Closed - Kiez burn vision weekend
This advice process has been closed. We will have the vision weekend in December 10th-11th. Sign up and details will follow soon.
TLDR: We think it might be time for a structured process regarding the future of Kiez Burn. We advocate for a strategy workshop with the goal of creating a longer term vision.
Proposers: @Julian Finn @Franzi
Proposers Roles:
Julian has been involved in KB since 2018 and was this year's welfare lead, Franzi has held multiple leading roles including being a Board member.
Who would impement this: Organizing the weekend would fall to the new board and whoever steps forward, probably Franzi
Affected: Everyone involved in Kiezburn
The Proposal:
Analysis:
Kiez Burn 2022 was a blast! Of course it was. This is not about criticizing the past year but rather about pointing out some systemic challenges. We are collecting here our observations as well as the outcomes from the leadership program and the powerful teams survey.
The Decentralization tends to lead to people defining their own lead roles, creating gaps and unclarities regarding responsibilities. This is mostly due to a lack of onboarding. The originally set up system of guides is not working in practise and most realizers are ‘left alone’. Roles are clearly defined but not communicated well. There is a lot of communication overhead between individual areas as well as between camps and core-orga (Korg, Board, Leads etc).
Orga set up: We have no clear set up for ‘how we do Kiez Burn’. We have different groups of people such as: board, korgies, leads, some form of core team etc but their roles and focus is not clarified. We have a lot of people working very, very hard to make Kiez Burn happen and burning out over it. Which leads to core people leaving every year and a lot of new people coming in. This causes us friction in: no clear roles, people don’t get onboarded, conflicts are not managed, realisers are not following the principles of Kiez Burn and doing ‘their own thing’, massive loss of knowledge and we lose amazing people. We have not managed so far to build a robust system with clear roles & responsibilities that makes people want to stay and allows us all to make Kiez Burn happen in a happy and healthy way.
Bureaucracy: Especially the dreams process has turned into a system where the hassle outweighs the benefits. It is easier to just self-fund (or drop) a small dream than going through the dreams platform. Creating a dream feels quite bureaucratic and un-burnery. It also favors those with a larger network and disadvantages people who are less good at communicating. To be clear: this is a structural issue.
Communication and ways of working: How do we store our knowledge and make it accessible? Do we still use realities? Was the launch of discord a success or a pain? What is the communication tool that serves us? How do we take decisions online together?
Separation from European Burner culture: KB is the fourth largest burn in Europe, yet we are more or less separate from the “rest of the scene”. With one or two exceptions there are no larger European camps or groups coming to KB, neither do KB camps tend to visit Nowhere, Borderland or other European burns. KB is extremely Berlin centric, with none of the crews from Hamburg, Cologne, Munich or other places coordinating to come. Long story short: KB somehow feels like its own thing without much of an integration and therefore not much variety.
Party Focus: If we want it or not: the chances of someone suddenly walking into The Observatory Friday night and getting lost in telescoping for 3 hours are fairly small. There are multiple theories why this is the case, but it is safe to say that most Kiez Burners somehow end up meandering along the underworld-musotopia axis (with wonderland / saloon as other stops) at night or just going to bed because they hate the music and there’s not much else to do.
Long-Term vision: Kiez Burn somehow lives from year to year, yet most of the camps have somehow been around for ages. This means that there are the same “should we get a new Gelände” debates every year and the same sort of “well, if someone did this it might be nice” responses. Yet we also don’t decide to grow, actively invite new camps or cooperate with Freiland to build new structures. All things that might be possible if we knew what we would be doing longer term.
Ideas
All these points are mere observations. To each of these there is a valid “yeah, and that is perfectly fine!” answer. And still, it feels like they could also be consciously discussed. And maybe written down somewhere.
Here are some wild ideas what a longer term vision could bring us:
If we were to decide to stay at Freiland for the next 5 years, we could decide to grow KB to the maximum Freiland capacity. We could talk to FL about building more permanent structures. We could focus on things such as extending the numbers of days (and be creative about how to fill them if we don’t get a sound permit). We wouldn’t even have to commit to FL with a contract. Just state intentions.
If we were to decide that we want to be “the german burn”, maybe other crews would put in more effort in joining. If we were to decide that we don’t want to fill that role, maybe the other crews would decide to do their own thing, which could also be totally fine
If we got more European camps to join us, maybe more people who only know Kiez Burn could become inspired. Start building their own stuff.
If we were to extend the burn to the entire week without getting more sound permits, maybe other camps could take over the Underworld space monday til wednesday.
If we were to change the venue, maybe we could get a “seven days including sound” permit without going on any neighbours’ nerves
Conclusion
All this means one thing: It is time to sit down and get inspired. To actually talk about the pressing questions. We’ve listed a few of them below and can imagine there’s many more. We call the KB community and Vorstand to come together, get a date and spend a weekend on a strategy workshop with the goal of creating a “Long term vision for Kiez Burn” document. Not as a fixed set of rules but rather as guidelines for where we want to go.
Some of the questions that could be discussed are:
What do we want KB to look like five years from now?
What set up do we need to get there? Board? Korg? Leads? Resuscitate guides?
Do we think Freiland enables or hinders us?
Do we wanna move site?
Do we want to become “the big German summer burn” or do we want to stay the way we are?
Do we want more outreach into the wider Burner Community? If so: How to do that?
Do we want more and bigger art pieces? If so: how do we want to achieve that?
Is three and a half days (Wednesday afternoon til Saturday night) enough or do we want to extend to five, six, seven days?
Do we want more sound / party? Less? Is it “too much party” or just “too little other stuff”? Or is it all just fine as is?
The workshop will be November/December from Friday - Sunday and open for everyone who wants to contribute. We will rent the Seminar House again. We will run workshops for: vision building, strategy & planning, retrospective ‘looking back to look forward’ and working out a clear set up for Kiez Burn.
EDIT:
After a discussion with Remy and Hanna Maija I am (Franzi) updating this advice process. Its to give more clarity in what we want to do.
The vision weekend will not only brainstorm on the vision of Kiez Burn but also take tangible and very concrete decisions on what our focus will be and what we will work on. eg: move site yes or no. on the back of the decisions we take the board and the kiez burn core team (whatever they ll be called) then will ensure that teams are formed that work on these initiatives and work on them themselves.
Cairn (Clément) Mon 3 Oct 2022 10:49AM
I disagree with a few points of the "Analysis" regarding Orga set up and would consider them to be more point of views rather than facts. I would wait for the results of the Census to draw conclusions as to the state of KB.
However I do agree with a lot of it, and mostly with the current necessity to sit down and discuss our vision and ways to work together.
Happy to take part in this, and very much like the proposed format!
As the realisers of this would include the new board, it would of course wait for the General Assembly and the new board being elected to be fully validated (unless you'd like to take it on by yourself @Franzi, but I agree that this is a project that could benefit for being (co)carried by the board)
Julian Finn Mon 3 Oct 2022 12:00PM
@Cairn (Clément) oh they‘re absolutely point of views! if they weren‘t there‘d hardly be anything to discuss ;)
Happy to find a better headline than „analysis“ to better reflect the fact that this is written from an individual standpoint.
Kaliope Mon 3 Oct 2022 2:06PM
Wow, this actually feels a bit anachronistic, a proper Advice Process on Talk – thanks for that 💪 This initiative and especially the Vision Weekend is definitely needed and many Kiezis will appreciate... Let's make the structures more sexy again and come up with brilliant ideas and strategies for the future! Retire the shadow council and prevent burner burnouts!
Completely agree with @Cairn (Clément) that some of the points are more personal preferences and opinions – so it is even more important to get a complete picture, include different points of view and also experiences from the last years.
Franzi Mon 3 Oct 2022 2:51PM
Thanks all for joining the discussion. Of course they are personal observations from Julian & myself. Its a starting point for this discussion and more for everyone to understand what triggered us personally to come forward with this proposal. We want to do a proper ‘state of the nation’ ad part of the weekend.
@Cairn (Clément) I am not sure I understand your comment 😬 the part with validation of the new board. Our idea is that everyone is invited that is interested and want to be driving the future of KB. Irregardless if board member or not :)
Saskia Tue 4 Oct 2022 7:11AM
Great initiative and I am always glad to see such a weekend happen. Thanks for taking the first steps.
I am with some others, I would contest some of those points. As you might think I particularly object the "it's only party" complaint.
As I have a lot of impressions and feelings regarding the dreams process and have been leading it for two years, I would like to be at that weekend simply for that reason alone. I have a radical idea to propose. :P :P
Crossing fingers I can make it that weekend and don't have other obligations.
Natacha Kromatik Tue 4 Oct 2022 12:15PM
Thanks for opening up this discussion, I would be very interested to take part in this week-end. We had a build & strike debriefing meeting lately that ended up with discussions around some of these questions, and I'd be happy to contribute with event infrastructure's feedback and ideas. Also interested in how to optimise our knowledge transmission system.
Kris Tue 4 Oct 2022 12:24PM
This is what I wish the "leadership weekend" was, there's some real issues we need to dig into here.
Not super interested in getting bogged down on "analysis", and there are big ticket items like "should we be in Freiland" that has the opportunity to derail a lot of conversations. (I think there's more than enough drive to keep having a burn in Freiland, so the question should be if we as a crew also want to get involved with something on a different site)
The overarching question for me is "how to we enable people to bring their authentic passions to Kiez Burn".
If we lose kieze to red tape, participants because there aren't enough tickets, art to lack of funding, or interesting parties to sound restrictions, that's a failure in making a frame that enables authentic expression.
Alex Kaos Tue 4 Oct 2022 9:23PM
Excellent initiative, I believe that creating a strong vision makes for a wonderful weekend and breathes new life, into even what I still consider a vibrant community.
Even if we didn't have these specific problems you are addressing, or even if we were to resolve all of these points, there will always be a good reason to enact out such a weekend, to imagine and plan out a better future.
Any vision of this magnitude will still need copious quantities of grit (passion and perseverance). And I have yet to see a single case of that working in a distributed manner. Decentralization has some wonderful properties, and it has it's place in fulfilling visions of scale, but it is not the secret sauce of said success.
Someone(s) needs to hold the course and keep the ship's rudder pointing in the right direction, watch the sails are full of wind, and when unfortunately necessary, row themselves.
The only extra point I would want to see on the agenda, in order to have full confidence that this vision will be a worthwhile endeavor, is to know that someone(s) with the necessary competency and commitment takes personal responsibility for this mission being executed.
What concerns me is an all-to-frequent offer I encounter of "I'll help make the concept/mission/job, and then step-out and allow others to fulfill it". Mostly because I believe that whilst this can work well in a professional setting, in the volunteer-run organization it won't get us past a 5-month horizon, as soon as the (i.e.) third major unforeseen challenge arises.
I understand this is a contentious angle, especially coming from me. It is however simply my advice, and can be discarded if it is believed to not be appropriate. I cannot attend the weekend unfortunately, as much as I would love to. Good luck to you all! x x x x
Uli aus Berlin Wed 5 Oct 2022 5:21PM
I would be very interested to take part in this weekend :-)
Franzi Fri 7 Oct 2022 9:28AM
I have edited the advice process:
EDIT:
After a discussion with Remy and Hanna Maija I am (Franzi) updating this advice process. Its to give more clarity in what we want to do.
The vision weekend will not only brainstorm on the vision of Kiez Burn but also take tangible and very concrete decisions on what our focus will be and what we will work on. eg: move site yes or no. on the back of the decisions we take the board and the kiez burn core team (whatever they ll be called) then will ensure that teams are formed that work on these initiatives and work on them themselves.
Alex Kaos Mon 10 Oct 2022 11:53AM
I would also like to request for an overview of the estimated cost for running such a weekend. As an e.V. member I would like to know how much such a vision would cost the Verein. Thank you. x
Franzi Mon 10 Oct 2022 12:08PM
@Professor Kaos We had not planned on Kiez Burn eV covering costs. We would expect people to feed themselves and spit accommodation costs.
Cris Mon 10 Oct 2022 3:10PM
Yes! Fuoaaack yeaaahsshhh!
Thank you for this initiative! ❤️ I think it really approaches many recurrent problems we drag through the years. The "how do we do KB", gathering and communication of knowledge touches me particularly.
Here there're some thoughts. The first one is a strong one, the others some further Quatsch:
-
I think this particular project should have an AG (orga group) of its own and don't fall per default on to the board
I know the board is the keeper of the vision, tralalá, but this is its whole new thing meaning a lot of work that wasn't part of the deal, originally. New candidates to the Board shouldn't be suddenly (imo) thrown this huge hot potato just some days prior to the GA. Besides, although I understand this vision will overlap or overthrown some of the previous tasks, the fact is that so far, there is already some homework awaiting. "Oh, but they can find a korg or someone and let them do it.." Well, yes, that also takes some work, and last year for instance, it wasn't that efficient in the end. (besides, I do find it a bit cheeky to propose sth to be done by others ;)
Disclousure: I'm stepping down, so I wouldn't have had to deal with this anyway 💃
I imagine this whole vision building could use more opinions and ideas than people can attend. What about an online form to gather some data that would then be discussed during the weekend? Maybe after the weekend some other wider-community move as well. (What did I say about proposing for other to do? Wait, wait, I could still even do this myself! or not..)
I agree with the "someone being responsible" point that @Professor Kaos mentioned. Here I'd proposed the board to be accountable for this vision (after having participated and agreed on it, selbstverständlich) Further boards should agree on the vision when they take over after the next GA.
Also, I'd suggest that for all the topics that weekend discuss on, there are clear and specific action points, and clear and specific roles to make sure they get fulfilled. I guess this might have been already a plan, but I'd enhance it twice as much.
Veroca R. Sala Mon 10 Oct 2022 4:01PM
hey hey thanks for this!
I agree many of the points are worthwhile to discuss. I do recognize POV's and I aknowledge that these are conversation starters. Let's present them as such and not as proved-by-research statements. I dare to say that the easiest way to avoid confusion there is to call things as they are. The analysis are rather hypotheses points or conversation starters. IMO it doesn't really matter, but I see how people have had different experiences and opinions on what the event was like in 2022 and what the event has been before etc. I feel how these points can touch fibres in those who read it as it is presented to them now. Nevertheless, I want to believe we all understand the intentions of this proposal as something beyond a personal POV❤️
Let's not focus on the one word that triggers a high-level disagreement and focus on what we can really do together to define a vision for Kiez Burn.
Supporting this initiative so much!
Caro T Thu 13 Oct 2022 1:13PM
Thank you. What a strong advice process and proposal. I LOVE that you two stepped up to propose this. Co-creating and voting on a Kiez Burn vision as a community - rather than the board alone at some handover weekend - will make this vision 1. Sustainable, 2. Democratic and 3. Decentralised. For that I find it essential to make this event as accessible and inclusive to as many people as possible.
-
I would propose doing this in Berlin, to make it more accessible to burners with children, community members currently dealing with mental-health issues, people that can’t take days off work, introverts that need to recharge, people with little to no money to spare, etc.
I do think the e.V. should pay for this, and for that I would hope to see a budget proposal. This is a too important weekend which we should have with as many community members as possible. If we expect people to pay for accommodation, transport, and food, we end up excluding people.
If the new board is to implement this, I’d ask that they also get to decide on timing and location after their election this Sunday.
I’m adding some more content-comments below for ease of commenting.
Caro T Thu 13 Oct 2022 1:18PM
Clearly Onboarding/Recruitment, Wisdom Transfer and Orga-Set-Up need to be done better and I look forward to co-developing them on such a weekend. These are all points that can quite beautifully be taken up by a work-force workshop weekend and result in actionable proposals and votes. Same goes for location, timing, etc
However, I fail to see why the Party Focus point is included in this. Even though I personally hardly visit the sound camps at burns, I feel uncomfortable that we’d put the actual content of a burn up for discussion. How people want to spend their time at a burn, what gifts they bring, how they express themselves (with music, visual art, workshops, bringing their kids, hiding under a rock…) is individual and grows organically. Commercial events get to decide if they are rave-focused or workshop-focused, but in our burn context, I don’t believe we have the right to make that call.
It is not safe to say that Kiez Burners are stuck between a night existence of “meandering along the underworld-musotopia axis” or hating the music and going to bed. In fact at most burns, things happen because the year before someone felt something was missing and decided to bring that very thing. Someone feels they have nothing to do at night? They can bring night-content next year.
So discussing at a workshop like this or putting to a vote, if we want more or less sound, seems inappropriate to me. Fact is, there is sound at Kiez Burn. Some love it, some hate it. More valuable would be to discuss, how we can enable as many experiences as possible, how to create a burn where both UnderWorld and The Observatory are possible, where everyone can express themselves as loud or quiet as legally possible without annoying each other? And if there is no way to do that at Freiland, then Freiland is the problem, not “the party focus.”
Bee Tue 18 Oct 2022 10:19AM
Late to the party but happy to see this motion moving forward and looking forward to joining!!
For Berlin based venues (accessibility) ideas:
https://www.creatorshub.berlin/en/info/spaces
https://www.facebook.com/UHU.SPACE
Uli aus Berlin Tue 18 Oct 2022 11:05AM
I'm also late to the Party. When is this weekend planned?
Uli (Workshop Lead Decom)
Hanna-Maija (Animal) Tue 18 Oct 2022 11:59AM
Heya! I have been having in-person conversations about this initiative in the last weeks and just want to drop a line here to say that I am super excited about this, want to definitely participate, can offer help organising and/or facilitating and am very motivated to find out how we can move towards a new carefully planned shiny future of Kiez Burn 🔥
Jaina Hirai Sat 22 Oct 2022 10:07PM
I've just returned to Berlin after a month away, and am so happy to read this proposal. Many great topics to discuss! I'll comment on just a few.
The question of moving site is a big one, and needs to be resolved ASAP. I cannot attend the chosen weekend, sadly, but I want to thank Julian, Franzi and Hanna-Maija for taking the reins and for making Vision Weekend happen in 2022. My personal vote would be to move site, if possible in 2023, and if not, then in 2024. It would really bring new life and new possibilities to our burn. It's not only about sound, but about the opportunity for growth, both in numbers and in offerings.
I also think that the communication question is a big one. How do we decide as a community which platforms we use, and which we abandon? How can we keep an archive of information and learnings, while streamlining our comms for easy accessibility?
And yes, burn out. It is real. And I am saddened when we lose great people to it. As a Camp Lead I strive to find a balance between giving too much and not putting forth enough effort. I can only imagine how much more intense it can be for some of our realizers and other dedicated orga folks.
Very much looking forward to hearing which decisions have been made and the course we will set for the coming year and beyond! ❤️
[deactivated account] Mon 24 Oct 2022 9:08AM
As per Board Meeting - reporting for duty to help facilitate and organise.
[deactivated account] Mon 24 Oct 2022 9:27AM
There appear to be two things on the horizon: retrospective, and strategy weekend.
both of these things need consensus around timing, inclusion and exclusion (unless full community involvement is required) and venue finding.
Poll Created Mon 24 Oct 2022 9:40AM
Let me help you organise Closed Mon 24 Oct 2022 1:35PM
Cancelled due to Franzi and the team not requiring me anymore - other teams have been assigned and dates are already set!
There appears to be a gap in someone organising the planning and alignment around dealing with repetitive problems of information loss, IT and communication strategy.
The most impactful things on the horizon are the retrospective, and strategy weekend.
I would like to propose that this collective empowers me to get the activities of these to events planned, and the get them done.
why me?
17 years in tech and platform strategy.
8 years in facilitation of face to face groups, facilitating large online strategic design (60-1000 people).
10 in team forming, process identification and streamlining.
5 years in competency Modeling (identifying behaviours and traits that help people work effectively in any role)
20 years as an event and festival builder.
17 burns completed and counting.
Deep love for this community and the event and a desire to see it be less impactful on people in leadership roles.
But lastly: I get shit done.
Help me help Kiezburn.
Results
| Results | Option | % of points | Voters | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
Agree | 100.0% | 1 | DU |
| Abstain | 0.0% | 0 | ||
| Disagree | 0.0% | 0 | ||
| Block | 0.0% | 0 | ||
| Undecided | 0% | 49 |
JT
A
K
K
P
MK
A
BDB
C
J
D
CT
K
A
|
1 of 50 people have voted (2%)
Jaina Hirai Mon 24 Oct 2022 12:26PM
Thanks for the initiative, Bandit. Can you elaborate a bit on what you are proposing, in a couple of paragraphs? On one hand you seem to be offering to organize the Retro & the Vision weekend, and on the other hand you seem to be digging into deeper issues of comms and IT security for KB overall. I am against any one person making lasting IT and comms decisions without input from the community, but beyond that i’m all for accepting your offer, with gratitude!
Franzi Mon 24 Oct 2022 12:33PM
Hi All, here comes an update from Julian & me. The advice process has been closed according to timeline on Sunday 16th October. We have a space and a time booked! Save the date: 10.12.-11.12.2022 in Soulincubator space. We will send a sign up form later this week.
The sitelead retrospective has already been booked and scheduled. All siteleads from 2022 have been invited.
We have a great team of modearators with @Hanna-Maija (Animal) and @otto and myself..as well as a great support crew with @Julian Finn and @Bee.
[deactivated account] Mon 24 Oct 2022 1:35PM
Thank you Janina - there are links between all theme… and the only decision makers are the participants.
I just wanted to help get it off the group with organising, so the community has the best consensus driven decision making process, and has strategies to hold people on track with what’s been committed to, to get ongoing change.
And yeah I did touch all those topics because they are all part of the causal network of difficulties in things running smoothly - the info security, the comms difficulties, the burn out, the knowledge loss.
Anyways all the best; I’m sure you guys will do great and we can expect big things
Paul aka Khromo Mon 24 Oct 2022 12:44PM
Accepted, but it doesn't give them mandate.
Franzi Mon 24 Oct 2022 12:37PM
Thanks for offering your help! The retro as well as the vision weekend have both already teams working on them. At the moment we dont need more help. We will reach out if anything comes up!
[deactivated account]
Mon 24 Oct 2022 12:09PM
🙏🙏🙏
Julian Finn Mon 24 Oct 2022 11:40AM
the point is that Kiezburn is the largest Burn in Germany by far. So the question is not about naming or getting listed as "the german regional" on some Burning Man dot org website, but rather whether and how we want to live up to that fact. i.e. actively invite other groups, grow the event, etc etc.
Paul aka Khromo Mon 24 Oct 2022 11:30AM
It very much is party focus compared to other burns (with the possible exception of Nowhre, but Nowhere can accomodate it due to being much bigger).
Someone once said to me, "the problem with Berlin burners is that they've been to too many burns and the problem with Kiezburners is that they haven't been to enough" - which sums it up for me: expereince and expectations.
Which is NOT to say party-concentric is a BAD thing: it's just a case of: is this what people actual want? Because if it IS - then there's no problem :)
But I guess that's what the vision weekend is created to discover.
Paul aka Khromo Mon 24 Oct 2022 11:25AM
Yeah, I thought it was a bit arrogant to say "do we want to be the German burn?" without at least asking the consent of other German regionals.....
Personally, I'm all for this idea - and have wondered about it before - but wondered how to get all of them together to discuss it. German organistaion does not seem to have filtered its way down to German burning,
[deactivated account] Mon 24 Oct 2022 1:42PM
My apologies Franzi - I thought when that was called out last week there was still that gap. Good to see that it’s moving forward.
Kris Mon 10 Oct 2022 6:29PM
So important!
A lot of the statements in this thread are super anecdotal (and quite a few conflicts with my experience).
We could gather data and prove/disprove a lot of these claims, most are measurable. Unfortunately, the survey that just got sent out was far from statistically sound, and had a couple of very leading questions.
I'd love to get an objective view of some of these issues, but that's ultimately premature if we don't first decide what's important to us.
Kris Mon 3 Oct 2022 6:27PM
One other idea for the list which some people are discussing could be a "shared" big burn in Germany. Finding a large area (like the Fusion festival area), and combine forces between the many Burn orga crews and camps in (and around?) Germany to create an event of a bigger size, where each existing event has "its own" area and can keep their identity.
Super into this idea! This would relieve some of the pressure and let KB lean into being the Freiland burn.
Owl · Sun 2 Oct 2022 10:24PM
It would be nice if the weekend 25.11/26.11. could be avoided. I'm preparing a German Burner conference in Berlin on that Friday+Saturday, to gather the different Burner sub communities for an exchange. The focus will be different from the vision weekend, so there won't be much taken away by that event for the vision workshop. Sorry for the short notice, the plan and date are there already for some time, but the process was not yet at a point to publish. https://www.facebook.com/events/1081524762558628
One other idea for the list which some people are discussing could be a "shared" big burn in Germany. Finding a large area (like the Fusion festival area), and combine forces between the many Burn orga crews and camps in (and around?) Germany to create an event of a bigger size, where each existing event has "its own" area and can keep their identity.