[Board] President and President-elect

[Jeff McKenna]

Hi Arnulf,

Thanks for bringing this up again.

I just went back and read my response to this idea, written back in
March
(http://osgeo-org.1560.x6.nabble.com/President-elect-and-limiting-terms-td5042497.html).
 Ever read your own words and think: "wow, I said that well"? ha.

I totally agree with my own words back in March.  Here is a summary
and some additions, as I grow into this role:

- I enjoy the position (maybe this is the most important point in my
email)

- There is more work to do than most know, in the OSGeo President
role.  Almost every day a direct email comes with a request or a need
to talk.

- I agree that having a President-Elect, to take over the current
president's term, is needed

- Having a current President, a President-Elect, and a Past President
would create an Executive Board, which may be used for important
decisions.  And also the Executive plus the Treasurer would be the
only ones with signing privileges for the Foundation (this still needs
to be resolved)

- I strongly suggest having a two year term in the President role (one
year is not even close to long enough to apply your vision)

- in my case, I came into the position in December.  I request that I
be given a full 2 year term, starting after this Board election.

I am proud and committed to represent the OSGeo community.

-jeff




On 2013-08-31 6:16 AM, Seven (aka Arnulf) wrote:
> Board, picking up an idea we tossed around for two consecutive
> years but never got around to actually implementing. In my opinion
> the OSGeo president  is not a power position (like the US
> president) but a more formal role. The most contentious thing the
> president of OSGeo will ever do is adjudicate in cases of ties. And
> represent OSGeo. This means that we will probably never see retail
> politics with election campaigns and people overly attaching to the
> role. Hopefully.
> 
> Another aspect is that it is hard stop being president when it is
> an indefinitely termed position. It will always make the impression
> of "stepping down" for some unknown reason. I actually know from
> own experience. It will always leave some room for speculation and
> gossip which is never good for an organization that lives off its
> kudos, transparency and authenticity.
> 
> Therefore I suggest that we limit the term for presidents to two 
> years, the first of which is as president-elect. It is a common
> model to elect the upcoming president a year before their term so
> that there is no void at the end of the current president's term.
> It would also fit in with our staggered board elections - given
> that someone from the "new" half of the board volunteers for the
> role of president-elect. It should probably be possible to run
> again for presidency after a full term has ended but then first
> starting in the president-elect role again. I don't think that 4
> years in a row as I did are that good an idea. Plus it burnt me out
> quite a bit.
> 
> Things obviously go wrong all the time: a director leaves the
> board early, president has to / wants to step down in mid-term, we
> have an interim director with only one year, none of the new
> directors wants to become president-elect right away, etc. So the
> president-elect role is no silver bullet and will not fix
> everything but it might help to stabilize things a bit and take
> away some pressure and expectations from that role.
> 
> Best regards, Arnulf
> 
> PS: There are more issues around elections and governance in
> general which I hope to address with a small sub committee or some
> such in October. Some of these changes (bylaws) will require a
> charter member vote which is a big thing we never before had to
> do.
> 
> I brought this one up now because we might want to have it sorted
> out for the next presidential term which starts after board
> elections are done. And I think the board should be OK to decide
> this on its own because it does not remove a key position but just
> changes some modalities around it.
> 
> _