Hi Jeff,

I am genuinely not sure whether GNOME has this already but given that the
board has stated it is quite overstretched by the current workload on them.
I get the impression some tasks tend to be delegated more on a need to
know/do basis and that this may be contributing to a heavy workload on the
board but it is hard to be certain whether that is a fair assumption with
the information available about that. With that in mind though, if this
does seem like a constructive long term adjustment, I would like to ask the
board to consider discussing establishing democratically elected formal
roles so that those with specific interests can support the BoD carry out
their work more effectively and strengthen the infrastructure of GNOME:

(I suspect these roles may already exist but I am not sure whether they are
elected roles or not or who currently manages them)

Secretary
Treasurer

(Although I am aware that there are teams who focus on some of these areas
already, I am not sure if the following formal roles exist to manage those
teams, at this time:)

Publicity and Campaigns
Events and Socials
Research and Development
Diversity and Equality
Outreach and Engagement

There may be some important areas which I have not suggested a role for and
maybe some that are suggested are not quite right for GNOME's needs, so
please take the specific suggested roles with a pinch of salt: they are
just suggestions and ideas. The main point of consideration that I think
might be worth discussion in this instance, is whether some sort of sort
of appropriate structured, democratic, delegation might be in order
(regardless of whether GNOME seeks a new CEO soon, or not).

I can appreciate that in the short term, something like that may be an
added burden to organise (but for what it is worth, I would be willing to
help out with that). I suspect that formally establishing dedicated roles
in a democratic way, could attract community interest in filling them and
also that the inferred delegation in that, could significantly free up more
of the Board of Directors time and allow you all (and the future cohorts of
directors) to focus on the important work, which you find that you are
unable to delegate:

Those who were to be elected into roles, could also be in charge of
managing teams who are willing to support the work they are focused on. If
that were to work out, then they could have regular IRC meetings to discuss
relevant items in detail and come up with actionable solution which they
could then present to the board of directors, as appropriate. It may also
provide members of the community who are interested in contributing to a
particular area of GNOME's infrastructure to quickly access relevant
published communications about that area of interest, so they can more
easily figure out what is going on, what needs to be done, who is involved
and how they can get involved, etc. It may also serve to assist successors
of the future to figure out where to start more easily, in general.

Magdalen


On Thu, Jan 8, 2015 at 4:36 AM, Jeff Fortin Tam <nekoh...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello Foundation members!
>
> The board will be having its regular meeting this Friday at 17h UTC.
> Here is an overview of the agenda/topics for this meeting so far:
>
>   * Funding - quick status check on:
>       Ecosystem (re)mapping
>       Adboard outreach
>       Sysadmin sponsorship
>   * Sitrep on deal with WHS for funds in Europe
>   * Review action items for completeness and status
>   * ED search
>
> (Other topics may be brewing in the backlog but not included in the
> meeting agenda until they have reached the required threshold of
> information or discussion on the board list)
>
> If you would like the board to discuss any particular issues at the
> meeting, you are welcome to request additions to the agenda here.
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-list mailing list
> foundation-list@gnome.org
> https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
>
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