[Board] Activity Update...

[Dave McIlhagga]

Tyler,

Sorry for the delay getting back to you about the fundraising issue.

Clearly -- fundraising is and must remain a top priority for our  
organization until we can feel confidence in terms of our ongoing  
ability to sustain the organization.

I think the biggest hurdle that we face is that no volunteer will be  
able to commit the core time required to maintain the drive forward  
that is a necessity for fundraising. I for one am more than happy to  
wear my board hat and make the pitch ... but I can't begin to commit  
the time that is required to produce the information and organize the  
"campaign" that we need to go with it.

For this reason -- I'd like to suggest Tyler that you play a strong  
leadership role in FunCom including chairing the committee. It should  
probably consume about 25% of your time until we are financially  
stable as an organization.  It's the one committee we really can't  
afford to leave to the vagaries of community contribution - the risk  
is too high for the organization.

There remains a lot of work to do to be successful in this area --  
the sooner we can get moving the better.

Dave



On 27-Jun-07, at 10:55 AM, Frank Warmerdam wrote:

> Tyler Mitchell (OSGeo) wrote:
>> Hello - I started to write an email update, but ended up pushing  
>> it out as a series of blog posts, so more people will see it.
>> Please see the last 3 postings at:
>> http://www.osgeo.org/tyler/
>
> Tyler,
>
> Thanks for the updates in your blog, they are great.  We really need
> some way of making these more evident. Perhaps a box on the main page
> with links to recent blog entries on osgeo.org?
>
>> There are a few items in there that are worth discussing over the  
>> next couple weeks - I'd love to hear your opinion, especially on  
>> the fundraising items.
>
> I was a bit surprised by "We've never had any real commitment to
> revenue targets - how many donors, how much from grants, who is
> responsible for doing it all,"
>
> We do have revenue targets, theoretical numbers of each class of  
> donor,
> and how much from grants.  It is also the responsibility of the  
> Fundraising
> Committee to pursue this task.  I'm not sure what you mean by a "real
> commitment".
>
> What we lack is people interested in actually raising funds.  I ran  
> out
> of steam as Fundraising Chair last year and tried to resign but with
> little success in getting a replacement.  Since getting the  
> sponsorship
> program passed I have done essentially nothing committee-wise though
> I have pursued GDAL project sponsorships (also promoting the option of
> OSGeo general sponsorships).
>
> Clearly we either need to get some people interested in doing  
> fundraising
> or we need to radically revise our expected income potential.
>
> PS. If we were to roll-up FunCom back into the board, how would
> non-board members get involved?
>
> Best regards,
> -- 
> --------------------------------------- 
> +--------------------------------------
> I set the clouds in motion - turn up   | Frank Warmerdam,  
> warmerdam at pobox.com
> light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/~warmerdam
> and watch the world go round - Rush    | President OSGeo, http:// 
> osgeo.org
>
> _______________________________________________
> Board mailing list
> Board at lists.osgeo.org
> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board