Working Agreement. But the more I think about it, the more "partnership agreement" seems confusing to me. And note these are not just agreements between partners, but also agreements like "I'll show up to work by 9am" or "I'll wear a uniform to work" or whatever. So, I think I'm leaning towards either Behavioral Agreement, to reinforce that those are agreements about behaviors specifically, or Working Agreement, to avoid the slight negative/punitive connotation that behavioral agreement has for some people.

I'm not sure there's any value in differentiating the two @ocompagne, because the actual structure is the same - the definition is the same. It's just a matter of whether you're agreeing to hold to specific behaviors because the company asked or because another partner asked.

brianjrobertson commented 5 years ago

Any thoughts between Behavioral Agreement vs. Working Agreement? Vote thumbs-up to switch to Behavioral Agreement, or thumbs-down if you think Working Agreement is better.

oliviercp commented 5 years ago

In that case I favor "Behavioral Agreement" because it's more accurate, and I value accuracy over the potential negative connotation for the sake of making Holacracy easier to understand. Some agreements can be partner-to-partner and very relational in a way that "working" agreement would be inaccurate IMO (or at least would be a stretch).

chrcowan commented 5 years ago

I also like behavioral agreement over working agreement.

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On Jun 3, 2019, at 3:02 PM, Olivier Compagne notifications@github.com wrote:

In that case I favor "Behavioral Agreement" because it's more accurate, and I value accuracy over the potential negative connotation for the sake of making Holacracy easier to understand. Some agreements can be partner-to-partner and very relational in a way that "working" agreement would be inaccurate IMO (or at least would be a stretch).

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brianjrobertson commented 5 years ago

The argument for Working Agreement over Behavioral Agreement was captured here by @ebabinet; does that sway you @ocompagne or @chrcowan, or do you still think Behavioral Agreement is better?

chrcowan commented 5 years ago

No, his argument doesn’t sway me.

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On Jun 3, 2019, at 7:28 PM, brianjrobertson notifications@github.com wrote:

The argument for Working Agreement over Behavioral Agreement was captured here by @ebabinet; does that sway you @ocompagne or @chrcowan, or do you still think Behavioral Agreement is better?

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oliviercp commented 5 years ago

I'm sensitive to Eric's argument but all things considered, I still prefer Behavioral Agreement for its added clarity. I wish there was a better option though

MiekeByerley commented 5 years ago

Would the Term of Colleague Letter of Understanding (CLOU) address what you are trying to address? I know that MorningStar uses this as do many other Self-Managing companies. Otherwise it might be a thought to connect with encode.org in my opinion.

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On Thu, 6 Jun 2019 at 08:00, Olivier Compagne notifications@github.com wrote:

I'm sensitive to Eric's argument but all things considered, I still prefer Behavioral Agreement for its added clarity. I wish there was a better option though

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ericdgraham commented 5 years ago

I like Working Agreement best. Behavioral agreement sounds like something you'd sign before entering parole. Too strict sounding. Working Agreement sounds more professional and collegial; adult to adult. IMO.

brianjrobertson commented 5 years ago

Man, I'm really torn on this one. I'd love any additional perspectives or arguments anyone has, if there are any out there that aren't already covered above. Anyone?

(@MiekeByerley, no, CLOU won't work - see the context of how it's used in the current draft version; we need something lightweight, and ideally some adjective before "agreement" to denote a certain type of agreement.)

ebabinet commented 5 years ago

I still prefer Working Agreements over Behavioral Agreements because of the negative connotations of Behavioral Agreements, however I quite like "Partner Agreements". Based on the current description, these are agreements between Partners about how they "fulfill their general functions as Partners" or interact with each other outside of role based work, but still as Partners.

Brian gave examples of agreements that are not between Partners such as "I'll show up to work by 9am" or "I'll wear a uniform to work", however, I'd argue that you are still making that agreement as a Partner and with the other Partners, even if the behavior does not involve other Partners.

On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 4:48 PM brianjrobertson notifications@github.com wrote:

Man, I'm really torn on this one. I'd love any additional perspectives or arguments anyone has, if there are any out there that aren't already covered above. Anyone?

(@MiekeByerley https://github.com/MiekeByerley, no, CLOU won't work - see the context of how it's used in the current draft version; we need something lightweight, and ideally some adjective before "agreement" to denote a certain type of agreement.)

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matthiask commented 5 years ago

One comment regarding "behavioral agreement". I'm not a native speaker but "good work" (working agreement) and "good partnership" (partner agreement) sound positive but "good behavior" just doesn't. The latter does not sound like a symmetrical relationship to me, more like a parent-child relationship and that's not a good connotation in this context.

brianjrobertson commented 5 years ago

Okay, time for another poll: How about Partner Agreement vs. Working Agreement? Vote thumbs-up for switching to Partner Agreement, thumbs-down for sticking with Working Agreement.

brianjrobertson commented 5 years ago

Okay, I'm going with Partner Agreement for this one; thanks everyone!

holacracyone / Holacracy-Constitution

Add mechanism for setting partner agreements #77