Draft Agenda
Welcome to the 2019 Make Hack Void AGM General Discussion!
Please add any points here you wish to have discussed here, and they will be added to the agenda.
Additionally, if you wish to throw up a “Request for Comments” on anything you would like to propose, this is the place to do it.
In the coming days I will make a final report of Make Hack Void’s finances covering the last year, and it will be published in its own thread. I would like to direct any financial queries into that thread as to keep this one related to all other issues instead.
Edit: You can find it right here!
I’d appreciate it if all the rough details of everything could be ironed out here so the AGM becomes more or less a “yay/nay” sorta deal, as no-one likes committee meetings dragging on too long, it seems.
If there’s any hills you wanna die on, maybe die on them here? Anyway, let’s try to keep this civil. Well, as civil as is reasonable, at least…
So after re-reading MHV 2019-2020 Financial Discussion I was going to (edit: comment) there, but then thought better to discuss more general here. So below is driven by the the Financial discussion.
I truly appreciate all of the thought & effort in the Financial discussion (having been treasurer & everything else of several struggling organisations), but I wonder if we should look at the situation in a different way?
For example instead of focus on the downward trend of our bank account, why not focus totally on what WE* ALL want for or from the space… and then once we are motivated and focussed, I am sure the little bit of extra income we need will just flow in.
A negative example from the long Financial discussion is all the points about improvements & better etc…which is great, we want a “better” space, but the negative I see is that improvement & better are rather vague. Maybe this a part of why according to the Financial discussion nothing much happened in last couple of years (and yes I am guilty of not doing much).
Instead if we have some clear goals, then the money is one aspect that will be accounted for as we move forward.
So lets discuss/pick a few major goals and plenty of minor, but still important goals and get stuck in!
To me WE especially includes new members and the integration process to turn them into long term happy members (& of course cash contributers).
I tried opening a discussion about this however, after taking some time off for work, I returned to find it had a good number of views but no posts. I’ll try to kickstart it now, but no promises.
My argument here simply is “We’ve been trying goodwill for the last two years and the space has only seen downward trends in income and members, saying “If only we’re motivated and focused everything will be fine” is akin to saying “If more people care about climate change then the problem will be solved!” without offering any solutions as to how it’ll be solved. This is mine.”
I firmly believe that with a cleaner, more usable space, functional equipment, more activities, and longer and more frequent openings that yes, the extra income we need will just flow in.
But keep in mind it’s not a little bit. This time two years from now we’ll need at least twice what we’re currently getting.
I’ll agree with this.
Same for this.
I’ll agree with this, but I’d consider this an overall goal, not a specific, clearly defined objective.
If I could suggest some specific goals, they would be
Having all power tools in a functional and safe condition
(this can be tackled one tool at a time for smooth, steady progression)
Having all workspaces with a clear, defined ruleset in order to make them accessible for any group or activity
(Think of how we cleared the tables on eastwing so it looked like anyone could use them for anything, rather than just specifically electronics. Examples might be having a bench in the CNC room just for laser cutters and 3D printers, without anything other than raw materials stored there, and also an electronics workbench on the other side of the room dedicated to soldering, meanwhile keep the table in eastwing clear for any desired purpose and the workbenches in westwing available for any woodworking/metalworking)
Functional and practical game consoles. As they are now, they’re pretty inaccessible. Making setup and usage easier, and perhaps doing something about the screen’s location, could help.
A clearly defined area for storage, rather than multiple drawers spread throughout the space. Centralise, minimise, optimise.
There’s other, smaller things however they’re just fixes and patches I plan on doing myself on infrastructure nights.
OK, some good ideas to focus on there. I might have slightly different priorities, but would like to see if others would like to go in that same direction before getting to that level of detail.
If you have other priorities then please, list them.
I’m just working on what I think may be beneficial to the community, and what I think the community overall wants, with some larger goals and smaller ones thrown in that could be quick to achieve.
It’s impossible to work out what the community at large is after if people don’t list their specific priorities and desires. Who knows, I may be completely off the mark, that’s why I like to hear what other think, so I can better understand the community.
If you’ve got a different set of priorities, I’d love to hear them. I’d much rather people go along with plans that they better agree with than just doing what I suggest because I seem to be making the most noise at any given time.
I agree with that goals should be specific and achievable. In addition, specifying for each goal a deadline and the person responsible may help. Of course in a volunteer space, the responsible person has to agree to take ownership of a particular goal.
To refine the specific goals:
All tools easily findable (organised on a wall, tool stand, drawers or similar) and in a functional and safe condition (ANU Makerspace is a good example).
Workspace rulesets printed in large letters and posted above the workspace (ANU Makerspace is a good example).
Storage labelled in large letters as such. Everyone encouraged to put tools and materials back in their proper place, no matter who took these out of their place.
Disagreeing a bit, I believe that hope is not an investment strategy. Specifically I am not optimistic about “cleaner, more usable space, functional equipment, more activities, and longer and more frequent openings that yes, the extra income we need will just flow in” and “once we are motivated and focussed, I am sure the little bit of extra income we need will just flow in”.
I’d say that listing everyone’s wishes for the space is important, however, when we’re talking about explicit goals it’s probably best to say that if you’re not personally willing to take ownership, try not to ask anyone else to take ownership of it for you.
Simply because no-one probably has the same motivation for seeing the goal through as you do.
I try not to suggest anything that I would not personally be happy with taking responsibility for, but I still welcome others giving suggestions for the space, even if they themselves can’t commit to seeing them through.
I also agree that hope alone is not an investment strategy, however I do believe that investing our time to improve the space and our money to improve the space resources, is.
Again, I’m happy to take ownership of what I’ve said. I’m already committed to opening the space every Friday night for Infrastructure evenings, another member has said they’d like to open the space on Sunday and, as they’re not yet a keyholder, I’d be happy to facilitate them doing so until they themselves have a key, there’s a handful of activities I plan on running at the space after the AMG is out of the way (2D/3D design for laser cutting, PCB design and soldering etc), so yes, hope is not an investment, but I believe this may be.