Just a quick thing I forgot to mention, I personally have no issue with posting the numbers in the space, but I can only speak for myself here.
On Thu, Aug 30, 2012 at 3:59 PM, Jay Smith <[email protected]> wrote: > Thanks Mark, the reply is greatly appreciated. I understand that it was an > innocent misunderstanding and I hope my initial reaction doesn't overshadow > the fact that I really do appreciate what you're trying to do. > > The more informed and proactive the membership is about our financials, > the easier my job is. I'd rather be a humble bookkeeper who facilitates > informed spending than a tyrant who has to dictate it. After all, half of > this discussion would have been avoided had I just printed off a proper > cash-flow report to go with the handouts at the last meeting! > > I'm going to bring more comprehensive monthly reports to the membership > through meetings and through the soon to be active financial mailing list. > This is long overdue and I apologize for the delay. In the meantime, I'll > happily provide the requested statistics and any others that might be > required of your budget team. Also, feel free to count me in on your > strike-force if you meet or need anything done. > > - Jay > > Ps. I'm going to have to remember when to use "Jelly Bean counters" vs > "Bike-shed-ers" when considering crowdsourcing. That's a great comparison. > > > On Thu, Aug 30, 2012 at 3:03 PM, Mark Jenkins <[email protected]> wrote: > >> However, intentionally causing panic to solicit better information from >>> me? >>> >> >> I regret it if I implyied this -- my first post was never an intent to >> solicit information from Jay personally or to send others after Jay in a >> wave for the same. I wasn't even thinking of Jay in the first post, which >> was really the most careless part of it for which an apology is due. >> >> There's a lot of people here who have a lot in in their heads that needs >> to be dumped, pooled, and congealed -- I'm trying to crack those quiet >> heads open. >> >> I failed to consider that the attempt to solicit broadly could bring up a >> disproportionate burden for Jay as the keeper of the historical records to >> answer questions. >> >> What members can start working on now is not so much spending much time >> studying the known historical stuff (a burden that largely falls on Jay as >> bookkeeper to extract in a suitable form) but to try to develop better >> estimates about our future electricity and gas use and the future trends in >> membership numbers. (that last point is informed by the past but pretty >> speculative for the future as well) >> >> It was a mistake on my own part to imply in the second big post that I >> was intentionally causing panic. The intent with "release early, release >> often" was to spur detailed discussion -- I did have in mind the awareness >> that panic to follow was a possibility over a certainty -- so not a full on >> mallicous intent for panic. >> >> Knowing that, I should have made a larger effort to say, "but, don't >> panic folks, this is version 0.1, we can make it better, please help out" >> -- so again for lack of appropriate effort there I'm sorry. >> >> I must concede, there was one mallicous component to the first post -- >> with respect to the rent I was trying to move us beyond the "keep it in >> your heads" situation by posting my best guess in the hopes that a >> non-board member in the know would reply publically saying that's the wrong >> number and make it public already. >> >> I still wish the rent figure could be outed in public and we could drop >> this whole thing of seeing it as a important secret to keep. But I realize >> this isn't going to happen, so I dropped it in version 0.2. I'm not a nice >> guy for trying to out it, but I'm nice enough to stop now. >> (I would still like to post it on the wall inside the space, even with a >> members only financial mailing list I still think its good to have this >> information available to members in an "in your face, you didn't ask for it >> or sign up for it or show up for it" kind of way. Aggressive push.) >> >> Personally I'm still a little bit panicked. I've adjusted some of the >> figures with some feedback I recieved off list and even though the numbers >> are cash flow positive again it's not in my judgement by a lot. >> (this may make the assumed loan hard to get from a bank, as banks want to >> see you can not only pay them and have much more to spare). >> >> I'm not convinced that we can do well with the status quo + renovations + >> new operating costs -- I think something is going to have to change. >> (but don't panic folks, study the full information as it comes out and >> decide for yourselves!) >> >> Our discretionary spending may not have to go to zero but to me it still >> looks like it's going to be very low with all of the assumptions stated, >> revised, challanged, and unchallanged so far. >> (I should put a line in for cleaning and bathroom supplies given that >> they aren't a discretionary expense :] ) >> >> I hope to hear more of the assumptions from the posted projections >> challanged and debated by the members broadly, sooner rather than later. >> >> Doing this as a broad committee of everyone to guess how much electricity >> and gas we're going to use and how well the member counts will evolve is no >> bikeshed -- these are specific, focused topics whoes final form is just a >> number [not a multi-demensional structure with many ways it can be built] >> and these numbers are critical to try and anticipate before we sign on to a >> new deal. >> >> In the end, we can't just accept any new offer made to us, we have to >> walk away if it's just too bad -- regardless of how costs per square foot >> compare elsewhere [higher in some places, lower in others], we always have >> the choice of moving to another place where the actual final costs are >> lower. (by calibrating the size of space and location of space to what we >> can afford -- there are spaces we can afford) >> >> Jay, I hope in the end that as our financial officer you'll not only end >> up with a lot of work (inivitable burden that we all should appreciate), >> but also be saved some work by some wisdom of the crowd coming forth with >> good information. (instead of just being a stupidity of crowds situation.) >> >> Isn't it the case that crowds are really good at guessing how many jelly >> beans are in a jar? (and bad at actual decisions, such as those that would >> go into building a shed) >> >> By this I mean, a crowd approach can be useful come up with accurate >> budget numbers, but are not neccessarilly well equiped to judge risk/reward >> implied by the bottom line (go for it or not?). And if it is a no-go, a >> crowd may not be well equiped to make the hard decisions of change to move >> the numbers to a comfortable place >> (e.g., raise membership dues, moving to a new location, severe rationing >> of gas and electricity policy, etc...) >> >> So, let's indeed have a full-on bikeshed to guess the number of jelly >> beans left in the jar under the assumption of the status quo + new >> operating costs + renovations and try to put off the possibility of harder >> stuff that could come thereafter. >> >> >> Mark >> >> ______________________________**_________________ >> SkullSpace Discuss Mailing List >> Help: >> http://www.skullspace.ca/wiki/**index.php/Mailing_List#Discuss<http://www.skullspace.ca/wiki/index.php/Mailing_List#Discuss> >> Archive: >> https://groups.google.com/**group/skullspace-discuss-**archive/<https://groups.google.com/group/skullspace-discuss-archive/> >> > >
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