The Plan to Spin CONvergence off from MISFITS/The Society
On August 3, 2009, The Board of the MN Society for Interest in Science Fiction & Fantasy decided by a unanimous vote to change the structure of our organization. For most people who attend CONvergence or are served by the many clubs and events put on by MISFITS, the change won’t even be noticeable.
The two halves of The Society - CONvergence and the collection of clubs and events known as MISFITS - will soon be two autonomous organizations operating under a partnership agreement rather than two halves of a single organization. MISFITS will retain The Society branding and organization, while CONvergence will be spun off and will organize as its own 501(c)3 non-profit entity.
The effect this will have on CONvergence and the various MISFITS Clubs and Events should be negligible. This change will primarily affect behind-the-scenes organization - meetings, funding, and the selection of leadership of the organizations. The two organizations will continue to work together, including teaming up for events. MISFITS fundraisers will continue, including their auctions hosted at CONvergence, and any new fundraising initiatives they plan to hold. The Board has also committed to a relationship of revenue sharing at current levels by CONvergence through at least 2012.
These changes have not yet been implemented, but a commitment has been made to revise bylaws and make plans as necessary for this change to go into effect by January 1, 2010. We are creating FAQs about our plans, and will be updating and adding to those FAQs as the details are hammered out.
This exciting change represents a major step in the evolution of our organization as we find new ways to grow our organization and partner with other groups.
FAQ / Frequently Asked Questions
Part 1 - Why Spin Off CONvergence from MISFITS?
- What is your reason for separating CONvergence and MISFITS?
- What is the history and structure of the MISFITS and CONvergence organization?
- Did anything trigger your decision to separate? What led up to this? What spurred this decision?
- What will this improve to make MISFITS and CONvergence better? What kind of new opportunities will this open up?
- Has this decision been made? Is there still time for input from Members and Attendees?
- Is this Separation legal?
Part 2 - What Will The Future Look Like?
- What happens to the MISFITS name/concept? What happens to the CONvergence name/concept?
- Will CONvergence still be a non-profit after the separation?
- What happens to the money from CONvergence that’s historically been given to MISFITS?
- Who is now part of the membership for MISFITS and CONvergence?
- How will elections be done for MISFITS and CONvergence?
- What happens to the Office?
- As a Volunteer or Convention-Committee member, how will this affect my Department’s budget?
Part 3 - How Do We Get There from Here?
- What is the Partnership Agreement?
- Is there an email list I can sign up for to get updates about the work that is happing with the Separation and Re-Organization?
- How do we learn more about these Separation/Re-Organization Sub-Committees and who is on them? How can we get involved?
- What’s the division of debts?
- When will the new bylaws be announced?
Part 1 - Why Spin Off CONvergence from MISFITS?
Q: What is your reason for separating CONvergence and MISFITS?
The reasons for separating CONvergence and MISFITS are largely behind-the-scenes organizational. While several different organizational structures have been tried over more than eleven years, both halves of the organization have rapidly grown and evolved, all the while putting more stress on the existing meetings and structure. After a great deal of consideration over many months, it was unanimously decided by the full board of MISFITS and CONvergence that the best solution would be to spin CONvergence off from MISFITS, creating two autonomous organizations that can continue to work together through renewable partnership agreements. MISFITS will continue to be given extensive venue space at CONvergence, and will be receive funding from CONvergence for many years to come.
Q: What is the history and structure of the MISFITS and CONvergence organization?
CONvergence began in the wake of radical changes to the long-time Science Fiction convention Minicon, and a desire to create a new convention that could evolve and grow with the needs of the community. Early in its development, MISFITS was created both to broaden the base of our 501(c)3 non-profit status and also to carry out ambitions we had to serve the community that were year round and could not be served by an annual convention. From the very beginning, CONvergence and MISFITS were created as two halves of a whole.
Originally, "MISFITS" was synonymous with The Minnesota Society for Interest in Science Fiction and Fantasy, the 501(c)3 parent organization of CONvergence. The original Directors felt that organizing the year-round component of MISFITS clubs and events would require more time and attention than could be afforded in addition to their duties as hands-on organizers of CONvergence. A structure was created where the Directors (who each organized one of the seven divisions of CONvergence) were elected by the Voting Membership of The Society. They in turn would select a group of Officers who would oversee the year-round clubs and events that are not part of the convention.
This structure lasted for a number of years, but was awkward and caused a great deal of confusion ("If MISFITS is the parent organization, why do the MISFITS Officers report to the CONvergence Directors?").
The next major change occurred when the five Officers were made full Directors, electable by the Membership just like the CONvergence Directors. The Society now had 12 Directors divided into two standing committees, the seven CONvergence Directors and the five MISFITS Directors, with "MISFITS" now being used specifically to describe everything that The Society did that was not part of CONvergence.
This structure was also in place for a number of years, but had its own problems. There was still a huge number of meetings to attend, with each standing committee having it’s own meetings, and various additional sub-committee meetings, in addition to the quarterly Society Director meetings with all twelve Directors attending. Because both the MISFITS and CONvergence leaders were Directors and elected by the Society Membership, both groups had to fit into to the same election cycle and structure, even though the nature of the work and responsibilities of both groups varied greatly.
Much of the difficulty with both of these structures came from the relationship between the two groups. There was an inherent factionalism, as both groups would spend most of their time dealing with their own issues, developing their own work styles and structures, and then would have to wait for meetings of the full Society Board to ratify certain decisions, or would otherwise have to try to get business done in a meeting of the Society Board which was unwieldy in size and was by its nature divided into camps.
A number of things were tried to alleviate these problems, from more frequent meetings of the full Society Board (!) to retreats that would give the two groups more time to deal with each other as a two halves of a whole. But that was ultimately the issue, MISFITS and CONvergence were two separate halves and always would be. The body of the organization felt more and more like conjoined twins, with each twin finding it increasingly difficult to operate efficiently and effectively while so intertwined with the business of the other.
This finally lead to a decision to begin the process of spinning off CONvergence from MISFITS, to separate the two bodies into independent organizations. The two organizations would continue to work together and serve the community through partnership agreements, but both be free to grow and evolve their organizations to best suit their individual needs.
Q: Did anything trigger your decision to separate? What led up to this? What spurred this decision?
Upon hitting the organization’s 10-year anniversary, we started taking a hard look at how all quarters of the organization have grown and changed in that time. In turn we began to look ahead to how we wanted to grow and evolve over the next ten years and beyond.
Also, we’ve struggled with variations on the current structure for as long as it has existed. While there had been a certain amount of turnover in the personnel occupying the MISFITS Officer/Director roles, the line-up of Directors on the CONvergence side had been largely unchanged. Once these positions began to turn over in the last couple of years, we saw that even with different people on both sides, many of the problems stayed the same. The problems were systemic, and the structure was broken.
Another effect of the turnover of personnel was an influx of new energy, new perspectives and new ideas. This was a major factor in wanting to find a whole new approach to how we did business, including solutions as radical as this one.
Q: What will this improve to make MISFITS and CONvergence better? What kind of new opportunities will this open up?
We believe the separation will allow each organization to be more nimble, focus on our visions and allow room to grow. Both MISFITS and CONvergence will be articulating their plans for the future as we move forward.
Q: Has this decision been made? Is there still time for input from Members and Attendees?
The nature of the issues being wrestled with were all very organizational and the decision made on August 3, 2009 was made by the elected representatives of the membership who had the most first-hand knowledge of the problems. Of the Directors involved in the decision, some were in their first year in the role, while others had been there from the founding of the organization, and the decision was unanimous.
That said, the decision made on August 3 was one of intent. The separation has not yet occurred, and legally CONvergence and MISFITS are still one organization. The commitment made was to move towards separation, with a target date of January 1, 2010 for the separation to take effect. Before that happens, revisions to bylaws must be written, a formal partnership agreement between the two organizations must be crafted, and plans for the future of both MISFITS and CONvergence must be made. All interested parties are invited to offer their ideas and otherwise get involved with this process. Those who would like to be involved should contact info@misfit.org.
Q: Is this Separation legal?
For all the talk of "Separation," what’s really happening here is that The Society is spinning off one of its events (albeit it’s largest single event) into a separate, autonomous entity. There will be many changes necessitated by this in our bylaws and a variety of procedures, but this is within the purview of the Directors of The Society to make changes to the bylaws and organization of The Society as they feel is in the best interest of the organization. So yes, this falls within the legal authority of the Society Board of Directors according to the organization’s bylaws.
We understand that the size and scope of this decision makes it controversial. We would like to remind everyone that at this point the decision is a commitment to a goal, and has not yet been legally implemented. We invite anyone who would like to contribute to how this goal is carried and out and where both organizations go from here to contact us at info@misfit.org.
Part 2 - What Will The Future Look Like?
Q: What happens to the MISFITS name/concept? What happens to the CONvergence name/concept?
MISFITS will continue its current clubs and programs with the exception of spinning off CONvergence, and will maintain their branding as well as the branding and the organization of The Society. CONvergence will continue as before and will retain it’s own branding, and will create a new 501(c)3 non-profit corporate entity for itself.
Q: Will CONvergence still be a non-profit after the separation?
CONvergence will continue to operate as a non-profit and is working to create a separate legal/corporate identity which will also have a 501(c)3 status. A non-profit organization is defined as such by what it does with its surplus funds. They are not distributed to owners or shareholders, but instead are used to help pursue its goals.
There are many types of non-profit organizations including charities and public arts organizations. Other local non-profit organizations include Anime Detour, the Minnesota Fringe Festival, and MONDO.
Because of the attention given to MISFITS’ charitable endeavors and CONvergence’s role as a fundraiser for MISFITS and the Society, there has long been a perception that The Society’s non-profit status flowed solely from the MISFITS side and that CONvergence was just a big, money-making party. This has never been the case.
CONvergence as an event already serves many community-building and educational goals, and it’s new non-profit entity will donate surplus funds (after funding events and administration needs) to non-profit entities such as MISFITS as opposed to distributing those funds as profit.
Q: What happens to the money from CONvergence that’s historically been given to MISFITS?
CONvergence has already made a commitment to continue the current rate of monetary support through at least 2012. The Partnership Agreement will formally confirm that support, and additional support can be negotiated beyond that.
Q: Who is now part of the membership for MISFITS and CONvergence?
While the details are being worked out as to membership requirements for both MISFITS and CONvergence post-separation, current members will continue to be members, and there will be a certain grace period where membership in one will count for both, should all the details not be worked out or implemented by the time of the actual separation.
Q: How will elections be done for MISFITS and CONvergence?
Election Procedures and who qualifies to be part of the Voting Membership are defined in the bylaws of MISFITS and CONvergence. Any changes to these bylaws and procedures have not yet been worked out and WILL NOT be in effect prior to the next election cycle.
At this time we do not see any changes in the next election, which is scheduled to be held at the January Convention Committee meeting. The deadline for Candidates to Declare is November 1, 2009.
Q: What happens to the office?
Even prior to plans for the Separation, MISFITS and CONvergence were interested in finding new office space with more room for storage and a larger better meeting space. The Facilities Sub-Committee is now looking for new and improved office space that could be shared by CONvergence and MISFITS and possibly other partners. The current office will continue to be shared by MISFITS and CONvergence until a new space has been found.
Q: As a Volunteer or Convention-Committee member, how will this affect my Department’s budget?
It will not. Currently funding levels are guaranteed for the immediate future.
Part 3 - How Do We Get There from Here?
Q: What is the Partnership Agreement?
The Partnership Agreement is a contract between MISFITS and CONvergence detailing how the two organizations will work together after the separation. There is currently an informal agreement in place that the two organizations will maintain current levels of funding, venue sharing and similar forms of partnership through at least 2012. The Partnership Agreement Committee has been created to draft this contract.
Q: Is there an email list I can sign up for to get updates about the work that is happing with the Separation and Re-Organization?
For general information or to be put on a mailing list for Separation/Re-Organization updates, contact info@misfit.org. For more information or to be further involved with individual Sub-Committees, see below.
Q: How do we learn more about these Separation/Re-Organization Sub-Committees and who is on them? How can we get involved?
Below are the names and descriptions of the four Sub-Committees that have been formed to help plan the Separation of MISFITS and CONvergence. If you would like to have more information or get involved, please contact the individual committees at the through the individuals below.
Finance Sub-Committee
Responsible for dividing the financial assets of MISFITS and CONvergence and planning post-separation Financial Proceedures.
Contact Thomas Keeley at tskeeley@gmail.com.
Partnership Agreement Sub-Committee
Responsible for drafting an agreement of partnership and co-operation for the post-separation MISFITS and CONvergence.
Contact Thomas Keeley at tskeeley@gmail.com.
Facilities Sub-Committee
Responsible for finding new office and storage space, and with dividing the physical assets of the organizations.
Contact info@misfit.org.
Communications Sub-Committee
Responsible for communicating decisions and progress regarding the Separation and Re-Organization to the rest of the organization and to the public.
Contact Christopher Jones at publications@convergence-con.org.
Q: What’s the division of debts?
MISFITS and CONvergence do not currently hold any debts.
Q: When will the new bylaws be announced?
The bylaws are currently being created for CONvergence and rewritten for MISFITS. While we do not yet have a date when these will be completed, this would need to happen before the Separation could be made official, and the target date for Separation is January 1, 2010. We will have updates on the timeline over the next few months. For more information on the Bylaw Process or to get involved, contact info@misfit.org.