Gerard Endenburg

Terra Viva, São Paulo, Brazil

28 December 2010

Terra Viva is an agribusiness centered in São Paulo, Brazil begin by the Schoenmaker family in 1959 to grow gladiolas. Though not mentioned on their website, Gerard Endenburg consulted with the owner in the 1970s to develop the company using sociocracy. They now have more than a thousand workers and focus on bulbs and plants for [...]

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Semco, São Paulo, Brazil

28 December 2010

Throughout Maverick, Ricardo Semler’s book on the development of his corporation Semco, he expresses and implements ideas that are hauntingly similar to those of Gerard Endenburg. Semler calls his method “open management” and refers to democracy for workers. He never mentions Endenburg’s “sociocratic-circle-organization.” What was the connection between the ideas of Semler and Endenburg? Between [...]

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The Love Assumption

12 December 2010

There is a persistent assumption in cohousing and other consensus communities that lack of love is the cause of conflict. That conflict arises when we allow ourselves, our ego, our self-centeredness to isolate us from others, from understanding their needs, from caring. If we confront our isolation and commune with our neighbors, we will “feel [...]

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Hierarchies 101

23 August 2010

There is nothing about a hierarchy that assumes “the people at the top” are any more intelligent or more highly trained than the people at the bottom. They have a different function, one which requires a specific knowledge base and skill set, not necessarily more of either intelligence or training. A case in point is [...]

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The Downside to Standardization

2 April 2010

A great concern of the Global Circle of the international sociocratic certification body is and has for many years been convinced that certification is essential to preserving the core principles and their proper application. In addition to a concern about the principles being misapplied and the method misrepresented, the Global Circle is concerned about “sociocracy” [...]

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