Skip to content
Sunday Assembly logo

Notes on Transparency and Structure.

At The Sunday Assembly we take great pains to try to make the right decisions, obviously. However, seeing as there is a lot of interest in us (hello, media!), and the unsavoury reputation of many congregational movements (thanks for nothing, L Ron Hubbard!), we not only have to make the right decisions, but we should also be transparent about it.

We are going to show our workings, that way, like in GCSE maths, if we don’t come up with the right answer – and we’re going to make mistakes, guys – it will at least be clear that we did it for the right reasons. Also, if we show our workings in public, we should be able to harness the hive mind of The Sunday Assembly. There are lots of brains out there that we want to tap into.

In this post we’re going to say what organisational structure we’re going to create, and the reasons we’ve chosen it (‘Wow! What an interesting blogpost. Gee, I’m glad Tim Berners-Lee invented the internet’ – you).

We are going to set up a normal limited liability company, with the long-term goal of turning it into a social enterprise, using the C-i-C structure (you like that sexy business talk, don’t you?). This is following advice from the wonderful Trudy Thomson, who regularly mentors and advises social enterprises FOR FREE! Hit TT up @Bricksandbread on Twitter if you want some.

Apparently, setting up a C-i-C is a lot of paperwork, and regulations, and is generally a bit of a hassle for a very young enterprise, while the benefits, at our micro-scale, are small. A limited liability company structure will still allow us to receive Gift Aid on donations (if we do some other paperwork), and that will help us immensely.

We discussed whether we should set up a charity but that is, apparently, even more work and really not worth it until we are far bigger. Oh, and the social aim of the enterprise is this:

The Sunday Assembly is a godless congregation that celebrates life.  Our aim is to live better, help often and wonder more.  Our mission is to help everyone first discover and then achieve their full potential.  We meet because we know we are stronger together than on our own.

That’s all folks. Leave a comment if you know about these things and can give us good advice!

TL:DR: The Sunday Assembly will be incorporated as a limited liability company by the end of next week but the final goal is to be a social enterprise.