Updated: Feb 20th, 2024, Owner/contact: @Susanna Laanikari, Role: Organisational development

<aside> <img src="/icons/apple_gray.svg" alt="/icons/apple_gray.svg" width="40px" /> We are a self-governed expert network with a strong purpose and cultural and operational backbone that allows us to always assemble the best combination of experts to deliver the work.

</aside>

Sonder is a self-governed network of independent designers and design-minded professionals. As such, Sonder does not have any employed staff but provides the financial and operational structure for project teams to collaborate on impact work. This means that Sonder is not an employer.

With this self-governed, co-operative structure, Sonder can keep operational costs low and contract team members based on the specific needs of each project.

This way of working leads to several benefits:

• Sonder can always put the best combination of people with specialised expertise (rather than who is available) on a project, pulling from a wide network of professionals.
• Sonder can expand or contract in size depending on project needs and does not need to factor in the financial burden of keeping full-time staff on payroll.
• Without an office and with a lean organisational structure, Sonder keeps operational costs to a minimum.

What does this look like in practice:

• Project team of freelancers
• **Day rate-**based contracts
• Sonder takes typically up to 15% on top of personnel costs from projects to manage operations and evolve as a collective
• The budget can be reassigned to make the project more impactful