Keys to democratic governance in organizations

'Government' is the first element of the concept of 'democratic governance', and refers to the development of decision-making and its implementation.

In an entity, the decisions that must be taken at a structural level are grouped into three groups: global, objective and work. The global decisions , first of all, refer to debates about the entity's identity (purposes, principles, values...), statuses or regulations, the election of governing bodies and the approval of accounts. Regarding the objectives of the entities , decisions must be made on the strategy (future of the entity, shared vision...) and the management and budget plan (income, costs, results...).

Finally, the last area of ​​decision in organizations is that of work , which introduces reflections on the organizational structure (work teams, coordination...), the autonomy of the teams (self-organization...) and self-regulation of people

In all these areas, the action of government and, therefore, of decision-making, has a margin of action of variable size. For formal aspects such as statutes, governing bodies or accounts, the governance action is framed in formally predefined issues at the time of the organization's establishment. On the other hand, there are other aspects, called ' cultural aspects ', where the governance of entities has a lot of room for action and decision, since they are built in each organization.

The concept of 'democracy', which makes up the second axiom of 'democratic governance', defines that a person's capacity to make decisions about what they should live is considerable. This capacity for decision or influence is called ' voice ', which in the field of democratic governance must be expressed as a member of a ' natural grouping '.

In organizations, the natural groupings of participatory voices that can be found in a democratic governance are: governing bodies (general assembly, board of trustees...), management or management or responsible team , members , employees , users and volunteers .

Each and every one of these voices must be able to express themselves and decide both on what affects all groups (objectives, global provisions, issues of structure and operation...), which is known as 'power democracy'; as about what affects their group individually (users about receiving services, volunteering about dedication...), which is 'democracy action'.  

Based on the definitions set out in the two previous sections, democratic governance is a government framework in which the entity incorporates the different voices involved in decision-making, resulting in processes and rules that empower all people in a transversal way.

Thus, democratic governance gives power to the different groups that are more or less involved in an entity so that they have a say in the decisions that inevitably appeal to them. All these voices, in turn, will exercise their power in the horizon of the common good .

In this sense, we will speak of democratic governance when: the group's objectives are considered first, cooperation is taken in the definition of objectives, the collective work plan is respected, everyone's knowledge is contributed, responsibilities are assumed concrete ones that derive from collective agreements, all points of view are considered, and meetings and gatherings are prepared in order to promote these attitudes.

In short, this governance framework is structured in co-decision and co-construction , a space where no voice is ignored, but no voice is imposed on the others. It is, as has already been pointed out, a principle that guarantees an improvement in the functioning of the entity , because when a voice manifests itself and feels that it contributes things, it becomes more involved in the organization, and here it is easy to walk towards an improvement of the results.

Democratic governance is made up of two stages or dimensions , participation and decision , which will be defined in detail in the following two sections.

'Participate' means to take part, actively manifesting . It is the basis of democratic governance, and the starting point for collective decision.

Participation, for it to be real and have the effect of walking towards democratic governance, must be complemented or built on two actions. First the information . People must be informed, know well the situation on which they have to decide. For this, it is necessary to provide them with the means .

The second primary action of participation is contribution , which is the means by which people participate. It will be necessary to define the form and channels of this contribution.

The act of deciding is the definitive step of democratic governance, the action of taking an active part in the agreements that define the entity and its functioning. It is an aspect that, in addition, has a character that walks towards transcendence , and is that although it begins in an individual expression of the voice, it is a wave that, through the influence in the team and, from it, in the service and the organization, it is inevitably projected outside the entity towards the community where the work is carried out or even beyond.

In fact, it is necessary to listen to the individual voices but considering them collectively with the natural groupings, which may have a relative weight that will vary according to the idiosyncrasies of the entity.

Each entity is a world, and the various forms of implementation of democratic governance will vary according to its different characteristics. However, in general, there are six steps that can serve as a template for this implementation.

The first step is conceptually constructive and enabling, and it is about aligning the organizational will towards democratic governance from the management team. Next, it will be necessary to create a transversal team with people from all groups or voices which, in turn, will have the role, in the third step, of analyzing where the entity is and the different voices that make it up in relation to with democratic governance. Similarly, in the fourth step, this same transversal team will have to define the weight that each voice will have and set a schedule for it to reach this point.

The fifth step is to plan the participation , defining a plan with the objectives of the voices and the actions to achieve them. This will also be done by the transversal team, but with the reinforcement of other members of the different voices involved. Once the plan is in place, the last step in implementing democratic governance is precisely to reinforce that plan , monitoring it and ensuring that all voices have the information they need at all times for equal participation. It can also be interesting to have the help of experts or to train a member of the team in democratic governance.

In order to deploy this framework, it will be necessary to introduce elements that will facilitate the implementation of the plan . They are organizational will, people's time management, easily accessible information, creativity in processes and the use of technology.