🚀 go-pugleaf

Clark:

Some belated responses to your thoughtful comments...

1. Since the board sought legal advice in handling the situation with the
national VP, I find it a reasonable assumption that the lawyer would have
told them if they were not on solid ground as to just and sufficient cause.

2. As a member of the certification council I have worked with a number of
the national board members over the past three years, and I have always
found them to be reasonable people. There certainly has been no conflict in
any of my meetings and dealings with them.

3. I agree that it is time for some introspection by CIPS. We are 40 years
old, and perhaps it's time to change the way we do some things. But I
believe strongly that the change needs to take place at the right level,
and in the way that it is most needed. Will changing a few by-laws at
national really solve what may be nothing more than a middle-aged malaise?
My personal feeling is that where CIPS is most in need of revitalizing is
at the section level, which national certainly cannot do... speaking as a
Toronto member, we have been following the "dinner meeting" model for all
of the 20 years that I've been in CIPS, and I go to fewer and fewer of them
because they are relatively expensive and no longer very interesting for
me. The IT field has become so broad that it's difficult to get speakers
who can appeal to a broad audience.

What's your experience as a Bluenose member, and as a visiting NB member?

Regards,

Bill Ross








Clark Morris <morrisc@nbnet.nb.ca> on 03/10/99 07:59:19 AM

Please respond to CIPS General Discussion List <CIPS-L@LISTSERV.UNB.CA>

To:   CIPS-L@LISTSERV.UNB.CA
cc:    (bcc: Bill Ross/CTAL/CTC)
Subject:  Comments on motion 1 of the SGM




In looking back over the past few months, I find myself asking why am I so
interested in the issues surrounding Steve Gallinger's removal from office.
I don't know him and though I liked his platform, I don't believe that I
remembered to vote in that election.  I do know Mike MacDonald and Doug
Swift from having attended CIPS Fredericton and respect both of them so the
issue was at least one worth further consideration.  I also have been long
interested
in politics and how institutions work so this too has played a part.  I
also
am not content with the status quo and have wondered each year whether I
should renew my membership since I have not found anything where I wanted
to
volunteer my time.  The major motivation that I have for pursuing this
issue
is that various precedents are being set and seemingly set in a manner that
gives little guidance to those who want to bring about change.
Everyone who is on the board represents at least one constituency which is
all or part of the electing body be it national or one of the regions.  If
the election is uncontested, it can be safely assumed that the agenda of
the
person was not opposed sufficiently to engender an opposing candidate.  If
the person was the winning candidate in an election where there were
distinct points of view expressed, those points of view and platform
promises can be said to be at least more acceptable to those who voted than
the views and platform of the opponent.  Thus the views brought by any
member of the board must be considered as having backing and resonance with
a broader constituency.  Further it is difficult with so few contested
elections and with the limited amount of campaigning allowed to determine
the prevalence of any given viewpoint within the constituencies.
On removal of a member of the board, there are two distinct views among the
membership.  One is that the board has a fair amount of leeway in determing
acceptable and unacceptable behaviour and that the individual members are
responsible basically to the board.  The other is that a member can be
removed only for serious behaviour detrimental to the society or flagrant
non-feasance of office.  In the latter view incompetance would not be a
just
and sufficient cause where in the former view it would.  I hold to the
latter view but would not want to stake any large amount of money on that
being the prevailing view within the general membership.
If I vote for motion one, i.e. to re-instate Mr. Gallinger it will be
because of the following:
1.  Descriptions of each of the acts with date, time and context,  that
constitute the justification for the charges have not been provided.  Thus
I
have no basis for either determining the validity of the charges or
questioning Mr. Gallinger for his side of the story.
2.  To my knowledge, the board made no attempt to forstall the SGM by
offering to agree to an independent review either as outlined by motion 2
which was discussed on cips-l for over a month before the call became
official or as could be negotiated by the principal parties on both side of
the issue and
to hold off on any specific further action until the review was completed.
As one of the signatories, I know that my transmission to the president
indicated an openness to change if it could be agreed to by the other
parties involved.  This was sent on December 17 and other than the
acknowledgment of receiving the message and the forwarding to the national
office, I have heard nothing since other than what we see on the various
lists.  Since the board had the right to set the date and time of the
meeting, they could have set instituted the review committee as set forth
in
motion two, postponed filling the vacancy, and scheduled the SGM for two
weeks after the report was made available to the membership.  While I can't
speak for my fellow signatories, that would have been acceptable to me and
won my hearfelt approval.
3.  The acceptance of the removal without clear statement of actions
involved where we can look at the documents or question people about the
events causing the removal leaves people who may wish to run for board
office in opposition to current policy in a vulnerable place if they obtain
the office.  I do not wish to set that precedent.
4.  I will not consider the statements that various officers plan to resign
as final.  If they choose to quit because a majority disagrees with them on
one issue and lose their ability to shape ongoing events, it is a shame
that
things have escalated to this extent.  Many statements are made in the heat
of a dispute that we later regret.  I can not claim that I look back on all
of my actions in disputes in the various organizations as having been the
best but hope I have learned from that.
5.  It may be the little things that have tipped the balance.  The SGM web
page can't be reached from the main web page.  The board 's unwillingness
to
allow a member in good standing to post a request for a meeting and not
providing a safeguarded mechanism (i.e. concurring requests from twenty
members in good standing from at least 3 different chapters, etc.) if they
feel that allowing on the petition of single member is too open to abuse.
If sgm-l is a cips enabled discussion group, there was no notice of it on
the SGM-L web page as of Tuesday, March 9 and no posting to either cips-l
or cips-ann.
If I vote against the first motion, it will be because the board and/or
others provide enough evidence that it would be against the best interests
of the organization to do so because of stated specific actions by Mr.
Gallinger.
In closing, this series of events definitely warrants a review that is not
controlled by partisans of either side.  Further it calls for careful and
considered review of our governing documents.  Since the executive is the
governing body on with the board offering sporadic oversight at most, is it
appropriate for the president to be able to appoint the directors of his
choice thus guaranteeing that he/she has a majority of the executive?  Also
with the executive being the normative governing body and the policy
shaping
organ, I believe that the agenda for the various meetings should be posted
in advance.  We also have to explore which good practices of a board as
mentioned elsewhere are applicable to an organization such as ours where
the
staff is in a support role to the volunteers and is not the company and
hopefully is not the major doer of most things.  We also need to explore
the
extent of control that the board should have over committees and SIG's and
if there should be some constraints on that control and ability to create
and disband.  Just getting the right questions to enable intelligent and
fruitful exploration of the issues and avoiding creating worse problems
than
we already have will be difficult.  The benefit to all of this review is
the
enabling of people to work in a knowable framework and for change to be
openly discussable.  Both the review committee that I hope will come out of
the SGM and the constitutional review committee have major tasks in front
of
them.  I can see the latter committee needing up to a year to really do the
job right.  Some changes may be straight forward enough to be ready by the
annual general meeting and not preclude more comprehensive change later but
I believe much work is needed on obtaining a view of who we want to be and
how we should relate to our institutioms.
Clark Morris, Member of CIPS Bluenose on assignment in New Brunswick
                      morrisc@nbnet.nb.ca