For point #2, one speculative thing that comes to mind is the legal and governance structure of an incorporated organisation, i.e. being incorporated, and having a board – whether a board of directors/​trustees who have legal responsibility for the organisation and whom the team ultimately report to, or an advisory board.
I know that plenty of larger EA groups, particularly national ones, have these kinds of things already, and I wonder whether it would be beneficial for more large EA groups to do so. (I don’t know what the answer to this question is.) Possible advantages that I can think of of such a setup:
If you can find board members who are knowledgeable about the area – like maybe some EA community-building funder, or a leader of a larger EA group or something – their input might be great for strategy.
Running the legal entity’s operations could be good skill-building for the organisers, e.g. if any of them want to work in operations or entrepreneurship.
It might be better for longevity and stability of the group – the board would always be responsible for the organisation, so if a dedicated group leadership team moved on before finding good successors, it would be the board’s job to try again later.
If there are paid organisers, they could be on payroll, which might be nicer experience for them than being paid directly by the funder. If the group ever wanted to rent property, it could do so in its own name.
Particularly if it’s a charitable structure, having a legal entity might help with outreach due image reasons, particularly if targeting professionals rather han students.
If a charitable structure, it might help get more funding, or funding from more diverse sources.
DIsadvantages I can think of include the effort and administrative complexity (which for a charity, might be very high), the time cost to the board members, the financial cost (e.g. incorporation fees, insurance etc, maybe legal advice or professional fees depending how much you did yourself), and maybe worse consequences if things go wrong (like forgetting to do some legal filing or doing your accounting wrong or something). I also have no idea whether groups that are student societies are allowed to be incorporated.
For point #2, one speculative thing that comes to mind is the legal and governance structure of an incorporated organisation, i.e. being incorporated, and having a board – whether a board of directors/​trustees who have legal responsibility for the organisation and whom the team ultimately report to, or an advisory board.
I know that plenty of larger EA groups, particularly national ones, have these kinds of things already, and I wonder whether it would be beneficial for more large EA groups to do so. (I don’t know what the answer to this question is.) Possible advantages that I can think of of such a setup:
If you can find board members who are knowledgeable about the area – like maybe some EA community-building funder, or a leader of a larger EA group or something – their input might be great for strategy.
Running the legal entity’s operations could be good skill-building for the organisers, e.g. if any of them want to work in operations or entrepreneurship.
It might be better for longevity and stability of the group – the board would always be responsible for the organisation, so if a dedicated group leadership team moved on before finding good successors, it would be the board’s job to try again later.
If there are paid organisers, they could be on payroll, which might be nicer experience for them than being paid directly by the funder. If the group ever wanted to rent property, it could do so in its own name.
Particularly if it’s a charitable structure, having a legal entity might help with outreach due image reasons, particularly if targeting professionals rather han students.
If a charitable structure, it might help get more funding, or funding from more diverse sources.
DIsadvantages I can think of include the effort and administrative complexity (which for a charity, might be very high), the time cost to the board members, the financial cost (e.g. incorporation fees, insurance etc, maybe legal advice or professional fees depending how much you did yourself), and maybe worse consequences if things go wrong (like forgetting to do some legal filing or doing your accounting wrong or something). I also have no idea whether groups that are student societies are allowed to be incorporated.