Today, organizations have to reinvent themselves continuously and be dynamic enough to respond appropriately to the challenges they face. There are more and more organizations structured with roles and circles to build a workplace where all people have autonomy, mastery and a sense of purpose.

In such organizations, power is distributed among employees, traditional managerial positions are removed, and the remaining jobs are sorted into smaller, autonomous roles with relating responsibilities. These roles are help within autonomous circles (teams). Within these self-organized circles the roles can communicate, collaborate, set goals, make decisions and get the work done.

A circle can be referred to as a team and can be formed by grouping multiple roles together, with team members holding a number of different roles.

On Holaspirit, circles are nested, so they can form sub-circles. Circles can be permanent, or set up for a limited time, perhaps for interdisciplinary projects. The size of the circles decreases according to how deep they are in the general circle. But they have full autonomy within their respective domains (areas of responsibility), provided their purpose contributes to their parent-circle's purpose.

Note: People can be members of several circles within an organization.

Difference between a circle and a role

A circle is basically a role that has expanded into more parts. A circle brings together different roles assigned to people that forms a team with the same purpose.

For example, if you work in the Social Media role and realize that the work goes beyond a simple role, you might want to transform that role into a circle. You will be able to create new roles in that circle to fulfill the purpose of Social Media.  

On a role or a circle page, you'll find information such as their:

• Name: More than just an official job title or designation, this sums up the tasks and responsibilities of the employee who will be holding this position.
• Purpose: It clarifies the identity and intention of a role or circle. The purpose orients the action of a role or circle even without any other explicit accountabilities, domains or policies.
• Domain: It represents a distinct area of influence, control and decision making of a specific role. (Read more)
• Accountabilities: Each role is associated with a set of responsibilities. This answers the question on what are the expected results associated with the role.

How can I move a role from one circle to another?

A circle can contain sub-circles which can themselves contain sub-circles.

In some situations, your organization may want to restructure itself and move the its roles to others circles to better fit the reality.

👉 Read more about how to move a role from one circle to another.

Can a user be part of circle without being assigned a role?

In some cases, a user may need to be part of a circle even though they don't hold a role within it. Holaspirit allows you to add members without a role to circles.

It means they can:

• Attend the circle meetings and access the meetings reports
• Submit proposals and/or add evolutions to the circle.
• Work on the circle's projects.
• Review and get updates about the circle's activities

👉 Read more about how to add members without a role to circles.

Can I integrate my circle with others tools?

Every team has its own way of working and sometimes uses different tools.
While one team may prefer Trello, another might use Slack or Jira. For this reason, every circle has the option of integrating whatever apps they prefer to use. This way, each circle can be efficiently productive, even if their work style differs from the rest of the organization.

👉 Read more about how to integrate apps to your circles.

How to create, edit or delete a circle?

As your organization evolves, the circles that constitute it do as well. As a member of a circle, you might want to add a new one, delete or edit an existing one.

👉 Read more about how to add circles.

👉 Read more about how to edit existing circles.

👉 Read more about how to delete circles.