Today I opened space for people to talk about Mobile Organising for the Open University Business School as part of the 11th International Critical Management Studies Conference. Which all sounds very posh, but really was just some really interesting and down to earth people talking about how workers can organise effectively in the early 21st Century. We had a mix of academics and activists including people with experience of organising a union in the gig economy for Deliveroo drivers and other couriers and one of the leaders of a campaign for Fair Pay and Fair Tips at TGI Fridays.
We talked a lot about technology and the ways in which it's used to control us as employees and consumers when it was supposed to set us free. I think in a bigger group there would have been appetite for a session about the freedom-friendly aspects of the blockchain.
It was only half a day (this way of organising our time is dangerously radical and revolutionary stuff for many academics!) but it confirmed my view that you need one or two days for really good conversation and bonds to happen. By the time we'd finished we were just getting to know each other well enough to talk properly! And we quickly got out of the stuffy room to make the most of the green spaces in the lovely Open University campus.