Even when I was living in a very liberal area, there were only a small handful of stores that advertised as worker co-ops. It’s funny too because those co-op stores were all incredibly popular and successful, so I don’t understand why they are so comparatively rare? The organizational structure seems simple to maintain, and has a high incentive for regular workers to go above and beyond since they directly benefit from the business being successful, so what’s the deal? I am speaking from a US centric view, so maybe things are different in Europe, but even with my limited knowledge I feel like they are relatively unpopular there too, but maybe not? I dunno.
I agree with your first paragraph, and once we instituted a traditional hierarchy of responsibility in the form of editors and publishers with defined timetables and expectations, things ran more smoothly - the effort lasted 12 years in all before closing.
However, the amount of management and moderation involved from those placed at the top was far greater than in a comparable corporate structure, in large part due to the human behavior factors I addressed above. This led to burnout, and which had a cascading effect on those with less responsibility. While I don’t regret what we accomplished, I’ve come to the conclusion it would have been undoubtedly easier to succeed in the publishing space with a corporate structure.
As such, I disagree with your assumption in the latter half of your comment that a co-op can take in any worker irrespective of ethic. A co-op thrives because it’s a community that relies on each other. When you introduce bad actors into the mix, who are benefiting without contribution, it breeds resentment and similar behavior if not corrected quickly - especially if you’re working on a profit-share basis. My experience in both the non-profit and corporate worlds has shown that the latter can absorb a much higher ratio of these bad actors than a co-op or non-profit can, as these latter organizations rely on an equitable social contract to motivate their workforce. Corporations just rely on a paycheck.
I appreciate your practical perspective vs the armchair philosophy on the matter. My company is private for-profit, but with a very loose heirarchy and a small team. None of us except the founders even own any of the company, but we are well paid and well taken care of with generous insurance and bonuses, and regular raises. Most of us appreciate that and work hard so the company can succeed - and we all get to keep working here. However we’ve had a few people who really didn’t pull their weight, and it does indeed breed resentment and detachment which only gets worse if nothing is done to correct it. If they hadn’t been let go, the damage to our culture could have sunk us.
You are not logged in. However you can subscribe from another Fediverse account, for example Lemmy or Mastodon. To do this, paste the following into the search field of your instance: [email protected]
No such thing. Ask away!
!nostupidquestions is a community space dedicated to being helpful and answering each others’ questions on various topics.
Rule 1- All posts must be legitimate questions. All posts titles must include a question.
All posts must be legitimate questions, and all post titles must include a question. Questions that are joke or trolling questions, memes, song lyrics as title, etc. are not allowed here. See Rule 6 for all exceptions.
Rule 2- Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material.
Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material. You will be warned first, banned second.
Rule 3- Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here.
Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here. Breaking this rule will not get you or your post removed, but it will put you at risk, and possibly in danger.
Rule 4- No self promotion or upvote-farming of any kind.
That’s it.
Rule 5- No baiting or sealioning or promoting an agenda.
Questions which, instead of being of an innocuous nature, are specifically intended (based on reports and in the opinion of our crack moderation team) to bait users into ideological wars on charged political topics will be removed and the authors warned - or banned - depending on severity.
Rule 6- Regarding META posts and joke questions.
Provided it is about the community itself, you may post non-question posts using the [META] tag on your post title.
On fridays, you are allowed to post meme and troll questions, on the condition that it’s in text format only, and conforms with our other rules. These posts MUST include the [NSQ Friday] tag in their title.
If you post a serious question on friday and are looking only for legitimate answers, then please include the [Serious] tag on your post. Irrelevant replies will then be removed by moderators.
Rule 7- You can't harass or disturb other members.
If you vocally harass or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.
Likewise, if you are a member, sympathiser or a resemblant of a movement that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of a group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you will be banned on sight.
Rule 8- All comments should try to stay relevant to their parent content. Rule 9- Reposts from other platforms are not allowed.
Let everyone have their own content.
Rule 10- Majority of bots aren't allowed to participate here.
Unless included in our Whitelist for Bots, your bot will not be allowed to participate in this community. To have your bot whitelisted, please contact the moderators for a short review.
Partnered Communities
You can view our partnered communities list by following this link. To partner with our community and be included, you are free to message the moderators or comment on a pinned post.
Community Moderation
For inquiry on becoming a moderator of this community, you may comment on the pinned post of the time, or simply shoot a message to the current moderators.
Matrix Chat Room
To find & join our chat room, log into fluffychat.im(or any other matrix client) and put #nostupidquestions:matrix.org on the search bar.
Credits
Our breathtaking icon was bestowed upon us by @Cevilia!
I agree with your first paragraph, and once we instituted a traditional hierarchy of responsibility in the form of editors and publishers with defined timetables and expectations, things ran more smoothly - the effort lasted 12 years in all before closing.
However, the amount of management and moderation involved from those placed at the top was far greater than in a comparable corporate structure, in large part due to the human behavior factors I addressed above. This led to burnout, and which had a cascading effect on those with less responsibility. While I don’t regret what we accomplished, I’ve come to the conclusion it would have been undoubtedly easier to succeed in the publishing space with a corporate structure.
As such, I disagree with your assumption in the latter half of your comment that a co-op can take in any worker irrespective of ethic. A co-op thrives because it’s a community that relies on each other. When you introduce bad actors into the mix, who are benefiting without contribution, it breeds resentment and similar behavior if not corrected quickly - especially if you’re working on a profit-share basis. My experience in both the non-profit and corporate worlds has shown that the latter can absorb a much higher ratio of these bad actors than a co-op or non-profit can, as these latter organizations rely on an equitable social contract to motivate their workforce. Corporations just rely on a paycheck.
I appreciate your practical perspective vs the armchair philosophy on the matter. My company is private for-profit, but with a very loose heirarchy and a small team. None of us except the founders even own any of the company, but we are well paid and well taken care of with generous insurance and bonuses, and regular raises. Most of us appreciate that and work hard so the company can succeed - and we all get to keep working here. However we’ve had a few people who really didn’t pull their weight, and it does indeed breed resentment and detachment which only gets worse if nothing is done to correct it. If they hadn’t been let go, the damage to our culture could have sunk us.