#3 Transparency - A Principle of Sociocracy 3.0
Part 3 of 7
Last year we updated and expanded our description of the?Seven Principles?of?Sociocracy 3.0.
Today, in this third post of seven, I'm delighted to share with you our description of?Transparency.
(the following is available to reproduce and share under our?Creative Commons Licence)
Go?here?for #1 Equivalence
Go here for #2 Consent
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Transparency
Record all information that is valuable for the organization and make it accessible to everyone in the organization, unless there is a reason for confidentiality, so that everyone has the information they need to understand how to do their work in a way that contributes most effectively to the whole.
Transparency in an organization helps people understand what’s going on, what to expect and why things are done the way they are. It reduces uncertainty, supports trust and trustworthiness and fosters accountability.
Adequate transparency means that people either have direct access to the information they need, or that they at least know where to go or who to ask, to get access to it. Transparency helps everyone understand when they can safely and effectively decide and act for themselves and when they need to involve others to respond to dependencies they share.
Transparency supports us to learn from, and with each other. It helps to reduce the potential of small problems growing into big ones because we are more likely to spot mistakes and negative unintended consequences more promptly.
Transparency facilitates the ongoing development and maintenance of a coherent and adaptive learning organization. Having access to relevant information helps us to quickly identify important needs and changes and respond fast.
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Clarify motivation for (more) transparency
Transparency is a means to an end, not an end in itself, so if you’re looking to increase transparency in your organization, take the time to clarify the reasons why. What are the challenges you are trying to solve by introducing more transparency and/or what are the opportunities you wish to pursue?
Introduce more transparency into your organization as a way to support learning and to free people up, not as a way to control them. Use it as a way to improve performance, not leave people feeling unsafe to do anything because they are anxious about being watched. Transparency can enable co-creation and innovation but in a context where failure is treated as negative, rather than an opportunity to learn, it will impede people’s willingness to take risks and experiment.
Consider reasons for confidentiality
Be clear about information that is inappropriate to share. While secrecy can be associated with illicit or dubious affairs, there are many legitimate reasons for confidentiality in organizations. Sometimes secrecy is necessary, for example, protection of people’s personal data and affairs, security of assets or protection of intellectual property that helps an organization achieve its goals.
Identify what information is valuable to record and share
Consider carefully what information is worthwhile to record. Valuable information worth recording typically includes:
Create and maintain a coherent system for recording information
Documenting relevant information in a way that is coherent and accessible is an ongoing task that relies on everyone in the organization playing their part. Developing a system for recording and sharing information and keeping it up to date takes time and effort. Choose tools that make it simple to create, update, and cross-reference records, as well as to search and retrieve information when it’s required. Make clear which information is recorded and updated, by whom and when, and structure records accordingly. Take the time to regularly check through your records, ensure your system remains helpful and keep an archive of historical information for reference.
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Are you interested in learning more about how to use Sociocracy 3.0 patterns to improve collaboration and build effective, agile learning organizations that scale?
Founder & Digital Innovation Leader at NETNODE | Pioneering Sustainable and User-Focused Digital Strategies | Sharing insights on #opensource, #webtrends, #AI, #UXdesign, #mentorship, #entrepreneurship
3 年I can explain how we do it at NETNODE AG. For us, transparency is important, because we believe if information is shared, it’s trust building and time saving. We use HolaSpirit and all Tactical and Governance Meeting logs are open to read for everybody. We have our internal dashboards where we show turnover-data and progress towards our goals. Everybody can see where we are money wise. We not only track financial progress. We are currently setting up NPS tracking, we track the tree plantings we do, we track innovation time, we track logged hours/overtime/holidays taken and it’s accessible for everybody. Every 3 months we do a town hall meeting and share the numbers proactively (even though everybody can access ist anytime). We also have Notion for whatever information is important to our company. All mentioned above is transparent for people within our tribe/company. What we do not share: 1:1 meeting discussions and there are some master passwords to master services only people who have the experience to use the system have access to (part of the security guidelines). If there would still be questions from somebody, there are plenty of opportunities to ask: team circle, Day2Day flow circle, townhall meetings and of course in 1:1s.
I like to look at transparency from a slightly different angle and define it as to ensure that those involved in decision-making are doing so on the basis of identical relevant information. Or short: information parity. This helps me navigate the topics of ?what can or cannot be made public?, ?public to whom? etc. It also makes it clear that everything need not be disclosed to everyone and that everyone don’t need to read up on everything that happens in all corners of the organization – which answers the first two questions I keep hearing about transparency: 1) Is it even allowed to internally publish all salaries; 2) how to deal with health issues and other confidential information. As you said, transparency is not a means in itself, but a means to an end: inclusion and equality of opportunity, for examples. I think the distinction is important, especially when we look at networked organizations that may even cross legal entities. There’s no point in asking for as-complete-as-possible transparency. But it’s necessary to create full transparency about the facts that influence a circle’s decisions. The goal has to be that everyone get qualification to participate in decision-making, whereas in less transparent organizations information can be misused secure the holders’ power to the detriment of the organization at large.
I'll Help You Strengthen Collaboration and Decision-Making in Your Teams and Organization | Co-Developer of Sociocracy 3.0
3 年The questions remain: - which information is valuable to record in your organization? - what's the best way to inform people about things that are relevant to their work? I don't know of any organization who has completely sussed out these things. #transparency is often a #workinprogress :)
Co-founder and Learning Facilitator at Sociocracy 3.0 Academy
3 年https://patterns.sociocracy30.org/