Why Contribute to Steward?

Introduction

Project Steward is more than just a tool—it’s a movement to empower workers, enhance workplace transparency, and build networks of collective strength. By contributing to Steward, you’re helping shape a platform that gives workers the ability to self-organize, visualize their power, and advocate for fair treatment.

Whether you're a developer, designer, worker, or advocate, your contributions help build a system that puts power back in the hands of workers.

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Reasons to Contribute

1. Empower Workers Through Technology

Steward provides visualization tools that help workers see their networks, grievances, and workplace dynamics in real time. Your contributions help refine these tools and make them more intuitive, accessible, and effective.

2. Reinvigor Workplace Organizing

Traditional organizing methods rely on word-of-mouth, meetings, and paperwork. Steward introduces network mapping, digital grievance handling, and collective bargaining support—making organizing smarter and more efficient.

3. Support Unofficial Authority Structures

In every workplace, unofficial leaders emerge—workers who have the trust and respect of their peers. Steward helps give these figures the tools they need to coordinate action, raise concerns, and negotiate with management from a position of strength.

4. Leverage Networks for Collective Power

Workers often don’t realize how much power exists in their network. Steward helps visualize workplace structures so that workers can identify allies, influencers, and leverage points—turning informal connections into actionable strategies.

5. Make Grievance Handling More Effective

One of the biggest challenges in workplace advocacy is that grievances go undocumented or get ignored. Steward provides a structured grievance-handling system, making it easier for workers to log issues, escalate concerns, and organize responses.

6. Encourage Self-Organization

Steward isn’t just about grievances—it’s about building long-term worker solidarity. By contributing to this project, you’re helping create a system that encourages self-organization, where workers don’t have to wait for permission to advocate for themselves.

7. Promote Open-Source Ethics

Steward is an open-source project, meaning anyone can contribute, improve, and expand its functionality. By joining the Steward community, you’re helping build a transparent, worker-first platform that belongs to everyone—not corporations, unions, or any single entity.

8. Expose and Counter Predatory Power Imbalances

Many large corporations—like Walmart, McDonald’s, and Amazon—operate with massive power imbalances that leave workers trapped in cycles of low wages, poor working conditions, and lack of agency. Steward provides visibility into these power structures, helping workers identify patterns of exploitation and organize against them.

9. Support Workers Stuck in Bad Jobs with Few Options

Millions of workers in low-wage, high-turnover industries find themselves stuck between bad jobs with limited mobility, under poor management, and facing exploitative scheduling practices. Steward offers a way for these workers to document mistreatment, find collective strength, and push for better conditions.

10. Address the Downsides of Corporate Competition & Data Mismanagement

Corporations prioritize efficiency, automation, and cost-cutting, often at the expense of their workers. Steward gives workers the tools to push back against exploitative policies driven by algorithmic scheduling, aggressive performance metrics, and data mismanagement.

11. Remind Corporations of Their Original Purpose

Corporations were once institutions that served a multitude of stakeholders—workers, communities, and the public good. Over the past 40 years, they have shifted towards a shareholder-driven economy, prioritizing short-term profits over long-term investment in workers and society. Steward aims to remind corporate institutions of their broader responsibility by giving workers a voice and a platform to push back against extractive corporate practices.