General Company Governance Meeting Minutes

All Partners of the organization are authorized to spend company funds or dispose of company inventory (e.g. books) using their reasonable judgment, in support of the Organization's purpose, within the following constraints:

For expenses of $20+:
• You must post to Slack before or simultaneous with the spending, sharing the amount they are spending and the purpose (very rough/brief is fine). This must be on a Slack channel that all partners are subscribed to, or have been notified may include spending announcements for the general category/purpose of the expense in question.

For expenses of $100+, or for any recurring expenses (including any pattern of one-off expenses for the same purpose):
• You must post to Slack (under the same channel rules as above) in advance of spending, and explicitly state your "intent to spend" (including amount and purpose, and with the whole channel tagged). You must then answer any clarifying questions and read any reactions about the spending (you don't need to respond to reactions). The spending is then automatically authorized 48 hours after you answer the last clarifying question (or after your original intent is stated, if there are no questions), unless any partner posts a request to escalate the decision to whatever other spending authorization processes exist (e.g. Lead Link authorization or a defined budget).

For expenses of $1000+ (including recurring expenses that would add up to $1000+ before being revisited), in addition to the above:
• After the required delay, if any critical or skeptical reactions were shared, you must consider them and re-state your intent to spend the funds if that still makes sense to you (this re-statement may include modifications if desired).
• You must get at least two other partners to attest that they would also make that spending decision were they in the relevant role. Partners may attest to this by adding a money-related icon to the intent-to-spend Slack post via a Slack "reaction", and no one may add such a reaction unless they are making this attestation. If you had to re-state your intent per above, this attestation must happen after your restatement, on that post. However, this step can be bypassed entirely for an expense of roughly the same general amount for the same purpose as any prior spending authorization within the past three months.

For any recurring expenses, in addition to the above:
• You must decide when you will revisit and reassess the spending decision, and share that when announcing your intent to spend. The spending authorization will automatically expire at that point, unless you get the expense re-authorized for another period beforehand.
• If the recurring expense is authorized, you must promptly document the reason, amount, and expiration of the authorization via a role note in GlassFrog (or in a file linked from a role-note). You must also add a trigger to your individual organizational system to revisit the expense at or before the expiration date.

In addition, for any spending under this policy:

• The spending must clearly support the purpose or accountabilities of a role you fill, without any reasonable inference that boundaries have been blurred in making the spending decision, either between different roles or between personal and role interests. For example, a reasonable inference might exist if funding a project you're really personally inspired to work on, but where the link to the explicit purpose/accountabilities of one of your roles would look more like a forced fit or a "nice story" vs. a natural way to express the role (to an objective third party). However, you may still spend even with a reasonable inference of blurred boundaries, if you have called out the potential boundary question in your Slack post, thoughtfully considered it, and genuinely believe it is not a case of blurred boundaries.

• You must submit a bill to @Bookkeeper promptly after authorizing the purchase, or pay the bill personally and submit for reimbursement via an expense report within the expense reimbursement process and rules published by @Finance.

The authorization given in this policy is just one possible way to get spending authorization; other methods with different rules may separately exist, and partners may use other methods instead of the above when otherwise authorized and applicable.

All Partners of the organization are authorized to spend company funds or dispose of company inventory (e.g. books) using their reasonable judgment, in support of the Organization's purpose, within the following constraints:

For expenses of $20+:
• You must post to Slack before or simultaneous with the spending, sharing the amount they are spending and the purpose (very rough/brief is fine).

For expenses of $100+, or for any recurring expenses (including any pattern of one-off expenses for the same purpose):
• You must post to Slack in advance of spending, and explicitly state your "intent to spend" (including amount and purpose, and with the whole channel tagged). You must then answer any clarifying questions and read any reactions about the spending (you don't need to respond to reactions). The spending is then automatically authorized 72 hours after your original intent is stated or 48 hours after you answer the last clarifying question (or after your original intent (whichever is stated, if there are no questions), later), unless any partner posts a request to escalate the decision to whatever other spending authorization processes exist (e.g. Lead Link authorization or a defined budget).

For expenses of $1000+ (including recurring expenses that would add up to $1000+ before being revisited), in addition to the above:
• After the required delay, if any critical or skeptical reactions were shared, you must consider them and re-state your intent to spend the funds if that still makes sense to you (this re-statement may include modifications if desired).
• You must get at least two other partners to attest that they would also make that spending decision were they in the relevant role. Partners may attest to this by adding a money-related icon to the intent-to-spend Slack post via a Slack "reaction", and no one may add such a reaction unless they are making this attestation. If you had to re-state your intent per above, this attestation must happen after your restatement, on that post. However, this step can be bypassed entirely for an expense of roughly the same general amount for the same purpose as any prior spending authorization within the past three months.

For any recurring expenses, in addition to the above:
• You must decide when you will revisit and reassess the spending decision, and share that when announcing your intent to spend. The spending authorization will automatically expire at that point, unless you get the expense re-authorized for another period beforehand.
• If the recurring expense is authorized, you must promptly document the reason, amount, and expiration of the authorization via a role note in GlassFrog (or in a file linked from a role-note). You must also add a trigger to your individual organizational system to revisit the expense at or before the expiration date.

In addition, for any spending under this policy:

• The spending must clearly support the purpose or accountabilities of a role you fill, without any reasonable inference that boundaries have been blurred in making the spending decision, either between different roles or between personal and role interests. For example, a reasonable inference might exist if funding a project you're really personally inspired to work on, but where the link to the explicit purpose/accountabilities of one of your roles would look more like a forced fit or a "nice story" vs. a natural way to express the role (to an objective third party). However, you may still spend even with a reasonable inference of blurred boundaries, if you have called out the potential boundary question in your Slack post, thoughtfully considered it, and genuinely believe it is not a case of blurred boundaries.

• You must submit a bill to @Bookkeeper promptly after authorizing the purchase, or pay the bill personally and submit for reimbursement via an expense report within the expense reimbursement process and rules published by @Finance.

• You must post your Slack message in a channel specifically created for the purpose of announcing spending intentions (i.e. this purpose must be in the explicit purpose field for the channel), and you must stay within any limits documented in the channel's purpose. If you create a new channel for announcing spending intentions, or modify any documented limits on an existing channel, you must promptly announce the new or modified channel in the #general channel, with everyone tagged.

The authorization given in this policy is just one possible way to get spending authorization; other methods with different rules may separately exist, and partners may use other methods instead of the above when otherwise authorized and applicable.