Professional Documents
Culture Documents
By Zvi Galor
www.coopgalor.com 1988
A. Introduction.
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In the administration of other organizations, a hierarchy of
responsibi1ity is seen, with one person in charge at the top. From
the apex, authority is delegated to those beneath, in progressively
increasing numbers. In other words, a director delegates authority
to the deputy directors, they delegate to the various
executives, who, in turn, delegate to the various department
managers. An organizational pyramid has therefore been
generated with one in control at the apex and a broad base of
responsibi1ity.
In a cooperative enterprise, however, the top of the hierarchy is
the members. This broad top base delegates authority to the
council, which in turn delegates to the management. The
management delegates to the manager, the one...at the bottom. In
the case of a cooperative, the organizational pyramid is "upside-
down".
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officers to the various bodies of the cooperative organization.
The annual general meeting is never presided over by the
Manager of the cooperative, but rather by a special ad-hoc
committee, responsible for all the sessions.
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c. Careful minutes should take the discussions and decisions of
every meeting. They should include:
1) The full name of the society
2) The date of the meeting
3) The number of members present
4) The name of the chairperson presiding
5) The name of the recorder taking minutes
6) The agenda
7) The decisions
8) Any remarks of the chairperson
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situations or social rank has caused increasing difficulty in
getting people together for a particular purpose.
d. A general meeting may be more successful if a day is chosen
when there are no competing interests, when the agenda is not
monotonous and when the points at issue are interesting. In
this way members may be encouraged to keep away from other
activities during a scheduled general meeting.
e. Good management of the meeting by the chairperson of the
meeting is assumed, as is a courteous and encouraging attitude
towards participation of the members in discussions.
a. The Council
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unsatisfactorily by a management committee may be
submitted to the council by the members themselves.
The Council is a relatively stable body where members feel
greater personal responsibi1ity than in the anonymity of the
general meeting. The Council reflects greater variety of opinion
than the management committee and has more public backing,
though there is not the same discrete, personal approach to
members' problems as in that body.
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incomplete or false information, resultant decisions may be
wrong or totally inappropriate.
Management has a global responsabi1ity for all acts of the
cooperative though there may not always be an immediately
discernable connection. It must decide on the executive acts of
the Manager and bears responsabi1ity for the successes and
failures of that officer.
It is incumbent on the management committee to ensure that
decisions taken can in tact be executed. The management
committee must guarantee a close correlation between theory and
practice, between decision and execution.
It is always good management policy to view every decision action
in the context of the total activities of the enterprise, present and
future. In this case, the management committee must seek to
discover the correlation between current actions and their
future consequences. In a way, it is like seeing not only the forest
as a whole, but also each tree as an integral part thereof.
c. The Manager
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of the socioeconomic policy of the cooperative. It is the manager
who proposes, plans, executes and evaluates.
d. The Treasurer
e. Control Committee
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2. Some of the specific duties of the control committee involve
supervision and checking of:
a. the general functioning of the enterprise.
b. the activities of management.
c. various decisions and their execution.
d. the financial situation and the annual balance sheet.
e. the behavior of the different committees.
f. complaints from members of the cooperative.
Finding: During six months since the committee had been elected,
it has never been convened. The committee chairperson refused
to activate it. The management of the cooperative is however
responsible for all on—going activities and is therefore guilty of
neglect in this case. According to the bylaws, it must immediately
see to replacing the inactive committee.
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3) Case: The names of two members of the annual election
committee appear among the candidates for membership in
Council.
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The fine is therefore justified. In addition to which, the
member's accusation that there was preference shown to members
of the management committee under similar circumstances
is rejected.
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d. Questions concerning participation in operating expenses
according to patronage.
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charged is debited to the appropriate department or section of
the enterprise. When there is no particular purpose for the credit,
but it is rather part of the general credit pool, the interest charges
are paid equally by all the members.
D. Summary
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