Hi all,
Sorry, my comment on diversity got cut off…what I meant to say is this:
P.S. Also please goodness let’s working on being more diverse. We’re an
international organization and we need a more international, gender-balanced
membership. This isn’t something that happens overnight and isn’t a problem
unique to HOT. But it is a fact that our volunteer and membership are
predominantly male and Western. It’s something to keep in mind as we grow and
try to attract new contributors and members. I would welcome input from any of
our contributors who’ve worked on such issues with other organizations
—
Sent from Mailbox
On Thu, Mar 12, 2015 at 1:18 PM, Robert Banick <rban...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
> In addition to the comments from Althio, Maning and others (which are
> excellent), I have a few things I’d like to see from HOT at this moment of
> transition:
> 1. Greater clarity on what support to local groups look like. I think
> everyone agrees that fostering local (HOT) OSM chapters around the world is a
> laudable goal. I’ve seen less details about what that means.
> Some of you are experts at building communities, some of you are active
> members of your local OSM communities and some of you are interested in
> getting started helping out. I put myself in the latter group, and speaking
> from that position, I would like to know exactly what kind of support local
> groups need and how exactly we think we can make that support happen. Lists!
> Explanations! Budgets! Basics we can build off of. I would hope that in a
> year’s time we could be on our way towards having a local community “toolkit”
> and some projects / support underway.
> 2. Recognition from the general membership that we can do multiple things at
> the same time. And that if a volunteer / member / board member / executive
> director doesn’t talk about one topic that much it may just reflect lesser
> familiarity, not a lack of approval. We all have our specialties that we
> focus on.
> I’m worried by how often our discussions imply that it’s My Priority vs. Your
> Priority. In English we call this “zero sum” thinking — the idea that one
> side winning means the other side losing. For HOT this is nonsense. We can
> all win. We will all win.
> If it feels like some parts of our mission are getting neglected then help us
> figure out what the bottlenecks are and how we can address them. If there’s
> not enough resources to address your priority, help us think how we can fix
> that.
> 3. Honest discussion about direct democracy. I know some of our members feel
> really strongly (here’s looking at you Severin) that we should operate on a
> more direct democracy model for our operations. I disagree but am open to
> being persuaded otherwise. I want to know exactly how that’s supposed to
> work, particularly when attendance at events is a problem.
> 4. Clear responsibilities for the membership. Right now membership is more of
> a recognition than a responsibility. I think we expect more from members but
> do too little to define what that more is. Until we do so I don’t think we’re
> prepared to really step beyond the traditional NGO mold — which we should aim
> to do.
> 6. Congratulate ourselves a little. Those who follow the main OSM listservs
> know that the broader OSM community has had a lot of turmoil in the past
> year. Big questions were posed about the effectiveness of the OSM Foundation
> and OSM’s direction. We should be proud that during those (intense)
> discussions HOT was repeatedly cited as a model of a functional international
> OSM group that gets things done and done well. We’re on to something really
> good here. Thanks to all of you for making that happen.
> Finally I want to strongly second the rotating board idea from Althio. That
> will introduce more constant discussion of HOT’s direction and prevent months
> of unproductive time being spent preparing for / adjusting from annual
> elections.
> Best,
> Robert
> P.S. Also please goodness let’s working on being more diverse. We’re an
> international organization and we need a more international, gender-balanced
> membership. This isn’t something that happens overnight but we need t
> —
> Sent from Mailbox
> On Wed, Mar 11, 2015 at 11:19 PM, althio <althio.fo...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Dear everyone,
>>>
>>> Let me kickstart this. First, no, I’m not running for the board, but
>>> here’s what I want HOT to aspire for in the future.
>> Good ones, Maning! Very inspiring.
>> Here is my brain dump of ideas, wishes, concerns and requests. No
>> priorities either. Not a complete assessment, just my point of view.
>> What I want from the Board:
>> A global overview of the running organisation.
>> A strategic view of the key positions and organisation bottlenecks.
>> A clear roadmap and to-do list of most-needed actions, most-wanted
>> features, most-blocking blockers. Directions. Priorities. Guidance.
>> Decision to allocate efforts and money where it helps the most. With
>> open decisions, always motivated; open debate whenever it is possible,
>> open budget. Transparent. Reports. Feedback.
>> What I want from the Board and/or Governance WG:
>> Board rotating, eg. 2 seats every 6 months, 2-year term.
>> For all processes including nomination and vote for board and
>> membership: clear requirements, extended periods, no rush. eg.
>> announcement, 1 month for nomination, 1 month for discussion, 1 month
>> for vote.
>> What I want from Projects and Working groups:
>> Project manager(s) collecting, organising ideas and proposing to-do
>> lists so that more contributors can help without having to figure out
>> the entire organisation or project structure and needs. More
>> documentation.
>> I would like to see more collaborative work done by online text pads,
>> more exchanges on WG email lists, more polls and decisions and reports
>> with collaborative online tools.
>> There is a wide diversity of languages, a range of language
>> proficiency, time zones, personal time availability, limited network
>> access...
>> What kind of diversity do we want in the Working Groups?
>> _______________________________________________
>> HOT mailing list
>> HOT@openstreetmap.org
>> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot
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