Who are we?
We are a small worker-owned agency that helps people make small changes that shift big things through research, facilitation and design. We are based in Glasgow, Newcastle and Manchester.
What do we do?
We carry out research that allows clients space to step back and see their programme, service, strategy or policy from different points of view. We are multi-disciplinary researchers and engagement practitioners who use mixed methods and our practice is based in principles of equity and participation.
As facilitators, we make space for the conversations that need to happen. We help people have meetings, workshops and gatherings that are purposeful, generative, and offer everyone the opportunity to participate. We also provide critical friendship for individuals and teams to apply equity-centred principles, frameworks, and theories to actions that help them shift and navigate systems.
Our workshops are designed to support different ways people think, process information, and work with others. Our facilitation styles are inspired
by tabletop games, emergent strategy, anti-oppressive facilitation and
collective decision making methods.
Quick facts
| Website | https://fractals.coop/ |
| Industry | Other |
| Founded | Feb 2022 |
| Turnover | £50,000-100,000 |
| Workers | 4 |
| Members | 4 |
| Who are the members? | Employees |
| Governance | Sociocracy |
| Pay | Equal pay |
| Legal form | Company |
How do we operate?
We are flat, small, a little scrappy, responsive, and operate under the mantra of “good enough for now, safe enough to try”. Our formal decision making process is by consent [Sococracy 3.0] and our informal decision making is through frequent discussion.
Where did we come from?
Some of us met through academia and some of us met through the Design Justice Network but we all bonded over shared practices and mindsets grounded in equity. Each of us had an existential need for different ways of working, a desire for community and a desire to move away from lone working.
Why are we a co-op?
We want to work in a flat, democratically controlled organisation that prioritises our wellbeing over grind. We often talk about fractals as an act of care for ourselves- we knew that in order to have what we want, we need to create it. And, being true to our name, we bring slower, kinder and more relational ways of working into our client work.
Lessons learned
We deliberately built up our foundations over a very long time- moving slowly has been the right thing for us
Budget for paying other people to do the bits you don’t like to do
Get to grips with marketing and the time it takes to do it
Unlearning practices and behaviours from our previous working lives can be difficult and confusing
Earnestly sharing our journey with other people has helped those close to us see that other ways of working that are possible
Focus on the relationships in your co-op- it’s not all setting up payroll and securing contracts- spend time with each other to know what you need, how you work and how you’ll deal with things when friction comes
Co-ops are not exempt from early startup cashflow problems