One aspect of Holacracy that people often struggle to understand is that it's not about the people. Yes, that's right – Holacracy doesn't care about you as an individual or about improving your personal qualities like compassion or consciousness. Instead, it prioritises roles and accountabilities over individuals, ensuring the best fit for each role.
This approach may seem impersonal, but we're not robots! We're real people with emotions, needs, and expectations. That's why we distinguish between two contexts: the Organisation Context and the People Context. Holacracy is the approach used to enable the Organisation Context to flourish. The People Context has its own methods to empower individuals to thrive and shape our culture at Luscii.
The Organisation Context is where the work happens. Each role has clear responsibilities and authorities. We separate the person from the role to gather feedback, refine our roles, and evolve as an organisation. We have two types of meetings: tactical and governance meetings. During these meetings, we focus on the purpose of our organisation. While it may seem a bit impersonal, it helps us stay on track and create space for care.
In the Organisation Context, Holacracy gives us the tools to continuously evolve the organisation into more clarity in service of purpose.
The People Context is where our collective culture resides. Culture is a concern for everyone, not just a specific department or group. As humans, we bring the roles of an organisation to life and infuse them with energy. Here is where we experience our social dynamics, relationships, and culture in general, as well as our individual autonomy, needs, desires, expectations, decisions, and so on. This is the space where we need to deal with tensions that are not organisational.
The People Context focuses on how we want to relate to each other and create an environment where we can all thrive. This includes our cultural values, assemblies, badges, trips, and green initiatives are housed. Additionally, we have policies such as the Minimum Viable Group policy, expectations on how we work together, feedback guidelines, accountability partners, and Kudos. These values and activities help guide our behavior and create a culture that we all want to be a part of. In a nutshell, the People Context is our space to be authentic, connect with others, and shape our own culture.
We also offer a tool called Relational Agreements, which outlines the expectations we have of each other and shapes how we interact and work together. These agreements focus on people, rather than roles, and help us become great collaborators. For more information on Relational Agreements and how to propose new ones, check out: Relational agreements.
If there is work that needs to be done in the organisation, we have roles in the People Ops circle to handle it. This includes culture event organizers and personal development circle members.
The People Context is represented in the Organisation Context by a People Context Rep. This ensures that the needs of the People Context are heard and integrated into our overall structure. If you feel that something from the People Context needs to be part of the organisational space, you can reach out to the rep link. They can help address your concerns and bring it to the table of the Organisation Context.
Anyone can request a new election for People Context Rep at least three months after the previous election. The person(s) who receive(s) the most votes will energise the role of People Context Rep, until they give back the role or a new People Context Rep is elected. The Anchor Circle Lead is not allowed to energise the People Context Rep role and is accountable for organising and coordinating the election.