HOWTO Be A Coordinator
Contents
Champion/Planner/Budgeter
Zone Coordinators are volunteers who represent their zone at i3. They also coordinate, drive and determine the future plans and directions for the zone. The Coordinator creates a yearly Zone Budget and is part of the annual Budgeting process for i3. The Coordinator is the Authorizing Party for purchases against the Zone Budget, and is responsible for setting the standards for training and use of zone equipment.
Zone Finances
For those new ZCs, we can spend the money 4 ways
1) Buy it yourself and get a reimbursement from the Treasurer. You can see how much money you have available in your budget and get a link to the reimbursement form on the Zone Funds page. All requests require approval from a coordinator or officer. Contact treasurer if you have any questions.
2) If online, you can give the Treasurer a link and the shipping address and they will make it so.
3) If the vendor can generate an invoice to i3, the Treasurer can pay direct by USPS check.
4) The Treasurer has a debit card that they can make arrangements to get to you and get back. We don't do this often. Usually only big ticket items.
If none of these methods work for you, talk to Treasurer to work something out.
How to use i3's non profit status for zone purchases
Coordinate Maintenance, Training, and Authorization
- The Coordinator makes sure the major equipment in their zone is being maintained and operational. Many times doing the work, but also gathering others to work on Zone Equipment. It is the responsibility of the Coordinator to, as best as they are able, keep the equipment working.
- The Coordinator makes training and orientation for the zone and equipment in the zone available for those who wish it. That includes sometimes being the Trainer, but also gathering others to Train. Try for a minimum of a class, orientation or equipment training at least once every other month
- The Coordinator sets the rules to the zone, including deciding which machines require Authorization to run and setting the standards for that Authorization. The Coordinator also decides which equipment can be loaned to the zone, no equipment lives in the zone without the Coordinator's explicit approval, and the Coordinator is the contact point when a member wants to remove loaned equipment.
Responsibilities to the space
- Communicate with neighboring zone Coordinators to tackle common problems and resolve zone conflict.
- At the 1st Tuesday Member Meeting, the Coordinator should write up and insert into the agenda prior to the meeting, a short (3 sentence) report on what happened in the prior 2 weeks, what will be happening, and any equipment issues. This lets the General Membership know what they can do in the zone. You do all that work, make sure the Members know about it.
Transition to a new coordinator
- Update the zone wiki page( Automotive Zone, Bicycle Shop, CNC Shop, Ceramics Zone, Classroom, Commons Area, Compute Zone, Craft Room, Electronics Lab, Fab Lab, Glass Zone, Infrastructure, Injection Molding Shop, Jewelry Zone, Kitchen Zone, Laser Cutter, Leather Loft, Machine Shop, Media Lab, Paint Zone, Sewing Zone, Sky Zone, Tool Crib, Vinyl Shop, Welding Area, Wiki, Wood Shop ) and set the new coordinator "|Zone Coordinator=". This information is displayed in the info box and also automatically cascades to the zone list page.
- Update zone mailing list in google admin
- Update coordinator contact info posted in zone
- Get zone lock box key
- Make sure new zoco has access to i3 general share for zone documents
Zone Specific Guidance
- To be filled in
Expectations of the coordinator
- Zone coordinators are expected to use their position to act in the best interest of the space and membership, following the guiding rule of "be excellent".
- Other best practices can be found below.
- No they can’t (it might be because there's overlap with Responsibilities to space?)
- Provide zone updates at monthly member meetings.
