Cooperative Design: How Co-ops Center Their Members to Build Better Products, Faster
“As we can see with Stocksy and Loomio, their future is enabled by embracing a more functional role for members as leaders. Members can propose new ways to be served if leadership can trust the process, and members can advance the overall business if leadership includes them in strategy conversations that might feel risky or uncertain.
To get started, credit union and co-op leaders can leverage their existing democratic structure by adding capacity for deeper engagement. This might include a trial program to invite and cultivate proposals from members for special projects, centering them in co-designing products they care about, and partnering with community organizations and industry associations to bring them to market, and the broader movement.”