General Company Governance Meeting Minutes

These messaging standards are intended to apply internally to HolacracyOne as well as to any company licensed to use the Holacracy brand (i.e. licensees). In order to preserve the Holacracy trademark, all roles releasing content associated with the Holacracy brand shall follow the messaging standards below:

On official channels controlled by H1 or licensees (e.g. own website, own blog, own documents), the following messaging standards apply: 

(a) Prominent Mentions: All prominent mentions of the brand must include a "®" symbol next to it. It can be small, stylized, or otherwise made less eye-catching for aesthetic purposes as long as it is present and noticeable. For the purpose of this policy, "Prominent Mentions" include the logo or the main appearance of the brand name in the title of any document usually considered authoritative (website, contracts, stand-alone products, etc). Exception: in editorial content (e.g. blog), it's acceptable not to use the ® symbol in the article title, as long as it's clearly mentioned somewhere else in the article.

(b) Trademark Statement: All printed or digital documents marketing the brand should include the following statement somewhere in the copy, typically at the bottom of the page or the footer of the webpage: "Holacracy is a trademark of HolacracyOne, LLC."

(c) Brand Consistency: The name "Holacracy" should be used consistently without spelling deviation: use it capitalized, don't use a translation (e.g. Holacratie, Holakratie), Holakratie) unless it is a translation specifically authorized by @Holacracy_Ecosystem, don't transform it into an adjective (e.g. holacratic).  

(d) Brand as Qualifier: Don't use the brand as a common noun (e.g. "a holacracy") or a proper noun (e.g. "Holacracy"); instead use it as a qualifier (e.g. "using the Holacracy practice" rather than "using Holacracy"). Exceptionally, if you cannot find an appropriate way to use it as a qualifier, you may use it as a proper noun with an "®" symbol (e.g. "Holacracy® is a self-management practice...").

On unofficial channels or those where the tone is customarily conversational (e.g. forums, social media posts, guest blog posts, interviews), these messaging standards may be deprioritized in favor of keeping a conversational and context-appropriate tone.