Challenge How does a Board of Directors (re)craft its annual assessment of the CEO when that role is filled by a four-person, shared, non-hierarchical leadership team? This was precisely the challenge the Fractured Atlas Board faced in early 2019. Below, in detail, we describe the process we crafted to answer this question.

[Heads up: While I am a certified Professional in Human Resources (PHR), I’m not an employment attorney. If you have questions about whether and how these laws below apply to you and your organization you should connect with legal counsel.] In 2018, in the wake of the #MeToo movement, state and local governments took action and enacted a number of laws to address sexual harassment in the workplace. Places like California, Connecticut, Delaware, and Maine introduced new and updated provisions and laws to increase employee protections. You might remember hearing about these laws when they were first proposed and signed. This is a reminder that specific, mandatory employer provisions are now going into effect, with one deadline in New York State on October 9, 2019.

by Nicola Carpenter, Associate Director, People Operations at Fractured Atlas This is part of a series. If you read part one or part two, skip the intro and head straight to the interview. At Fractured Atlas, we really love sharing many of the inner workings around how our organization works. By sharing the things that work (or don’t) for us, we hope to help out in making the sector, as a whole, stronger. A few years ago, we shared our How We Work site so that anyone could see how we work at Fractured Atlas. We’ve also shared how our use of OKRs increases transparency, alignment, and accountability (that post even included a free template). We’ve shared updates on our Anti-Racism, Anti-Oppression journey, why we have race-based caucusing, and so many other things.

by Nicola Carpenter, Associate Director, People Operations at Fractured Atlas This is part two of a series. If you read part one, skip the intro and head straight to the interview.

Applying a Lovingkindness Lens by Tim Cynova, Chief Operating Officer at Fractured Atlas Remember when it seemed like everyone was trying to achieve “work-life” balance? More recently, perhaps in a nod to the challenges of balancing “work” and “life” in an always-connected world, or maybe because for those searching for meaning and purpose in their activities there’s not always a bright line distinction between “work” and “life,” the phrase has shifted to “bringing our whole selves to work.”

Note: The librarian’s last name is Reading. How awesome is that?! (Also note, my mom saved everything.) Around Memorial Day each year when my sister and I were kids, our parents would take us to the McCollough Branch of the Evansville Public Library. It was that annual rite of passage — the summer reading challenge! We’d select a hefty stack of books, and then hope to God come Labor Day we’d have read enough of them to earn that sweet certificate for a free scoop of Baskin Robbins ice cream.

by Nicola Carpenter, Associate Director, People Operations at Fractured Atlas Full team photo from All Hands 2019 At Fractured Atlas, about half of our team work fully distributed so we started having full staff events 6 years ago when we realized that there are conversations and activities that are better to do in person. We originally called these week long events “OkTECHberfest” but changed to “All Hands” last year. Through these years, we’ve found ways of creating an event that supports our organizational shared purpose.

[This time of year brings a whole host of looking back, looking forward pieces. Instead of a round-up of the top books or movies, or predictions about what’s to come in 2019, I thought it might be a good time to check in on our anti-racism, anti-oppression journey at Fractured Atlas.]

How many minutes each day do you spend drafting emails? How about attending meetings? Chatting on Slack? Water cooler conversing with coworkers? Do you measure it in any way? Or, when you think about it do you merely quantify the time simply as a “lot/little” or “more/less than I used to?”

It is December, which means that I am watching way too many holiday movies -(specifically the romcom variety that Hallmark and Netflix do so well), and it seems like I’m not alone. As I’ve been watching movie after movie, I have noticed some common themes: baking cookies (yum!), accidentally falling in love with a prince (or Santa’s son!), really fake looking snow (or incredibly not winter friendly outfits!), and people loving their jobs (just kidding).