[Members] Re: Member/Board Interactivity

[Matthew Rubenstein]

	One response (from B Massey) to this member/board interactivity
question included making board committees to target specific areas of
concern, and subcommittees to solve specific problems in those areas.
That might be too exclusive a hierarchy, or it might be structured
enough to actually finish tasks of solving problems - the reason that
structure is so popular in governance. But it does present a system for
plugging the membership into the board, integrating decisions with both
issues and execution. Maybe just a set of committees, each started as an
issue is decided important enough by the board, with mixed board/member
membership.

	Would you set up a sub/committee system with mixed board/member
membership, or an alternative? Or would you have the board do a
different planning process to decide how to structure for this
interaction?


On Tue, 2006-10-24 at 13:25 +0200, Egbert Eich wrote:
> Now this is the complete answer.
> 
> Matthew Rubenstein writes:
>  > 	These issues indicate a broader process problem limiting the current
>  > Foundation operations. X.org has members, a board/chief, sponsors, and a
>  > budget. None of them are being used to their maximum capacity (or near
>  > it). The solution of course is the board planning more Foundation
>  > activities for members (and associates), then spending budget on those
>  > activities. Which in turn will help the Foundation raise even more
>  > money, on the strength of productive activities rather than the
>  > potential of the organization.
> 
> The Board would not be able to plan those activeties nor should it.
> The Board should encourage people from within the community to take
> charge and organize events while the Board is offering support.
> This can be financial support but it may also act as a door opener
> or a contact establisher.
> 
> In the past the argument for attending industry events was to 
> be able meet decision makers there to increase our sponsorship.
> While I'm still in doubt that it is likely to be able to talk
> to these decision makers without prior appointment I always felt
> that spending sponsored money to get more money is an end in
> itself.
> Instead we should identify worthwhile opportunities to spend
> money find out how much funs we need and determine from there
> how much more we need.
> Without that I feel it is very hard to convince exisiting or
> prospective sponsors to fund us.
> 
> But let me say: I'd be alarmed by the notion that spending 
> money will solve the problems of this organization.
> Free and oepn source projects live from the activeties of
> its contributors. 
> The funds should aid those contributors, provide basic things
> like decend hosting equipment, purchase documentation (anyone
> still need some VESA specs?) etc. With more funds we can organize 
> events which will allow our contributors to cooperate better 
> and do outreach to other projects and events ourside of X.Org.
> 
> But volunteers are something money can't buy - that's where
> the focus of this organization should be. If there is money
> available you quickly have consumers for it lurking trying
> to sell services we don't need.
> 
>  > 
>  > 	This election will pick a new leader of the foundation. Practically
>  > everyone involved is "part-time", with even secondary responsibilities
>  > in other work, so delegating "production" work to members, coordinated
>  > and led by the board and its leader, is the only way to manage the
>  > community. As the new leader, how will you get the community to
>  > contribute proposals for which activities the board should decide to
>  > spend money on? A better cycle of member proposals and board decisions
>  > will not only better use the time and money budgeted. It will also
>  > invigorate the membership, and attract new/better members.
> 
> Matthew, there may be a misconception. There is no 'leader' of 
> the Board. There is the postion of the secretary who is assigned 
> the duty for the responsibility over the records of the 
> organization.
> But to answer your question in a somewhat different context: 
> what should the Board do to get the community to contribute 
> proposals?
> 
> * Improve communication: The board was unapporachable for a long time,
>   the Members mailing list was unavailable. This has changed now and
>   we should make continued use of the available channels - beyond this
>   preelection discussion.
> 
> * The Board should not be afraid to ask for help: The current Board
>   tried to organize and handle a lot of things itself. Sometimes
>   it looked like an event planning workgroup, sometimes it discussed
>   how to design logos and banners.
>   The community could help on most of these things. Maybe we should
>   establish working groups which people with interest to help can
>   join and offer their help.
>   Again note that this lives from the support of volunteer contributors. 
>   The Board cannot mandate or force these Working Groups. It can make
>   sure they exist and that people who would like to help are able to
>   do that.
>   But it is importand to encourage the people to take on responsibility
>   and not wait for the Board to endorse everything or for the Board to 
>   move and throw money at a problem.
> 
> * Budget + Spending Policy
>   If we are to spend money we should set up a budget.
>   We got this for this year - doing this wasn't easy as there
>   was very little to go by. Looking back at it there are certainly
>   a lot of things I would do differently today - but this is
>   a learning experience.
>   We already have some ideas: we know a number of events which 
>   are worthwhile sponsoring and larger events which require
>   a lot of funding should be known well in advance.
> 
>   The budget gives us a pretty good idea how much money we need
>   to earmark specifically and how much we have to 'play' (ie 
>   explore opportunities to spend it on).
> 
>   Once we have a better knowledge how much we want to spend on 
>   activeties we already know about we can better estimate on what 
>   to do with the rest.
>   With this budget we should solicite the members (not only the 
>   Members because a lot of contributors don't bother to become 
>   Members) for additional ideas.
> 
>  > 
>  > 	Do you agree? How would you lead the board to get this show on the
>  > road?
>  > 
> 
> There are two things the Board should do:
> 1. It should advertise that funds are available.
> 2. Solicite the community about ideas.
> 
> However such ideas and initiatives *must* come from our 
> community. The Board should not predetermine any direction 
> as this will create the feeling that decisions have already 
> been made and input is not appreciated.
> 
> However there is an important consequence: not the Board
> makes the decision if a certain activety is worthwhile,
> the community does. In a sense the Board should be tasteless
> here and take a passive role. Instead it would:
> 1. Make sure a consensus is reached.
> 2. Determine if funds are available.
> 3. The spending is justified according to spending policies
>    By-Laws, laws and regulations.
> 4. Make sure all agreed on procedures are followed and all
>    dues are paid as agreed.
> This doesn't mean that Board Members should not come up with
> ideas of their own: they should however do so as contributors
> - not as Board Members.
> 
> Cheers,
> 	Egbert.
-- 

(C) Matthew Rubenstein