An organization begins with an idea. Begin with the aim in mind. The founders imagine a product they could make or a service they could deliver. That is the aim. And why would we make or deliver that? Answer and you have your mission, for example to end homelessness by building houses for and with the homeless in this region of this country. (See more on mission and aims in section Section 2.2, “Empowering the circle: aims, domains and members” on page Section 2.2, “Empowering the circle: aims, domains and members” @@TODO@@: Figure out page references..) To (mission) by (aim). The mission plus aim is the invitation. You can now call for people to join you as volunteers or as paid staff. They know what they would be doing and why. Next, make your aims ever more specific. One product or service or many. Who are the customers? Design the input – transformation – output workflow doing picture forming and proposal shaping. To get to the desired output, what resources (people, skills, raw materials, tools, funding, etc.) will you need? How will you organize the work? What roles and subcircles do you need? Who will fill them?

The first circle will have as input the aim and domain of the circle, its members, and its resources. In order to function well, we need to define process and operational roles and fill them. Not all of those steps have to be completed in the first meeting, but over time, each needs to be addressed. For securing the input, make sure everyone understands the aim and domain. Consent (or object and resolve) to the initial circle members. Consent to the leader who was appointed by the parent circle or if no formal leader exists, select one. Select people into the roles of facilitator, secretary and delegate. That completes the basic sociocratic structure of the circle. Then it is time to operationalize the aim of the circle: define the workflow that will get the work done, set policies that will give both freedom and limits to how the work gets done, and define and fill operational roles. The output should be a circle that is ready to start.