How will IF AGORA function?
IF-AGORA will be a streamlined enterprise. Its home will be within the InterFace group.
We will start with a simple web application. On top of a little information and the legal necessities, it will contain a small depot with current news, the market place and the partner’s page.
In the current news, you will always find the latest from the market place, such as new knowledge advertisements, events in the network and information on knowledge. On the partner’s page, you will find all providers and partners. The market place itself is the most important component. This is where all the advertisements are listed. From here, there is a direct link to the detailed descriptions.
The entire application has been programmed with the content management system Perch (Slogan: A really little content management system – costs: 35 £ for the entire web site). It was created by Felix Lange during the “silent time of the year” and is based on beautiful graphics by Johannes Naumann. It is easy to maintain. We will add to it according to need and adapt it as necessary. We plan to start with the project in the internet on January, 17th, 2011.
The (central) market place of the application is a list of knowledge advertisements. It will look like all other advertisements we are used to from other internet market places. If you select an offer, you get the detailed description. If you have something to offer, there is a simple form the content of which is the basis for the detailed description.
I will keep the rules concerning agency fees and knowledge search fees as simple and as low priced as possible. They will be published soon.
As I see it, the evaluation of the knowledge advertisements will be a challenge. Let me illustrate this with an example: a brain worker accepted in the network wants to offer his know-how on Excel on the market place. Well, in the spirit of IF AGORA, this might be a little questionable. It might be different if we were talking drawing the right conclusions from enormous data quantities and using Excel to do it.
Or else, let us assume there is a knowledge advertisement answering to all the AGORA criteria (from an accepted partner, not inimical, not manipulative, not political, not religious…), but it is totally obsolete… Here I can imagine some tricky situations that would have to be decided upon immediately.
If a conflict arises, I wish to solve it as fast as possible. Again, I will get advice from within the network. When in doubt, we will decide in favour of the person who offered his or her service.
As to the rest, we will keep a watchful eye on the developments on the market place (and of IF AGORA). We will “plan as we go” and always orientate ourselves anew. We will make decisions, especially hard decisions, in minimum time and in a pragmatic way and we will always include the advice of friends from the network.
I see no strong internal demand for personnel at IF AGORA. The mercantile and administrative tasks will be done by the FOCS team of InterFace AG at a reasonable price. Seeing partners will remain my job, the same is true for connecting those who offer something with those who ask for something. The search for knowledge will be done by me and my friends in the network.
If market place and network develop very dynamically, I will recruit an additional assistant. In this case, I would prefer giving the job to a part-time worker, for instance a single mother. Considering the general tasks, this should be easily manageable.
The necessary service for organizing events will be exclusively provided by partners I personally know. Our partners in organization are used to cooperating in teams with other experts. Since all our partners are medium-sized, I am assuming that all our events will be reliably organized with a high degree of self-organization and responsibility inside the team of partners.
I would personally wish to organize and be responsible for particularly demanding knowledge projects.
The success of IF AGORA will depend on how the market place and network develop. As soon as the website is active, it will be my main concern to recruit the already existing partners for the market place.
RMD
(Translated by EG)
P.S.
Here are the links to all my IF AGORA articles so far:
AGORA (1) – der Start (The Beginning), AGORA (2) – das Netzwerk (The Network), AGORA (3) – Empirismus&Neuland (Empirism&Virgin Soil), AGORA (4) – das Geschäftsmodell (Our Business Model), AGORA (5), die Partner (Our Partners) und IF-AGORA (6) – die Werte (Our Values).
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