§Organizations owned by the people in them
Do the work. Own what you build.
On Poa, the work you finish earns you real ownership. A share of the money when your organization distributes revenue, and a real say in the decisions. It is earned, never bought.
Ownership cannot be bought, sold, or given away. It is issued only when the work is approved.
- 3
- profit shares distributed
- 100%
- claimed by the members who earned it
- $0
- held by Poa
02The problem
From a group chat to an organization
The group is real. The tools were never built for it. The work starts, trust and good will carry it, and then the group gets big enough that trust alone stops holding it together.
- 01
The work goes untracked
Effort lives in threads and someone’s memory. No one can point to who did what, so the record is whatever people remember.
- 02
The splits stay unspoken
Money comes in and goes out through a personal account. Who is owed what is a conversation everyone keeps putting off.
- 03
The loudest voice decides
Choices get made by whoever is most insistent in the moment, not by the people who carry the work.
The group held together, and the people doing the most owned nothing.
03The work
The work you do earns you a share
Post the work, claim it, review it, pay it. When your work is approved you earn ownership in the organization, recorded in the open on a board the whole group can see.
- 01
Ownership is earned, not bought
Ownership is earned when your work is approved. It cannot be bought, sold, or given away.
- 02
Tasks pay in dollars and build your ownership
A task can carry a payout in dollars and a share of ownership. The group decides what each piece of work is worth.
- 03
The right people take the right work
Roles can gate who claims and approves a task, so the work goes to the members set up to do it.
04The say
A real say in the decisions
Your group sets how it decides: one person one vote, votes weighted by contribution, or a blend of the two. You pick the rules, and you can change them by vote.
Choose how you decide
One person one vote, votes weighted by contribution, or a blend. The choice is the group’s, and it is written into the rules.
Every decision is on the record
Every decision is recorded with its reasoning, permanently and publicly. Anyone can read how a choice was made.
The rules can change, by vote
The group can change its own rules by vote. Nothing about how you govern is fixed by Poa.
Voting power is earned by participating, not bought.
05The money
When the money is shared, your share matches your work
The treasury is in the open and can be spent only by the rules the group set. When the organization distributes revenue, your share matches the ownership you earned.
A treasury spent only by the rules
The books are open to every member, and major spending requires a vote. Money moves the way the group agreed it would.
Revenue split by earned share
When the organization distributes revenue, it is split in proportion to the ownership each member earned.
Check your own share
You can check your share yourself, without trusting anyone’s spreadsheet, and cash out to Cash App, Venmo, Revolut, or your bank.
- distributed
- 3 profit shares
- claimed
- 100%
- held by Poa
- 0
The money is held by the organization itself, not by Poa. Poa never holds it, and never takes a cut.
06The people
Roles with their powers written down
Every role has its powers written down: who can approve work, set budgets, or run a vote. Nothing is left to whoever happens to have the keys.
- 01
Powers are written, not assumed
Each role spells out exactly what it can do. When officers change, the powers stay put and the organization keeps its shape.
- 02
Join in seconds
A member vouches for you, or you take an open role, and you are in. An account is a username and a passkey.
Built for
- Student organizationstemplate: student organization
- Community spacestemplate: community organization
- Creative collectivestemplate: creative collective
- Open-source projectstemplate: open-source project
- Worker owned businessestemplate: worker cooperative
07The record
Every organization on Poa is public: its rules, its decisions, its books.
Read the books for yourself→08The reason
The people who do the work own the most
There are no outside shares. Ownership belongs to the people in the organization, and it is earned, not bought. What you earn stays yours, and no one can take it from you, including us.
Most software is rented. Poa is owned: your group holds the rules, the money, and the record, and can take them anywhere.
Poa itself runs as an organization on Poa. Our books are public too.
09Start
Start in three steps
- 01
Choose the rules
Pick a template and set how your group decides, pays, and shares. You can change any of it later by vote.
- 02
Bring the people
Vouch in the first members and hand out roles. Each one carries the powers you wrote for it.
- 03
Run it in the open
Post work, run votes, share the money. Everything is on the record, and the books are open to every member.
An account is a username and a passkey. Poa charges nothing.